Surgery

A new report shows rising costs for prescription drugs and emergency room visits.

• By Candace Butera

In his work for the non-profit Uplift Internationale, Yrastorza has personally done about 100 facial surgeries, many on preschoolers.

• By Avital Andrews

The cheapest VR out there has already saved a life.

• By Elena Gooray

Or, asking ladies about penises.

• By Lisa Wade

Researchers find that doctors haven't heeded professional societies' advice to do less pre-operative testing.

• By Nathan Collins

A new meta-analysis of 138 previous studies finds different rates for different mistakes.

• By Francie Diep

A new analysis codes the reasons behind mistakes like operating on the wrong leg, or leaving a tool behind in a person's body.

• By Francie Diep

The side effects are significant, but mostly people feel fine afterwards.

• By Francie Diep

While coverage of Jahi McMath’s case usually focuses on what happened after her catastrophic brain injury, the events leading up to her procedure warrant just as much attention.

• By Alice Dreger & Helen Haskell

A firm sold 18,000 knee-replacement tools before the government called a halt. The OtisKnee case shows just how easily trust can be violated in the rapidly evolving world of medical devices, a thriving $110 billion-a-year industry.

• By Marshall Allen & Olga Pierce

Surgery is a fundamentally messy and stressful activity. When being a few millimeters off target can be life-changing, a surgeon needs to possess fierce concentration, unrelenting perfectionism, and, above all, staunch self-assurance.

• By Wen Shen

The former head of a prestigious Boston hospital found it unsettling that the surgical staff of an Illinois university medical center endorsed the medical device in an ad in the New York Times magazine. After he started asking questions, the hospital asked that the ad be suspended.

• By Charles Ornstein

This simple idea, encouraged by medical texts of the past that taught deviation from the norm would lead to confused sexuality and gender identity issues, has put a surprising number of babies under the knife.

• By Alice Dreger

There's no way to prove whether or not someone's had an out of body experience, but that hasn't stopped scientists from trying to study the phenomenon.

• By Katie Heaney

A survey of surgical residents found that limiting work hours not only compromises education but leads to worse care for patients.

• By Andrew Seaman