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 | 2013 MAY May 20, 2013
 What DSM-5, Updated Mental Health 'Bible,' Means for Diagnosing Patients The American Psychiatric Association released a new edition of the DSM, which doctors use to diagnose and treat mental disorders. Judy Woodruff discusses the changes and implications for both patients and professionals with Dr. Michael First of Columbia University and Dr. Steven Hyman of the Broad Institute.

   

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 | May 16, 2013
 Major Embryonic Stem Cell Advance Raises Ethical Quandaries Researchers at Oregon Health and Science University have achieved a longtime goal. They cloned a human embryo to derive embryonic stem cells able to transform into tissues and organs genetically identical to patients who need them. Jeffrey Brown talks to NPR's Rob Stein about the science as well as the ethical concerns.

   

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 | May 15, 2013
 Why Angelina Jolie Decided to Undergo Preventative Double Mastectomy In a New York Times op-ed, actress Angelina Jolie disclosed she had a preventative double mastectomy because she carries a greater genetic risk of developing breast cancer. Gwen Ifill talks with genetic counselor Beth Peshkin of Georgetown University and Dr. Kenneth Offit of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Center in New York.

   

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 | May 15, 2013
 Study Pinpoints Link Between Fitness and Cancer in Men There's new evidence that being fit reduces your risk for getting cancer. The study, released at the American Society of Clinical Oncology's annual meeting, looked at the link between fitness in middle-aged men and the likelihood of a cancer diagnosis later in life.

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 | May 14, 2013
 Jolie's Decision Sheds Light on BRCA Gene, Importance of Genetic Counseling Angelina Jolie announced today that she has undergone a preventative double mastectomy due to a gene she has that increases her risk of of developing breast cancer and ovarian cancer. What makes this gene so devastating and who is affected by it? We talked to a leading oncologist Dr. Sandra Swain for answers.

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 | May 14, 2013
 The Day Doctors Began to Conquer Smallpox For millennia, smallpox was humankind's deadliest foe -- that is, until Dr. Edward Jenner figured out a means of preventing it entirely. Jenner discovered a vaccine after he proved that inoculating people with a small amount of the disease cowpox would protect them from the feared smallpox.

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 | May 14, 2013
 Commander Hadfield Reports to Ground Control Commander Chris Hadfield is a great many things: photographer, educator, social media maven -- did I mention astronaut? Add troubadour to the laundry list. That his music video -- a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity" -- has already scored 6.6 million hits is a testament to his success as a popularizer of science and space.

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 | May 13, 2013
 Prescription Drug Abuse: CDC Answers Your Questions One in 20 people in the U.S. say they've used prescription painkillers for non-medical reasons in the last year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many ended up addicted. PBS NewsHour recently aired a report on prescription drug abuse that led viewers to ask questions, so the CDC provided the answers.

 

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 | May 10, 2013
 In South Africa, Using Mobile Technology to Improve Maternal Health Access More than 43,000 babies die in South Africa each year before they're one-month old. A full 75,000 don't make it to their fifth birthday. But a network affectionately known as MAMA is hoping to bring those numbers down dramatically with a simple tool: cell phones.

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 | May 9, 2013
 Eight Types of Nurses You Never Knew Existed Photographer Carolyn Jones spent the last two years profiling changes in the health care system and the compassion of those on the front lines. She speaks with Hari Sreenivasan about her new book, "The American Nurse," how the profession is evolving with the industry, and types of nurses you probably never knew existed.

 

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 | May 8, 2013
 Seeking Method Behind the Madness of Hospital Billing Disparities Different hospitals charge wildly different amounts for the same procedures, even in the same city. New data from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid shows a vast billing disparity between health care centers. Jeffrey Brown explores some striking examples and what these numbers mean with Barry Meier of The New York Times.

   

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 | May 8, 2013
 New Report Shows Staggering Differences in the Cost of Medical Treatments A new report released by the federal government raises questions about how exactly hospitals determine the cost of treatment, after it revealed that facilities across the country are charging wildly different amounts for the same medical procedures.

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 | May 8, 2013
 Preventing Drug Shortages with Cell Phones in Malawi Eighty percent of the 13 million Malawians live in rural areas, making delivering health services challenging, especially in remote parts with no roads.

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 | May 7, 2013
 Best and Worst Countries for Babies on Their First Day of Life One million babies die each year on the day they are born, according to a new study released by the international nonprofit Save the Children. In its annual "State of the World's Mothers" report, the group has ranked which countries are best and worst at helping newborns survive their first day of life.

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 | May 6, 2013
 U.S. Health Costs Rising More Slowly, But Will It Last? Americans still pay more than twice the price for health care than most other developed countries, but the sticker shock has come with a bit of good news in recent years: Costs are rising more slowly. But what's behind it? And will it last?

