Philadelphia (CNN) — Beth Rutstein rolls up the sleeves of her T-shirt, juggles a stack of fliers and knocks on the door of a stranger’s home. She’s on a mission to save lives.After wiping sweat from her face beneath the sweltering afternoon sun on a recent Thursday, she ascends another set of stair

Breast cancer screening saves the lives of two women for every one patient who receives unnecessary treatment, according to a major European review.There has been a fierce debate about the use of screening, and policy is being reviewed in England.The latest study, published in the Journal of Medical

(Reuters Health) – People in developing countries with heart problems may not be able to afford new pacemakers, but a new study suggests devices removed during autopsies may have enough remaining battery life to be donated and used again.Researchers found that of 334 autopsies preformed at the Unive

People with highly stressful jobs but little real control over decision making are running a 23% increased risk of a heart attack, according to authoritative research.Many people in today’s world, where the pace of life is fast and money is tight, may consider themselves stressed at work, but the de

(Reuters) – Britain launched a public consultation on Monday to ask whether controversial “three-parent” fertility treatments should be available to families hoping to avoid passing on incurable diseases.The potential treatments, currently only at research stage in laboratories in Britain and the Un

STOCKHOLM — Andemariam Beyene sat by the hospital window, the low Arctic sun on his face, and talked about the time he thought he would die.Two and a half years ago doctors in Iceland, where Mr. Beyene was studying to be an engineer, discovered a golf-ball-size tumor growing into his windpipe. Despi

(Reuters) – Alabama, one of two U.S. states that segregate inmates with HIV from the rest of their prison population, will seek to defend the policy against a class action lawsuit headed to trial in federal court on Monday.The American Civil Liberties Union sued Alabama in 2011 for what the group co

The number of complaints made to the General Medical Council about doctors has risen 23% in the past year, the regulator says.The GMC report showed there were 8,781 in 2011 compared to 7,153 in 2010.The rise is similar to the one the year before and continues a trend which has seen complaints jump b

(Reuters Health) – The short-term benefits of weight loss surgery are well known in severely obese people, but a new study finds that improvements in diabetes and blood pressure may hold up for years after the procedures.At six-year patient follow-ups, three quarters of people who’d undergone gastri

Up to a million people in the UK have “completely preventable” severe headaches caused by taking too many painkillers, doctors have said.They said some were trapped in a “vicious cycle” of taking pain relief, which then caused even more headaches.The warning came as part of the National Institute fo