Most Emailed Health News

LONDON (Reuters) - A molecule found in a curry ingredient can kill esophageal cancer cells in the laboratory, suggesting it might be developed as an anti-cancer treatment, scientists said on Wednesday.

TUESDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- Women who get migraine headaches with aura should stop smoking and using birth control pills because they may increase their risk of stroke, researchers say.

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 28 (HealthDay News) -- Letting children sleep late on weekends and holidays might help them avoid becoming overweight or obese, a new study suggests.

A new treatment for swine flu may already be on pharmacy shelves — cholesterol-lowering statin drugs like Lipitor and Zocor.

ATLANTA - Sleepless in Seattle? Hardly. West Virginia is where people are really staying awake, according to the first government study to monitor state-by-state differences in sleeplessness.

WASHINGTON - Vaccinating more children might help slow the evolution of the constantly changing flu virus, government scientists reported Thursday.

WASHINGTON - Call it a genetic patch job for worn lungs: Canadian researchers took donated lungs deemed too damaged to transplant and repaired them with outside-the-body gene therapy.

ATLANTA - As many as 5.7 million Americans were infected with swine flu during the first few months of the pandemic, according to estimates from federal health officials.

BASEL, Switzerland - Swiss drugmaker Novartis AG said Thursday it is on track to meet its U.S. government order for swine flu vaccine, seeking to calm fears in recent weeks that shipments and vaccination programs may be delayed.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - These are heady days for the medical tourism industry. With U.S. healthcare prices spiraling upward, more and more insurers and individuals are looking abroad for treatment. By some estimates, 650,000 Americans will check into foreign hospitals from Mexico to Thailand this year.

THURSDAY, Oct. 29 (HealthDay News) -- Want to improve that osteoarthritis in your knee? New research suggests that regular Tai Chi exercise can reduce pain and help your knee function better.

CHICAGO - The number of students staying home sick with the flu is multiplying nationwide and normally quiet school nurses' offices suddenly look like big city emergency rooms, packed with students too ill to finish the day.

SYDNEY (AFP) - An apple a day may keep the doctor away but a fibre-filled diet could also hold the key to keeping asthma, diabetes and arthritis at bay, according to Australian research.

TUESDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- More than 65 percent of U.S. mothers with depression don't receive adequate treatment, a new study has found.

MOSCOW - AIDS experts urged Russian officials on Wednesday to scrap their abstinence-based strategy for curbing the spread of HIV, saying the country's fast-growing epidemic could be entering a dangerous new phase.

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 28 (HealthDay News) -- Diet and exercise can keep diabetes at bay for a decade, cutting the risk for the disease by more than a third in the most susceptible people, a new study finds.

TUESDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- New research suggests that alcohol may boost the progression of cancer by stimulating a pathway inside cells.

CHICAGO (Reuters) - People on the brink of developing diabetes who get a lot of support and encouragement to diet and exercise can turn things around and avoid the disease, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 28 (HealthDay News) -- Transcendental meditation reduces stress and improves the emotional and mental well-being of breast cancer patients, new study findings suggest.

Have you seen your assistant surgeon? In too many cases these days, the second surgeon in the operating room is missing, due to lack of payment

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Men with larger foreskins are more likely to become infected with the AIDS virus, researchers said Wednesday in a finding that helps explain why circumcision can protect men.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Patients taking statin drugs were almost 50 percent less likely to die from flu, researchers reported on Thursday in a study providing more evidence the cholesterol-lowering drugs help the body cope with infection.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - People who have a compulsive urge to collect and clutter their homes with junk can partly attribute their problem to genes, a new study confirms.

LONDON (Reuters) - Tackling just five health factors could prevent millions of premature deaths and increase global life expectancy by almost 5 years, the United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) said Tuesday.

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Low vitamin D levels in the body may be deadly, according to a new study hinting that adults with lower, versus higher, blood levels of vitamin D may be more likely to die from heart disease or stroke.

TUESDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- If your little goblins or vampires are set to paint their faces this Halloween to look all the more believable, you may want to think twice, according to a new report released just in time for the holiday.

With Dad a world leader and Nobel Prize winner, Malia and Sasha Obama surely could have been first in line when vaccinations began for swine flu. They weren't, the White House says. But that hasn't stopped complaints that President Barack Obama's daughters got preferential treatment.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - When pregnant women get vaccinated against flu, their babies are bigger, healthier and less likely to be premature, researchers reported on Thursday.

Despite our stable agrarian society and medical advances that help us live into old age, the effects of natural selection are still at work on the modern human species, researchers say

TUESDAY, Oct. 27 (HealthDay News) -- Combining chemotherapy with radiation treatment for patients with advanced head and neck cancer increases their event-free survival to 2.2 years from just one year with radiotherapy alone, finds a new study.