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 | May 6, 2013
 Best and Worst Countries for Babies on Their First Day of Life More than one million babies a year die on the day they are born according to a new report released by the international nonprofit Save the Children. The report ranks 186 countries based on the chances a baby will survive the first day of life.

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 | May 3, 2013
 New CDC Report Finds Stunning Suicide Increases Among Middle-Aged Americans More people in the U.S. die from suicide than car accidents. That's according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control, which also found that the suicide rate among adults age 35 and 64 has risen 28 percent. Ray Suarez talks with CDC director Dr. Thomas Frieden about contributing risks and measures for prevention.

   

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 | May 3, 2013
 Chart: America's Rising Suicide Problem Suicides now kill more Americans each year than car crashes, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2010 alone, 38,364 killed themselves in the United States -- 4,600 more than were killed in motor vehicle accidents.

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 | May 3, 2013
 Are You a Work Potato? Two-thirds of American office workers experience pain on the job and a quarter expect it. Not from physical exertion but the opposite -- too much hunching, sitting, clicking and staring at screens. Are you a "work potato," and, if so, what can you do about it?

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 | May 2, 2013
 Justice Department Plans Fight Over Federal Ruling on Morning-After Pill The battle continues over the emergency contraceptive known as the morning-after pill, as the Justice Department announced it would appeal a federal ruling. A judge had ordered the age restriction be lifted so females of all ages could get the pill without a prescription. Jeffrey Brown talks with NPR's Julie Rovner.

   

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 | May 2, 2013
 What a 'Private Option' for Medicaid Expansion Might Look Like Arkansas has broached what could be a deal-making compromise for the health care reform law's upcoming Medicaid expansion, giving Washington the increased coverage for the poor it wants and Republicans something that looks less like government and more like business. Here's your primer on the 'Arkansas model.'

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 | APRIL April 30, 2013
 Pain and Consequences for Those Taking Too Much Pain Medication At age 22, college football player Austin Box had suffered a slew of painful injuries. Two weeks after his graduation, he overdosed on a lethal cocktail of pain medications, none of which he had been prescribed. Health correspondent Betty Ann Bowser reports on the perils of painkillers and the difficulty of combating abuse.

   

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 | April 30, 2013
 Opinion: 40 Years After Roe v. Wade, A Pro-Life Perspective On Tuesday's PBS NewsHour, we revisit the hot-button issue of abortion and debate its move from federal courts to state governments. Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, and Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro Choice America, both wrote op-ed columns for us.

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 | April 30, 2013
 Opinion: 40 Years After Roe v. Wade, A Pro-Choice Perspective On Tuesday's PBS NewsHour, we revisit the hot-button issue of abortion and debate its move from federal courts to state governments. Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, and Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro Choice America, both wrote op-ed columns for us.

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 | April 30, 2013
 Which Prescription Drugs Do Americans Abuse Most? Approximately 7 million people in the United States -- or 2.7 percent of the population -- annually abuse prescription drugs, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Which types? Here's your primer.

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 | April 30, 2013
 Prescription Drug Abuse: Top 10 Things CDC Says You Should Know Overdose deaths from prescription painkillers have quadrupled nationwide in recent years, now outpacing those attributed to heroin and cocaine combined. Here are the top 10 things the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says you should know about prescription drug abuse.

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 | April 29, 2013
 Is Processed Food a Pandora's Box for the American Diet? How did the United States become a nation where food isn't so much cooked as disassembled and reassembled? Author and former New York Times reporter Melanie Warner speaks with Hari Sreenivasan about her new book, "Pandora's Lunchbox: How Processed Food Took Over the American Meal."

   

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 | April 26, 2013
 Almost Half of U.S. Adults Do Not Have Health Insurance or are Underinsured In 2012, approximately 84 million adults -- or 46 percent of those aged 19 to 64 -- did not have health insurance coverage for the entire year or were considered underinsured, according to the findings of the Commonwealth Fund's 2012 biennial health insurance survey.

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 | April 25, 2013
 How Cell Phones Are Helping Fight Malaria Community health workers in Zambia receive new cell phones as incentives to continue their malaria rapid reporting. Zambia is home to the deadliest form of a parasite that causes malaria, with the disease affects more than 4 million people in country a year.

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 | April 24, 2013
 Americans Seriously Unprepared for Long-Term Care, Survey Finds With the number of seniors in the U.S. expected to nearly double in the next two decades, a new Associated Press survey confirms that relatively few older Americans understand the costs associated with the long-term care they're likely to need. And even fewer are planning for it.

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 | April 22, 2013
 The Importance of Reflecting on Death, Especially After Boston Erica Brown went face to face with her mortality on April 15, smack-dab in the middle of the chaos of the Boston Marathon bombings. But she was prepared. As the author of the new book "Happier Endings: A Meditation on Life and Death," she embraces the inevitable and makes a plea for people to do a better job of planning for it.

