By:Sandy Powers/DivineCaroline

In 2005, I had my yearly wellness check-up with my gynecologist.

“Breast exam fine,” he said. “If your Pap test is normal, I’ll send a card. Otherwise, I’ll call. And here’s your order for a mammogram.”

A scene repeated throughout the years but this time it was going to be different.

My Pap test came back negative. One down and one to go, I thought as I made my mammogram appointment. A few days after my mammogram, the radiologist called.

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27 (HealthDay News) -- Magnesium sulfate, given to mothers at risk of preterm delivery, cut the rate of cerebral palsy in their babies by nearly half, a new study found.

"If deemed to be at high or immediate risk of delivery prior to 32 weeks, women and their doctors should consider using magnesium sulfate to prevent their child from having cerebral palsy," said study lead author Dr. Dwight J. Rouse, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

The findings are published in the Aug. 28 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 20 (HealthDay News) -- Women who've experienced the pregnancy complication known as preeclampsia face a much greater risk of end-stage renal disease, new research suggests.

In fact, says the report in the Aug. 21 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, the rate of end-stage renal disease (ESRD) was between 3.2 and 15.5 times greater for women who had preeclampsia in pregnancy.

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 13 (HealthDay News) -- Three new reports challenge current guidelines on how long after cardiac death doctors must wait before taking a heart from an infant organ donor.

There's no question that organ donation saves lives, and there's also no question that there aren't enough donor organs to save everyone on the transplant list. However, deciding who is a suitable organ donor, particularly when the potential donor is an infant, is not so clear-cut.

THURSDAY, July 24 (HealthDay News) -- New research offers more evidence that a new AIDS drug brings significant benefits to patients who have failed other treatments.

The drug, known as raltegravir (Isentress), almost doubles the likelihood that patients will beat back the AIDS virus despite being immune to other medications, according to a study in the July 24 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

ATLANTA - An Oregon man, given less than a year to live, had a complete remission of advanced deadly skin cancer after an experimental treatment that revved up his immune system to fight the tumors.

The 52-year-old patient's dramatic turnaround was the only success in a small study, leading doctors to be cautious in their enthusiasm. However, the treatment reported in Thursday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine is being counted as the latest in a small series of successes involving immune-priming treatments against deadly skin cancers.

Scientists used gene therapy to improve vision in six people with a rare inherited disorder called Leber's congenital amaurosis, USA Today reported. The condition causes a gradual deterioration of eyesight beginning at birth, leading to blindness by a person's mid-20s.

By Amanda Gardner
EmpowHer's HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, April 23 (HealthDay News) -- U.S. researchers say they've confirmed that lots of the blood thinner heparin pulled from the market are contaminated with a man-made chemical called oversulfated chondroitin sulfate.

The findings were published online Wednesday in Nature Biotechnology.

And, according to a paper published online simultaneously in the New England Journal of Medicine, the same researchers state that regulators now have at their disposal a test to detect contaminated heparin.

By The New York Times

In an article in The New England Journal of Medicine, two leading researchers warn that the entry of big companies like Microsoft and Google into the field of personal health records could drastically alter the practice of clinical research and raise new challenges to the privacy of patient records.

The authors, Dr. Kenneth D. Mandl and Dr. Isaac S. Kohane, are longtime proponents of the benefits of electronic patient records to improve care and help individuals make smarter health decisions.