As the snow started falling, I drove to Giant Eagle to pick up some groceries. With a storm on the way, I needed to stock up on supplies in case we got snowed in.
Editor's note: In 1994, the American Psychiatric Association published the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM-IV. The DSM is the standard classification of mental disorders used by mental health professionals in the United States.
Autism (now better known as autism spectrum disorder or ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder caused, at least in part, by genetic factors.
People with sleep apnea, a breathing disorder that causes frequent sleep disturbances, often feel tired and unfocused during the day. But that may not be the only fallout: New research suggests the disorder also dramatically increases the risk of depression.
Marianne Swanson closes her eyes, with smoky gray circles beneath her long lashes, as she counts the number of pills she takes every day for HIV: "One, two, three, four" in the morning, and three more at night.
Her blue-green eyes are as clear as her name would suggest, but her wants and needs are muddy as she walks with aching joints on the streets of Atlanta, trying to resist the urge to get high.
Since Kezia Fitzgerald and her 1-year-old daughter, Saiorse, started cancer treatments this year, the disease has upended nearly every aspect of their lives.
When new patients worry they don't know how they'll get through breast cancer, Cindy Davis puts her hand on theirs and says, "I know, but I want to tell you, I truly know, because I went through this two years ago."
Alissa Welker would switch the lights on, off, on, off, on, off -- however many times it took to feel "right." When she was 9, she'd spend the equivalent of an adult workday doing these kinds of rituals. She also washed her hands excessively, avoided sick people and barely ate because she feared food poisoning.
Doctors who treat prostate cancer disagree on the value of the prostate specific antigen, or PSA, test. But they agree on one thing.
As the technology world mourns computing visionary and Apple, Inc. co-founder Steve Jobs, it's worth taking a closer look at the disease he publicly battled.
Every year, sneeze sufferers swear: "This is the worst allergy season ever." And they're right.
Tonya Rasberry dialed her husband's number, her composure shaken and her nerves numb.
She sat in a small exam room, down a hallway that gets even longer when she remembers it. That was where doctors told Linda Scruggs, 13 weeks pregnant, that she had tested positive for HIV.
In 1985, Edmund White had five or six published books behind him, a Swiss lover with him and the outcome of an HIV test ahead of him. When the results came in, White told his partner:
For years, doctors have been telling their patients to eat more fish in order to boost heart health.
Women who gain weight after giving birth for the first time dramatically increase their risk of developing pregnancy-related diabetes during their second pregnancy, a new study suggests.
In January, a bullet fired from point-blank range tore through her brain. Just last week, she was seen walking, albeit with effort, up the stairs of an airplane.
A quick and simple questionnaire given to parents during a regular checkup in a pediatrician's office may help detect autism in children as young as 1 year old, a new study suggests.
Several years ago, an 81-year-old woman with a raised patch of dry skin on her arm visited Mississippi dermatologist John Abide, M.D.
You know spring has sprung when hundreds of people daily turn to Twitter to vent about their itchy eyes, dripping nose and uncontrollable sneezing and coughing. And if it's not obvious that allergies can ruin a person's day, watch how many tweets go by that use "allergies" and the f-word in the same sentence.
Sarah Cooper was a new mom in her mid-20s, busily juggling her family and a career as an electrical engineer, when everything came to a halt.
Whether it's to a swimming pool or a doughnut store, Michael Browne knows where he wants to go -- and since he doesn't have the words to say so, he'll just dart off.
Nuclear power has generally proved safe and nondetrimental to human health.
As he cradled his wife's limp body in his arms, Tim Delgado told himself, "You have to do this."
When Samantha Hessel heard about the risks associated with tanning beds, she ignored them. When her mom cautioned her not to tan so much, Hessel shrugged it off.
For years, Dr. Jaime Guevara-Aguirre of Quito, Ecuador, noticed that his shortest patients never seemed to get the common ailments that befell others.
So, the Packers won the Super Bowl, but fans of mixed martial arts can't stop talking about how Anderson Silva took down Vitor Belfort in an Ultimate Fighting Championship title match with a single kick.
Women with early stage breast cancer that has spread to their lymph nodes may require less extensive surgery than previously thought, according to a new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Actor Charlie Sheen has begun at least his fourth stint in rehab after he was taken from his home to a hospital by ambulance last week.
This Sunday's Super Bowl could prove to be a real heartbreaker for some fans of the losing team.
The doctor currently in charge of Gabrielle Giffords' neurological recovery, the man who's had his very hands in Giffords' brain, was once mistaken for a kung fu expert.