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 | April 17, 2013
 Writer Advocates 'Clean' Start for America on Addiction In his new book, "Clean: Overcoming Addiction and Ending America's Greatest Tragedy," journalist David Sheff outlines a slew of reasons why addiction treatments largely fail to help 20 million people struggling with the disease. Judy Woodruff talks to Sheff about why the stigma of addiction has hurt addicts seeking to get clean.

   

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 | April 17, 2013
 How Boston Is Managing Pain After the Blasts While the physical wounds from Monday's bombings at the the Boston Marathon will take months or years to heal, health providers are preparing victims for a much longer recovery. "It's not unusual that the mental health issues will last a lifetime," said Dr. David Mooney of Boston Children's Hospital.

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 | April 15, 2013
 Supreme Court Tackles Case of Patent Law, Human Genetics The Supreme Court heard arguments in a case on whether a biotech company can patent a gene associated with cancer. Jeffrey Brown gets details from National Law Journal's Marcia Coyle, plus viewpoints from Ellen Matloff of Yale Cancer Center, a plaintiff in the case, and Kevin Noonan, an intellectual property attorney.

   

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 | April 15, 2013
 Top Five Ways the President's Budget Would Change Medicare President Obama's 2014 budget plan includes a number of money-saving changes to Medicare, some of which have triggered concern from patient and provider groups. Here are five things you should know about the president's plan.

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 | April 12, 2013
 The Day Polio Began Losing Its Grip on America Almost every summer not so long ago, polio epidemics left behind a wake of paralysis and death, leaving children struggling to walk or trapped in iron lungs. Then, 58 years ago today, a scientist made a startling announcement: He'd found a vaccine that would nearly wipe the disease from the U.S.

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 | April 11, 2013
 Hospitals Dispute Failure to Disclose Clinical Study Risks for Premature Infants Two dozen hospitals are under fire for allegedly not disclosing the risks of participating in a clinical study, which involved 1,300 premature infants. The study was to determine proper supplemental oxygen levels, and risks to the infants included death and blindness. Judy Woodruff talks to David Brown of The Washington Post.

   

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 | April 11, 2013
 How U.S. Obesity Compares With Other Countries After decades of rapid growth, adult obesity is stabilizing in many developed countries. Check out how U.S. obesity rates compare with the 33 other member nations of the OECD.

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 | April 8, 2013
 Finding the Prescription for Improving U.S. and Global Health Care The United States isn't the only nation struggling to improve the quality of its health care while keeping down skyrocketing costs. Just look at the systems in England, France, Japan, Canada and Israel and it won't take long to realize nearly every one of them is in pursuit of the elusive "Triple Aim." Here's why.

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 | April 5, 2013
 Why We Should Treat, Not Blame Addicts Struggling to Get 'Clean' Journalist David Sheff talks to Judy Woodruff about his new book, "Clean: Overcoming Addiction and Ending America's Greatest Tragedy," describing how society and addiction programs have largely failed to help 20 million Americans struggling with the disease and why stigma is one of the root causes for ineffective treatment.

 

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 | April 4, 2013
 Estimating the Soaring Price Tag and Other Costs of Dementia Care A new study by the RAND Corporation estimates the cost of dementia care as $41,000 to $56,000 anually per patient. Jeffrey Brown examines the findings and implications with Dr. Ronald Petersen, director of the Mayo Alzheimer's Disease Research Center, and Dr. Richard Hodes, director of the National Institute of Aging.

   

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 | April 4, 2013
 Assessing Your Risk of Alzheimer's Disease A new study shows that Americans spent as much as $215 billion on care for dementia patients in 2010 and that costs are rising steeply. While Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia, can't be prevented or cured at the moment, many still want to know whether the disease and its heavy costs are in their future.

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 | April 3, 2013
 Why Rural Hospitals May Pose a Greater Risk of Death For 15 years, Congress has bestowed special privileges to some small remote hospitals, usually in rural areas, to help them stay afloat. But a study published Tuesday sounded a warning: the death rates at these critical access hospitals were growing while mortality rates at other hospitals were dropping.

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 | April 2, 2013
 Obama Reveals Brain Mapping Project President Barack Obama unveiled the BRAIN Initiative today, a new collaborative effort to map the human brain and better understand how it works. BRAIN -- which stands for Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies -- will diagram how the brain learns, thinks and remembers.

 

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 | April 1, 2013
 Mutating Gonorrhea and 'Superbugs' Coming Soon to a Town Near You? The director of the Centers for Disease Control recently warned that drug-resistant "superbugs" in U.S. hospitals could become more deadly in the years ahead. A number of other ailments -- including gonorrhea and tuberculosis -- also seem to be growing more indestructible by the year. Is the world close to a post-antibiotic era?

