Medicine

An illustration of the vagus nerve’s location in the human body.

The vagus nerve does it all—tells your lungs to breathe, controls your heart rate, and even forms the foundation for a whole new medical field.

Nurse Agnes from Uganda’s Bwindi Community Hospital prepares a vaccination against measles.

Before the measles vaccine, there were between 3 and 4 million cases in the U.S. per year. Now, it’s less than 500.

A detail of Edvard Munch’s ‘The Sick Child,’ a portrait of his sister who died of tuberculosis at age 15.

Tuberculosis may seem like a historic malady, but it’s still the world’s deadliest infectious disease. Here’s what you need to know about its past and current outbreaks.

Spoiler alert: They’re still around.

Several factors make people more susceptible to the flu in winter.

Like clockwork, flu viruses seem to strike more people in winter than in any other season—and there are several reasons for that.

George Washington died after his physician treated his sore throat with bloodletting, but don't let that stop you from learning more about the human circulatory system.

The dogs who pulled off the Nome Serum run might have looked a little bit like this.

From January 27, 1925 until February 2, 20 mushers and 150 dogs heroically transported desperately needed diphtheria antitoxin to the remote town of Nome, Alaska, saving countless lives in the process. But the event wasn’t without controversy.

Feeling like garbage? That’s your immune system at work.

Without our immune system, we wouldn't last very long: this complex network of organs and cells fights off pathogens and helps maintain our health.

The super-contagious gastrointestinal virus is causing outbreaks across the U.S. Here's how to protect yourself (and everyone around you) from norovirus.

The world of medicine is even stranger than you can imagine.

From Alice in Wonderland Syndrome to the real-life version of Benjamin Button’s disease, these rare conditions could come straight out of a storybook.

The 5500-year-old trepanned skull of a woman now displayed in a Swiss museum.

The practice of drilling or scraping a hole into the skull’s cranial vault has been performed for thousands of years.

Get tips for what to pack in a go-bag, including the essentials you should definitely have stashed away before a natural disaster strikes.

MRSA bacteria bound to a neutrophil, a type of infection-fighting white blood cell.

Public health officials are concerned that we could move back into a situation like that of the early 20th century, before antibiotics were discovered.

Winter is synonymous with dry and flaky skin, but we don’t recommend treating it with these ancient recipes for body lotion.

Searching for ideas on what to spend your FSA funds on this year? Consider these.

Unsure how to spend your FSA money? From new glasses to over-the-counter (OTC) medication, here are some health products you can purchase using FSA funds.

Not only is the liver your largest internal organ; it is in charge of hundreds of bodily processes ranging from fighting infection to manufacturing proteins and hormones to helping your blood clot.

Up to 70 percent of people have experienced hypnic jerks, but they’re usually nothing to worry about.

A doctor checks a young girl for swollen tonsils.

You might think they’re unnecessary, because so many people have had their tonsils removed—but tonsils actually serve an important role in your immune system.

Super-thin pasta has medical usefulness.

It's 200 times thinner than human hair, and you won't find it at Olive Garden anytime soon.

This ancient symbol, also called the Staff of Hermes, depicts two snakes intertwining around a stick that is capped by wings. It’s used as a medical logo, but for almost all its roughly 5000-year history, the caduceus had nothing to do with medicine.