Electroshock therapy today bears little resemblance to its lurid depictions in Hollywood dramas like "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."
From a rehabilitation center in New York, Emilie Gossiaux has been planning her next art project, which she will probably never see. She's thinking it will involve constructing a chair out of wood and then covering it in multicolored clay to turn it into a completely different shape.
After surviving a gunshot wound to the head at a political event Saturday, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords remains in critical condition, and Tuesday was seen as significant in her recovery.
After surviving a gunshot wound to the head at political event Saturday, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords remains in critical condition, and Tuesday was seen as significant in her recovery.
Spending lots of free time glued to the TV or computer screen can hurt your heart and shorten your life, no matter how much exercise you get when you're not riding the couch, a new study suggests.
The controversy over the existence of a link between autism and vaccines is not likely to end, even after the only study to imply such a link has been discredited, retracted and called an "elaborate fraud."
Editor's note: "Sanjay Gupta MD Reports: A Conversation with Michael J. Fox" airs at 6 p.m. ET Friday on CNN. A version of this story was originally published on September 29.
If you're a woman in your 40s, you probably remember how checking the health of your breasts became a point of national contention last year.
An autopsy of a 21-year-old college football player who committed suicide has revealed mild stages of a type of brain damage typically seen in retired or aging athletes and can cause neurobehavioral disorders and bizarre behavior.
For most people, salmonella can be nasty for a few days or maybe a week, but then it's gone. Specific treatment isn't needed to recover.
Popular bone drugs taken by millions of older people to prevent osteoporosis do not appear to raise the risk of cancer in the esophagus, as some doctors and patients have feared.
Two-year-old Ethan Wily had a cold recently, so at first it wasn't surprising that he started coughing last week after eating some pistachio gelato.
You're in a restaurant, or at an airport, or on a crowded street. The man or woman next to you crumples to the ground. Do you know what to do? Anyone trained in CPR knows the first step: Check for breathing, and check for a pulse. If there's no heartbeat -- what then?
June 5, 1981. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued its first warning about a rare pneumonia called pneumocystis circulating among a small group of young gay men.
Jeanette Potter was in the Atlanta airport when she started to feel a bit off.
Jasan Zimmerman remembers running into his room, burying his head under a pillow and saying he didn't want to die. His mother chased after him and told him, "I'm not going to let you die."
If you've ever seen a brown haze of pollution hanging over your city, most likely your response was, "Ugh. How can I avoid breathing that stuff?" But let's face it, even if you know it's a bad air day, you probably need to grab some sunshine, get in an outdoor run, or get to work.
A decade after critics first accused the Food and Drug Administration of downplaying side effects from Avandia, the agency says it will reveal on Friday the data it is reviewing ahead of an advisory panel meeting about the safety of the popular diabetes drug.
Millions of Americans already take fish oil to keep their hearts healthy and to treat ailments ranging from arthritis to depression. Now, a new study suggests that the supplements may also help women lower their risk of breast cancer.
Every Friday morning, students walk into an art class in Atlanta, Georgia. Some look dazed, uncertain in their environment, as if it's vaguely familiar but they can't fully recognize where they are -- until they sit down and begin to draw.
The link between depression and dementia has always been unclear, but a new study supports the theory that depression increases dementia risk.
Young, athletic and troubled -- NFL player Chris Henry might have been a football cliché.
Menthol cigarettes now account for more than one-quarter of all cigarettes sold in the U.S. In fact, menthols -- often described as "cooling," "soothing," and "smooth" -- make up a growing share of the shrinking cigarette market. Between 2004 and 2008, the percentage of adult smokers who smoked them increased from 30 percent to 34 percent.
People who have low levels of the so-called good cholesterol have long been known to be at higher risk of heart attacks and heart disease. Now, a new study suggests they may have a higher risk of cancer, too.
The next time you order Chinese food or need a side dish to serve with dinner, you're better off choosing brown rice instead of white. Eating more brown rice and cutting back on white rice may reduce your risk of diabetes, a new study reports.
You dread this: Runny nose, scratchy throat, maybe a cough. And worse, it's 80 degrees outside.
Potential cancer vaccine! Possible anxiety treatment! Scientific studies looking at potential therapies for physical and mental illness often sound exciting -- that is, until you read further and realize they're in mice.
Emerson Donnell III had heard that 80 percent of marriages that include a child with autism end in divorce. And he felt certain it would happen to him.
Heidi Bayer knows all too well that diagnosing food allergies isn't clear-cut.