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 | MARCH March 29, 2013
 How a Doctor Discovered U.S. Walls Were Poisonous Doctors have recognized that high doses of lead are downright poisonous since, at least, the days of Hippocrates. But it wasn't until March 29, 1979 -- some 34 years ago today -- that a pediatrician first documented the dangers of even the lowest forms of lead exposure.

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 | March 27, 2013
 Are You Eating Real Food or 'Food Product'? In her new book, "Pandora's Lunchbox," Melanie Warner explains what she considers "processed food" and how it affects the human body. Over the past week, we've received a lot of questions about Warner's book. She answered them during a live chat with PBS NewsHour on Wednesday.

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 | March 26, 2013
 Should Gunshot Wounds Be Treated Like a Disease? In a city like Newark, N.J., it's not uncommon to see as many as 35 people walk into an E.R. "shot, stabbed or beaten" in one night, according to emergency medicine physician Dr. Sampson Davis. Would treating gunshot wounds "like a disease" help stop some of the bloodshed?

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 | March 25, 2013
 Live Chat with Dr. Sampson Davis Sampson Davis grew up in one of the poorest neighborhoods of Newark, N.J., robbing drug dealers and dodging juvenile delinquency. Today, Davis is an emergency medicine physician at St. Michael's Medical Center, just blocks away from the streets of his rough past. He will join PBS NewsHour for a live chat 1 p.m. ET Tuesday.

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 | March 25, 2013
 NPR/CPI Report: Deadly Work, Little Oversight in Nation's Grain Bins NPR and CPI spent six months reviewing government documents, interviewing workers, government officials, victims' families, company owners and legal and agriculture industry experts who have studied grain bin working conditions.

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 | March 25, 2013
 Gunshot Deaths Pushing Some E.R. Doctors To Activism In Colorado, where more people die from gunshots than car crashes, the victims have a profound effect on the physicians who treat them. For some of the doctors on the front lines, the experiences lead to a strong opposition to guns, questions about gun laws and even activism.

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 | March 21, 2013
 As Health Reform Law Turns Three, What Should You Expect Next? Three years after the Affordable Care Act became law, a roundtable of reporters weighs in on what's changed for consumers, businesses and state governments -- and what you should expect next.

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 | March 20, 2013
 Emergency Room Doctor Returns to His Roots in 'Brick City' In his new book, "Living and Dying in Brick City," Dr. Sampson Davis recounts his return to his hometown of Newark, N.J., as an emergency room physician. Ray Suarez talks with Davis about working on the front lines of his community and his insights on the systematic public health challenges he sees his patients facing each day.

   

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 | March 20, 2013
 Why Long-Term Care for U.S. Seniors is Headed for 'Crisis' As baby boomers continue to age, many health care experts predict the U.S. is destined for crisis if better long-term care strategies -- both at the national and personal level -- aren't devised quickly. What are some of the potential solutions, and what might happen if the nation chooses to do nothing?

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 | March 20, 2013
 Seven Things Teenagers Can Do To Stay Out of the Emergency Room As an E.R. doctor in Newark, Dr. Sampson Davis has seen the devastating effects of poverty on health and wellness. Having grown up in that same city, he's felt them firsthand. Ray Suarez sits down with Davis to discuss the new book on his experiences, "Living and Dying in Brick City: An E.R. Doctor Returns Home."

 

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 | March 18, 2013
 How Good Is Your Hospital? Depends Who You Ask Evaluations of hospitals are proliferating, giving patients unprecedented insight into institutions where variations in quality can determine whether they live or die. But those ratings, each using its own methodology, often come to wildly divergent conclusions.

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 | March 15, 2013
 California Law That Aspires to Improve Mental Health Raises Coercion Concerns In the wake of several recent shootings, politicians and commentators have called for improved mental health screening and treatment. Spencer Michels reports on a program in California called "Laura's Law," an unfunded mandate that has proven difficult to implement and has drawn concern about involuntary treatment for patients.

   

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 | March 15, 2013
 Seven Foods You Think Are Healthy But Aren't In the United States, “food isn't so much cooked as disassembled and reassembled," Melanie Warner writes in her book, "Pandora's Lunchbox." Warner explains what she considers "processed food," and how it affects the human body. Plus, seven "healthy foods" you might want to reconsider after reading the fine print.

 

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 | March 12, 2013
 Researchers Aim to Unlock Genetic Data Goldmine for Vital Medical Information Researchers in the San Francisco Bay area believe genetic tests will help them find the best ways to treat and potentially prevent diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, breast and prostate cancers. Spencer Michels reports on a giant data bank that houses genetic information on 200,000 people as part of a groundbreaking study.

   

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 | March 12, 2013
 How Well Do You Want to Know Your DNA? On tonight's PBS NewsHour, Correspondent Spencer Michels reports on a massive, groundbreaking study underway at Kaiser Permanente and the University of California at San Francisco, which one day may shed light on the genetic roots of health conditions such as Parkinson's, cancer, Alzheimer's and heart disease.

