The Challenge: Can you solve the mystery of a 56-year-old woman who goes for a routine eye exam but ends up with a diagnosis of a disease she had never heard of and never suspected?Every month, the Diagnosis column of The New York Times Magazine asks Well readers to sift through a difficult case and solve a diagnostic riddle. Usually I provide all kinds of detailed lab reports and images from the patient’s medical chart. But not this time.Solve a medical mystery with Dr. Lisa Sanders.Today, I’m presenting a case in which the diagnosis was made based on very little information. I’ll share everything that the doctor involved had to work with, but I warn you, it’s a tough one. As usual, the first reader ... Continue reading →

Getty Images Family | By KATE MURPHY | April 16, 2012, 6:15 pm Researchers say that many children who are found to have an attention disorder may in fact have a different problem: a sleep disorder, like apnea. Read more… Noel Celis/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Babies that were comforted during vaccinations showed the lowest pain scores in a recent study. Family | By ANAHAD O'CONNOR | April 16, 2012, 5:11 pm Parents can lessen the sting of an injection by soothing their babies with a quick series of comforting measures, including a popular technique called swaddling. Read more… Getty Images Despite a rising population of teenagers, the number of babies born to them has fallen sharply. Family | By NICHOLAS BAKALAR | April 16, ... Continue reading →

Angela Cappetta/Getty ImagesIn a survey, women tended to be less positive than men were about their hospital experiences.Early on in my residency, a fellow surgeon-in-training revealed that she was switching fields. Her real love was not general surgery, she explained, but urology.As she recounted the steps leading to her decision to focus on diseases of the urinary tract, I couldn’t help wondering about her future practice. She might see an occasional woman or child; but most of her patients would be men.I shared these thoughts with her, and she laughed. “Male patients have different expectations than female patients,” she said. “Somehow, I think I’m a better fit as a doctor for men.”It wasn’t the first time a colleague had made a sweeping generalization about patient ... Continue reading →

April 12, 2012, 8:50 amWhen the Chef Is Also a Doctor By TARA PARKER-POPE, EditorJim Wilson/The New York TimesDr. David M. Eisenberg tosses snow peas in a wok.Doctors often tell their patients to eat healthful, nutritious food. But what do they really know about eating well?Not enough, says Dr. David M. Eisenberg, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and the Harvard School of Public Health, and founder of a cooking conference for doctors and other health care workers in the business of dispensing nutrition advice. As Patricia Leigh Brown reports in The Times’s Dining section:“This isn’t neurosurgery,” Dr. Eisenberg said as he whacked a garlic clove with the cleaver. “This is hearty, affordable, cravenly delicious food.”The son of a Brooklyn baker, Dr. Eisenberg is ... Continue reading →

Ashley WooSuleika Jaouad is undergoing a bone marrow transplant for leukemia.Today, I’m writing from a hospital bed in New York City. I’m in the bone marrow transplant unit, where this week I’ve undergone 20 intensive chemotherapy treatments in anticipation of receiving my brother’s stem cells. In the year since my diagnosis with leukemia, I’ve struggled to hold onto a sense of who I am while I watch the person in the mirror change.Patient JournalSuleika Jaouad writes about facing cancer in your 20s.Looking back, I call the first month after my diagnosis “the cancer bubble” because I wasn’t showing obvious signs of my disease. I looked about the same — maybe a little more tired and pale than usual, but a stranger could never have guessed ... Continue reading →

Ashley WooSuleika Jaouad is undergoing a bone marrow transplant for leukemia.Today, I’m writing from a hospital bed in New York City. I’m in the bone marrow transplant unit, where this week I’ve undergone 20 intensive chemotherapy treatments in anticipation of receiving my brother’s stem cells. In the year since my diagnosis with leukemia, I’ve struggled to hold onto a sense of who I am while I watch the person in the mirror change.Patient JournalSuleika Jaouad writes about facing cancer in your 20s.Looking back, I call the first month after my diagnosis “the cancer bubble” because I wasn’t showing obvious signs of my disease. I looked about the same — maybe a little more tired and pale than usual, but a stranger could never have guessed ... Continue reading →

Marcus Yam for The New York TimesResearch links eating fish to lower rates of heart disease. Do fish oil pills have the same effect?People who put their faith in fish oil supplements may want to reconsider. A new analysis of the evidence casts doubt on the widely touted notion that the pills can prevent heart attacks in people at risk for cardiovascular disease.Fish oil supplements have become some of the most popular dietary pills on the market, largely on the strength of medical research linking diets high in baked and broiled fish to lower rates of heart disease. Across the United States, annual sales of purified fish oil, commonly sold as omega-3 fatty acids, are in the neighborhood of a billion dollars. And in some ... Continue reading →