Too many people in the U.S. may be taking stomach-acid-suppressing drugs such as Nexium and Prevacid, new research suggests. The drugs, known as proton pump inhibitors, help those with serious stomach and digestive problems, but the risks may outweigh the benefits for people with less serious conditions, experts say.
Acclaimed chef Grant Achatz once said he would rather die than lose his tongue.
A vaccine treatment for prostate cancer has become the first therapy of its kind to win approval for use in U.S. patients.
The feeling of blood hitting the brain's sensitive covering can give a person the worst headache of his life, doctors say.
In the fight against memory loss, nothing is certain, doctors say.
In the fight against memory loss, nothing is certain, doctors say.
A rare but life-threatening tropical fungus that causes lung infections in both people and animals has been seen in the Pacific Northwest and could spread, researchers are reporting.
Sleep has long been known to improve performance on memory tests. Now, a new study suggests that an afternoon power nap may boost your ability to process and store information tenfold -- but only if you dream while you're asleep.
If you have perpetually clogged and swollen sinuses, secondhand smoke -- even in small amounts may be to blame. According to a new study, secondhand smoke may be responsible for up to 40 percent of cases of chronic sinusitis.
Courtney Bugler moved from Illinois to Georgia while undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer four years ago, but she didn't ask anyone except her husband for help packing up her old apartment.
Feel like you can't breathe? Do you have the uncontrollable urge to rub your eyes every 10 seconds?
The benefits of fruits and vegetables in staving off cancer exist, but they're not as strong as previously believed, a new study reports.
When the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed on Sept. 11, 2001, they produced a dense cloud of smoke and vaporized concrete and drywall.
Figuring out what's cool. Struggling for acceptance. Dealing with homework. These are familiar perils of middle school. But Haley Moss did it all while dealing with a hidden challenge: autism.
Four years ago, novelist Siri Hustvedt stood at a memorial for her father and began to speak. And shake. Her arms flailed and legs buckled. She had no idea what was happening, but her mind was clear and she could talk clearly, unheard of during typical seizures.
A federal court ruled Friday that the evidence supporting an alleged causal link between autism and a mercury-containing preservative in vaccines is unpersuasive, and that the families of children diagnosed with autism are not entitled to compensation.
The first week of each month, Karen and Jerry Vaneman pack their car for a four-hour drive from Asheville, North Carolina, to the medical complex at Duke University. Inside the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Center, Karen waits patiently as a parade of doctors and technicians pokes and prods, taking samples of all kinds. On this day alone, she gives 21 vials of blood.
Peanuts are like poison for people who have severe food allergies to them. For some, ingesting even a tiny piece of peanut can trigger a potentially fatal reaction.
It brought a tough, All-Star NBA coach to tears this week. And it stilled the voice of a famous film critic.
When your favorite hospital drama star is treating a patient who's having seizures, you might want to pay more attention to what's revealed about the doctor's personal life than what he or she is actually doing.
Nearly 2,000 people, mostly adolescent and young adult males in Orthodox Jewish communities in New York and New Jersey, have contracted mumps since last summer, according to health officials.
For Mary Calhoun Brown, the term "Asperger's" is crucial to conveying to schools that although her 15-year-old son has had social difficulties, he has a near-genius IQ and great speaking ability.
Taking out a patient's gallbladder is routine. At least 500,000 such surgeries are done each year in the United States. It takes an hour or two, and the patient can go home that day or the next.
Eating a diet rich in healthy fats and limiting dairy and meat could do more than keep your heart healthier. It could also help keep you thinking clearly.
A 10-year study examining 4.9 million births in the 1990s has found more evidence that there's a link between autism and the mother's age at conception.
The retraction of a controversial study that suggested a link between autism and a childhood vaccine has been little comfort to Joe Dimino.
The medical journal The Lancet on Tuesday retracted a controversial 1998 paper that linked the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine to autism.
If you're trying to quit smoking, wearing a nicotine patch for up to six months -- far longer than is generally recommended -- may increase your chances of staying smoke-free, a new study has found.
The second-to-last time EJ Levy was at Disney World, she used a scooter to navigate the enormous park. Her legs were weak and she suffered from foot drop caused by multiple sclerosis. That was 4½ years ago. On her most recent trip, a few months ago, Levy walked the entire time, thanks in part to a drug approved by the FDA on Friday.
For the first time in the United States, stem cells have been directly injected into the spinal cord of a patient, researchers announced Thursday.
Watching too much television can make you feel a bit brain-dead. According to a new study, it might also take years off your life.
It fizzes. It quenches. And it could also contain fecal bacteria.
People who quit smoking are at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes after they kick the habit, most likely due to post-quitting weight gain, a new study has found.
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