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 | March 12, 2013
 What Blood, Spit and a Data Bank Can Tell Us About Disease A giant data bank containing genetic information on 200,000 people is in full operation in the San Francisco area. It's being ballyhooed by its founders as the world's best such repository. Researchers have begun to use it to explore the links between genes and disease, and environmental factors like pesticides and genetics.

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 | March 8, 2013
 When CPR for the Elderly Becomes Morally Gray Lorraine Bayless, 87, was barely breathing at the independent living facility where she lived. A nurse looked on, refusing a 911 dispatcher's pleas to perform CPR because doing so would have violated company policy. That situation provoked national outrage, but the events may not be as black-and-white as they first appeared.

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 | March 7, 2013
 Arkansas Abortion Law Bans Procedures After 12 Weeks of Pregnancy The Arkansas legislature passed the nation's strictest abortion rules, outlawing any procedures done after the 12th week of pregnancy. To learn more about the legal ramifications for doctors under the new law and how it will effect other states, Hari Sreenivasan talks with Suzi Parker, a reporter for Reuters from Little Rock.

   

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 | March 7, 2013
 How Quickly Do Germs Spread in the Office? We've all done it. Come to work when we're sick. We know we're not doing our fellow workers any favors by exposing them to whatever we've got, but pressure to get our jobs done trumps common sense. Well, now there is research to back up what common sense has been telling us all along: It's a bad idea.

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 | March 5, 2013
 New Study Shows U.S. Lags Behind Other High-Income Countries in Female Lifespan Gwen Ifill talks to Susan Dentzer, editor-in-chief of Health Affairs, about a pair of studies released in that journal about the lifespan of American women. In one, researchers found that in 43 percent of the nation's counties, more women 75 years old and under are dying sooner.

   

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 | March 4, 2013
 Access to Doctors Shrinks for Some Medicare Patients It's getting harder and harder for some seniors to find a primary care physician. Ray Suarez reports on why the threat of massive cuts to Medicare reimbursement rates has left some doctors so worried that they've decided to stop taking new Medicare patients.

   

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 | March 4, 2013
 Mississippi Doctors See Child-Size Breakthrough in the Global Fight Against AIDS Researchers announced that for the first time, a child born with HIV has been cured. To learn whether this offers hope to thousands of HIV positive babies worldwide, Ray Suarez talks to Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and Rowena Johnston of amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research.

   

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 | March 4, 2013
 Finding a Doctor Who Accepts Medicare It's getting harder and harder for some seniors to find a primary care physician. Ray Suarez reports on why the threat of massive cuts to Medicare reimbursement rates has left some doctors so worried they've decided to stop taking new Medicare patients.

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 | March 4, 2013
 Why Is It So Hard To Fix Pay for Doctors Taking Medicare Patients? While physicians have sidestepped drastic Medicare payment cuts for 2013, doctors' groups are gearing up for yet another battle to scrap the formula that forces Congress to consider the "doc fix" on a yearly basis. How did this become an issue, and why don't lawmakers simply eliminate the formula? Here's your primer.

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 | March 4, 2013
 Struck By a Turtle? Crushed By a Merchant Ship? There's a Code for That Struck by a turtle lately? No? Then surely you've been smacked by a raccoon, chicken ... or at the very least, a nonvenomous lizard.

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 | March 3, 2013
 First Child Cured of HIV The first child has been cured of HIV, human immunodeficiency virus, researchers announced Sunday. The case was publicly unveiled at the 2013 Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections in Atlanta.

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 | March 1, 2013
 New Documentary Puts Homegrown Issue of Hunger on the Table Although the United States is the largest producer of food per capita in the world, that food is not reaching the plates of millions of children in America. Hunger is the subject of the new documentary, "A Place at the Table." Ray Suarez talks with co-director Lori Silverbush about our homegrown problem.

   

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 | March 1, 2013
 With 50 Million Hungry in U.S., New Film Calls for 'A Place at the Table' The U.S. produces more food per person than any other country in the world but still has a major problem with hunger -- a hardship that only grew worse in the recession and its aftermath. A new film called, "A Place at the Table," challenges the viewer's assumptions about who is hungry and why.

 

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 | FEBRUARY Feb. 28, 2013
 The Day Scientists Discovered the 'Secret of Life' Sixty years ago today, two men burst into a bar to declare they "had discovered the secret of life." Indeed, they had. That morning, the pair worked out the double helix structure of deoxyribonucleic acid, better known to every first-grader as DNA.

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 | Feb. 25, 2013
 Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop Leaves Legacy on AIDS, Smoking Dr. Charles Everett Koop, the former surgeon general who delivered straightforward talks on AIDS and smoking, passed away Monday in his home in Hanover, N.H. He was 96 years old.

 

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 | Feb. 25, 2013
 Adding Up and Breaking Down Health Care's Big Price Tags Why does a few days of lab work end up costing more than the price of a car? Judy Woodruff interviews journalist Steven Brill about his Time magazine cover story about how and why the private marketplace isn't working in the health care industry.

   

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 | Feb. 25, 2013
 What a Missing Section of One Man's Brain Taught Science About Memory It was in 1953 that a neurosurgeon removed a significant portion of Henry Gustav Molaison's brain, including much of the amygdala and the hippocampus. The patient, known as H.S. up until his death in 2008 at age 82, was intensely studied, making him one of the most important patients in the history of brain science.

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 | Feb. 23, 2013
 Bradley Cooper Joins Effort to Find 'Silver Lining' in Mental Health Future "Silver Linings Playbook" isn't just receiving good reviews from the critics. Many sing the movie's praises for its realistic portrayal of mental illness. Earlier this month, Oscar nominee Bradley Cooper spoke alongside lawmakers and advocates to address how mental illness has affected their lives.

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 | Feb. 22, 2013
 Gun Violence Is Public Health Crisis in Chicago So far in the first two months of this year, gun deaths in Chicago have already outpaced last year's explosive rate. Elizabeth Brackett of PBS member station WTTW explores the escalating public health crisis in Chicago due to the high rates of gun violence.

   

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 | Feb. 22, 2013
 News Wrap: FDA Approves Breast Cancer Drug In other new Friday, the FDA approved a first-of-its kind breast cancer drug called Kadcyla for advanced, aggressive forms of the disease. Also, a winter storm continued to whip across the Midwest, taking four lives. The storm is expected to make its way to the Northeast and New England this weekend.

 

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 | Feb. 22, 2013
 Medicaid Expansion Will Also Expand Access to Mental Health Services Upcoming Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act will increase the list of treatments and services covered, including automatic mental health coverage. This is occurring when state funding for mental health services has significantly decreased. Pew's Christine Vestal gives an overview on the state of U.S. mental health.

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 | Feb. 22, 2013
 Schools Add Anger Management to the Lesson Plan As the nation struggles to pinpoint what might help prevent violence in the wake of the mass murder at Sandy Hook Elementary, a program being piloted at a school in Ohio may have a solution. The theory: short bursts of therapeutic exercise, even in a health class, can boost a teen's chances of dealing with stress and adversity.

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 | Feb. 21, 2013
 Republican Governors Rethink Opposition to Medicaid Expansion At first, many Republican governors actively opposed expanding the Medicaid program and said they would not participate. Now, some of them, including Florida Gov. Rick Scott, have reconsidered. Judy Woodruff talks to Paul Howard of the Center for Medical Progress at the Manhattan Institute and Ron Pollack of Families USA.

   

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 | Feb. 21, 2013
 CDC Report Offers Glimmer of Progress on Altering U.S. Obesity Trend According to a new report from the CDC, Americans' consumption of fast food has declined and kids are eating fewer calories, suggesting that efforts to fight fat may be working. Ray Suarez discusses the state of the obesity epidemic with Michael Moss, author of "Salt, Sugar, Fat," and former CDC official Dr. William Dietz.

   

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 | Feb. 21, 2013
 Live Chat: Mind of a Rampage Killer Can science help explain what combination of factors compels a human being to commit the most inhuman of crimes? Join Miles O' Brien of the report "Mind of a Rampage Killer" on NOVA, and social science expert Katherine S. Newman of Johns Hopkins for a live chat at 7 p.m. ET today.

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 | Feb. 21, 2013
 Son of 'I Am Adam Lanza's Mother' Likens Rage to Becoming a Werewolf For his PBS NOVA documentary on the brains of rampage killers, Miles O'Brien spoke with Liza Long, the Idaho-based writer who penned the blog, "I am Adam Lanza's Mother," and her son about his struggle with mental illness.

 

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 | Feb. 20, 2013
 Will U.S. Forge Public-Private Partnership to Draw Brain Activity Map? In his State of the Union address, President Obama proposed a decade-long effort to map the activity of the brain. To understand the president's plan and walk through the possible implications, Ray Suarez talks to Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, who would coordinate much of the project.

   

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 | Feb. 20, 2013
 Live Chat: Who is Adam Lanza? In the wake of the mass killings at Sandy Hook Elementary, FRONTLINE and The Hartford Courant's jarring documentary "Raising Adam Lanza" tries to make sense of the horrific act that drove Adam Lanza to violence. Join the filmmaker and reporters on the case in a live chat.

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 | Feb. 20, 2013
 Health Care Without the Doctors Coming to a Walmart Near You As Americans gain coverage under the federal health law, putting increased demand on primary care doctors and spurring interest in cheaper, more convenient care, unmanned kiosks in places like Walmart may be part of what their manufacturer bills as a "self-service healthcare revolution."

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 | Feb. 20, 2013
 Sins of the Sons It’s a parent’s nightmare. Your child’s school has been the scene of a mass shooting. But what if your child was the shooter? Miles O’Brien meets the father of a rampage killer and a mother who worries her son might one day become one.

 

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 | Feb. 15, 2013
 Can Folic Acid Reduce the Risk of Autism? According to a new Norwegian study, women who took folic acid supplements before and during early pregnancy were about 40 percent less likely to have a baby later diagnosed with autism.

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 | Feb. 13, 2013
 The 2013 Oscar Documentaries, Part 1: 'How to Survive a Plague' In a new documentary, "How to Survive a Plague," filmmaker David France re-examines the in-your-face brand of AIDS activism that forced the nation to pay attention in the early days of the epidemic and eventually convinced the federal government to speed the approval of life-saving drugs.

 

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 | Feb. 13, 2013
 How Undocumented Immigrants Sometimes Receive Medicaid Treatment While federal law generally bars undocumented immigrants from being covered by Medicaid, a little-known part of the health insurance program for the poor pays about $2 billion a year for emergency treatment for a group of patients who mostly comprise undocumented immigrants.

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 | Feb. 8, 2013
 News Wrap: British Food Safety Office Orders Testing After Horse Meat Revelation In other news Friday, the British government has ordered that products be tested after a major European food supplier found horse meat had been marketed as a beef ingredient. Also, police in California and Nevada continued their manhunt for Christopher Dorner, an ex-Los Angeles cop who has been on a deadly killing spree.

 

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 | Feb. 1, 2013
 News Wrap: Obama Administration Announces New Rules for Contraceptive Coverage In other news Friday, the Obama administration announced that faith-based non-profits like hospitals and universities won’t be forced to provide coverage for contraceptives in their insurance plans. Also, the economy grew in the first month of 2013, but not enough to change the unemployment rate.

 

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 | Feb. 1, 2013
 Contraception Rule Revised by Obama Administration After a year of lawsuits and public outcry, the Obama administration proposed today that women employed by nonprofit religious institutions must get free access to birth control as promised under the health law, but their employers will not have to pay for it.

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 | JANUARY Jan. 31, 2013
 Should Parents Worry About Energy Drinks? Energy drinks have been getting a bad rap lately, including an FDA investigation over potential links to ER visits and even death. What should parents know about these drinks and their possible effects on young people?

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 | Jan. 30, 2013
 Inside a Bomb-Proof Israeli Hospital Despite questions surrounding the possibility of an Iranian missile strike, Israel is preparing for the possibility of an attack or counterattack in case it does decide to hit Iran's enrichment facilities. One such precaution is to build underground hospitals.

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 | Jan. 29, 2013
 Iraq War Vet Receives Rare Double Arm Transplant Former solider and Iraq war veteran Sgt. Brendan Marrocco is the recent recepient of a double arm transplant, which took place at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Marrocco lost all of his limbs during a roadside bomb attack in the spring of 2009. Gwen Ifill talks with Dr. Jaimie Shores, director of hand transplantation at Johns Hopkins.

   

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 | Jan. 25, 2013
 Did Shakespeare Have Syphilis? In a new book, "Shakespeare's Tremor and Orwell's Cough: The Medical Lives of Famous Writers," Dr. John J. Ross of Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital looks at how disease and mood disorder may have infected the lives, creativity and words of some of the world's most beloved authors.

 

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 | Jan. 22, 2013
 The Debate on Abortion, Four Decades After Roe v. Wade Forty years ago, in the landmark case Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decided that abortion should be legal in the United States. Charmaine Yoest of Americans United for Life and Nancy Keenan of NARAL Pro-Choice America join Gwen Ifill to debate the state of abortion rights and activism today.

   

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 | Jan. 22, 2013
 New Scan May Enable Better Diagnosis, Treatment for Athletes' Brain Damage Jeffrey Brown talks with Dr. Gary Small of UCLA about how new procedures may enable doctors to identify serious head injuries in athletes and others, and the grave importance of protecting our brains from physical trauma.

   

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 | Jan. 22, 2013
 Why U.S. Views on Abortion Haven't Changed Much On this 40th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, a new survey of U.S. attitudes on abortion decision is striking, mostly because of just how much things haven't changed. In a nation that's shifted profoundly in recent decades, attitudes on this issue haven’t budged much at all.

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 | Jan. 17, 2013
 In Preventing Violence, 'Very Hard to Identify' Individuals Who Need Help Most Ray Suarez looks at responses by lawmakers and the NRA to President Obama's gun violence proposals. Jeffrey Brown hones in on the topic of mental health with Barry Rosenfeld, a clinical forensic psychologist at Fordham University, and Dr. Paramjit Joshi of the Children's National Medical Center in Washington, D.C.

   

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 | Jan. 16, 2013
 Why NFL Players May Be Prone to Depression as They Age National Institutes of Health released new research that shows NFL players may be at higher risk of depression as they age due to brain damage from concussions. Betty Ann Bowser explores how this could affect professional athletes, high-school students, and even peewee football players.

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 | Jan. 15, 2013
 News Wrap: Lance Armstrong 'Forthcoming' on Doping in Oprah Interview In other news Tuesday, Lance Armstrong discussed doping in an interview with Oprah Winfrey months after the world famous cyclist was accused of using performance enhancement drugs to give himself an edge during competitions and stripped of his titles

 

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 | Jan. 14, 2013
 News Wrap: Military Suicides Outnumbered Combat Deaths in Afghanistan in 2012 In other news Monday, the Associated Press reported U.S. military suicides hit a record in 2012, with 349 deaths. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called the rash of military suicides an epidemic. Also, government officials in Beijing admitted for the first time that the city was suffering from extreme smog.

 

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 | Jan. 11, 2013
 How a Boy Became the First to Beat Back Diabetes On Jan. 11, 1922, a 14-year-old boy hovered between life and death. His name was Leonard Thompson and he was suffering the end stages of diabetes mellitus. This is the story of the wonder drug that ultimately saved him while also revolutionizing treatment for the disease.

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 | Jan. 11, 2013
 The NewsHour Has the Flu The NewsHour has the flu. Or a really bad cold. Or some combination of the two. And we are a reflection of our great nation here, if Google search terms are any indicator.

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 | Jan. 9, 2013
 More Than 40 States See Widespread Flu Infection Last year, cases of influenza were at extremely low levels, but the virus has returned with a vengeance. Gwen Ifill talks to Dr. Julie Morita of the Chicago Health Department and Dr. William Schaffner of Vanderbilt University about the current flu outbreaks, hitting cities like Chicago and Boston particularly hard.

   

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 | Jan. 9, 2013
 Talking Robots Play Part in Therapeutic Treatment for People With Special Needs Researchers at University of Notre Dame and University of Southern California have found that robots can be less intimidating than humans to some patients. Ray Suarez reports on how researchers are using machines as nontraditional therapists to treat conditions such as autism in children and strokes for seniors.

   

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 | Jan. 9, 2013
 Study Shows Many Teens at Risk for Suicidal Behavior Despite Mental Health Help A new study shows most teenagers who think about or attempt suicide have already had mental health treatment. Gwen Ifill talks to Dr. Timothy Lineberry of the Mayo Clinic and Drexel University psychologist Brian Daly about concerns over the effectiveness of current clinical treatment programs to prevent adolescent suicide.

   

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 | Jan. 9, 2013
 Map: Flu Rampant Throughout US It's been a banner year so far for influenza. Examine where flu infections have spread on a Centers for Disease Control map.

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 | Jan. 9, 2013
 Americans Far Less Healthy, Die Younger Than Global Peers, Study Finds Americans are far unhealthier than residents in other high-income countries even though the U.S. spends much more on health care, according to a report released Wednesday by the National Academy of Sciences. This health disadvantage exists across all ages and demographics.

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 | Jan. 7, 2013
 Health Care Spending Increases but Rate Slows With Recession and Economy While health care spending rose in 2011, it did so only slightly due to the recession and slow overall economic growth. Ray Suarez talks to Health Affairs' Susan Dentzer about the dichotomies of health care spending, including why there has been a slowdown in health care spending when personal out-of-pocket costs have increased.

   

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 | Jan. 2, 2013
 What Immigrants Can Teach the Rest of America about Health, Happiness and Hope When Claudia Kolker began reporting about recent immigrants to the U.S., she found a wealth of wisdom to be shared with all Americans. Kolker talks to Ray Suarez about her new book, "The Immigrant Advantage: What We Can Learn from Newcomers to America about Health, Happiness and Hope."

   

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 | Jan. 1, 2013
 Rooting Out Waste in Health Care by Taking Cue From Toyota Assembly Lines When the Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle was losing money for the first time in its history, CEO Dr. Gary Kaplan turned to an unlikely place for help: giant automaker Toyota. Health correspondent Betty Ann Bowser reports on the hospital's success in lowering costs and improving health outcomes.

   

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 | Jan. 1, 2013
 Health Reform May Be Headed Back to Supreme Court in 2013 Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind? Maybe not for the Affordable Care Act. Looks like 2013 will include many of the characters who made 2012 such a nerve-racking year for the health care reform law -- everyone from state-level Republican leaders to Supreme Court justices.

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 | Jan. 1, 2013
 Seven Lessons Americans Can Learn From Immigrants Hispanics in the U.S. are worse off than their white neighbors by almost every economic measure, yet they live longer, healthier lives. In her latest book, "The Immigrant Advantage," journalist Claudia Kolker looks at how some of the customs imported by America's newest residents could benefit the rest of the nation.

 

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