Conditions and diseases

7,003 articles · Since 2005

Physicians writing on KevinMD about the diseases they treat and the people who have them: cancer and its screening arguments, pain and the drugs that treat it, diabetes and the obesity argument, mental illness and who gets treated for it, and the decisions at the end of a life. Five maintained records draw on this archive: Cancer: what physicians say, in their own words, Opioids: what physicians and pain patients say, in their own words, End of life: what physicians say, in their own words, Diabetes and obesity: what physicians say, in their own words, and Mental health: what psychiatrists and physicians say, in their own words.

Latest articles

A nerve block checklist cannot replace the final pause

Dr. Girishkumar Modi

November 7, 2026Nov 7, 2026

A nerve block may involve a small needle and a carefully chosen injection, but its final safety decision is larger than either. The patient may be correctly identified, the consent signed, the intended side marked, and the ultrasound machine ready. Yet one question remains until the procedure begins: Did the people about to perform the block actually stop and agree that this is the correct patient, side, and procedure?

In regional …

The infant gut microbiome shapes health for decades

Savita Srivastava, MD

November 6, 2026Nov 6, 2026

When you're expecting your first child, your mind is naturally consumed by the big, tangible details: assembling the crib, choosing a car seat, and debating baby names. But beneath the surface of those exciting preparations, an invisible, high-stakes biological process…

When you’re expecting your first child, your mind is naturally consumed by the big, tangible details: assembling the crib, choosing a car seat, and debating baby names. But beneath the surface of those exciting preparations, an invisible, high-stakes biological process is taking place. From the moment of birth through a child’s second birthday, an entire microscopic ecosystem is taking root inside their body.

As physicians, our clinical training conditions us to …

First dialysis treatment in the hospital: what to expect

Henry Mercines, RN

November 6, 2026Nov 6, 2026

If you're reading this from a hospital bed, you might still be asking yourself how you got here. A lot of my patients tell me they never thought it would come to this, that dialysis was something that happened to…

If you’re reading this from a hospital bed, you might still be asking yourself how you got here. A lot of my patients tell me they never thought it would come to this, that dialysis was something that happened to other people. If you feel that way, nothing is wrong with you. Denial is normal. It just means this is big, and your heart is still catching up to what …

Real physician voices, twice a week

Free, and one click to unsubscribe.

Homocysteine and glutathione: the detox link we skip

Dan Purser, MD

November 6, 2026Nov 6, 2026

Most conversations about a homocysteine genetic problem stop at the blood number, the methylation genes, or a vitamin plan. That misses the backside. Homocysteine sits at a biochemical fork. One branch remethylates it back toward methionine. The other, transsulfuration, feeds cysteine into the making of glutathione, the body’s main intracellular antioxidant and a central Phase II detox carrier.

In my practice, I believe transsulfuration supplies well over half, and often most, …

Sedation after intubation cannot be an afterthought

Dr. Girishkumar Modi

November 6, 2026Nov 6, 2026

An emergency intubation can create a moment of relief. The breathing tube is in place, its position is confirmed, and the ventilator is supporting a patient who may have been deteriorating only minutes earlier. But the procedure has not answered another urgent question: What happens when the drug that made the patient unconscious wears off, especially if the drug preventing movement is still working?

In anesthesiology, paralysis, sedation, and pain relief …

What the 2026 MI definition means for myocardial injury

Dr. Tarik Alsalih

November 5, 2026Nov 5, 2026

An elevated cardiac troponin level often changes the trajectory of a clinical encounter. A patient presents with pneumonia, severe anemia, tachycardia, hypoxemia, or another acute illness, and the troponin comes back above the laboratory's upper reference limit. The immediate question…

An elevated cardiac troponin level often changes the trajectory of a clinical encounter. A patient presents with pneumonia, severe anemia, tachycardia, hypoxemia, or another acute illness, and the troponin comes back above the laboratory’s upper reference limit. The immediate question is often: “Is this a myocardial infarction?” The answer is not necessarily.

The Fifth Universal Definition of Myocardial Infarction (UDMI), released in 2026 by the European Society of Cardiology, American …

When a failed newborn heart screen reveals something rare

Srinivasarao Badugu, MD

November 5, 2026Nov 5, 2026

A newborn failed her routine screening for critical congenital heart disease. What followed was a journey through one of the rarest forms of congenital heart disease, and a reminder of how a simple screening test, followed by the right clinical response, can change the course of a child’s life. The infant had been born near term by urgent cesarean delivery after concerns developed about the fetal heart rate tracing. After …

Depression in men often doesn’t look like sadness

Neurolief

November 4, 2026Nov 4, 20262

Men are less likely to be diagnosed with depression, less likely to seek treatment, and yet also die by suicide at roughly four times the rate of women. Those three facts tell one story. Together they describe a system that…

We miss it because we’re looking for sadness. In men, depression often shows up as something else.

What depression can …

A spouse says it’s early dementia. The patient looks fine.

Francisco M. Torres, MD

November 4, 2026Nov 4, 20262

When I learned that Sir Patrick Stewart had passed away following a "brief and poignant journey" with Alzheimer's disease and Lewy body dementia, I didn't think of Captain Picard. Instead, I thought of the husbands and wives who sit in…

When I learned that Sir Patrick Stewart had passed away following a “brief and poignant journey” with Alzheimer’s disease and Lewy body dementia, I didn’t think of Captain Picard. Instead, I thought of the husbands and wives who sit in my exam room, worried something is wrong, even when the person next to them looks perfectly fine to me.

The phrase “brief journey” caught my attention and made me reflect. …

Why delirium after surgery is easy to miss in older adults

Dr. Girishkumar Modi

November 3, 2026Nov 3, 20264

An older patient who tries to climb out of bed after surgery usually draws attention. Someone lying quietly, answering slowly, or turning away from conversation may draw much less. The second patient may be recovering normally. But if that behavior is new, it can also be a sign of delirium. The absence of agitation should never be mistaken for proof that attention and awareness have returned to normal.

Delirium is a …

TMS vs. Spravato: which to try first for depression

Ravi Singareddy, MD

November 3, 2026Nov 3, 2026

Most of us know the moment. A patient has failed two, sometimes three, adequate antidepressant trials, maybe an augmentation agent too. They are still depressed, often demoralized, and now asking, sometimes skeptically, what comes next. For two decades, the honest…

For two decades, the honest answer was “another medication,” with modest expectations. In STAR*D, fewer than 15 percent of patients reached remission with a third medication trial. Two FDA-authorized options have changed that conversation: transcranial magnetic …

Why doctors should order the homocysteine test more often

Dan Purser, MD

November 2, 2026Nov 2, 2026

Every week I meet a patient who has already done everything "right." They've had the annual physical, the lipid panel, and the metabolic panel. They're still sick: tired, foggy, inflamed, and sometimes carrying a fatty liver that nobody can explain.…

Every week I meet a patient who has already done everything “right.” They’ve had the annual physical, the lipid panel, and the metabolic panel. They’re still sick: tired, foggy, inflamed, and sometimes carrying a fatty liver that nobody can explain. And nobody has checked their homocysteine or asked whether their methylation genetics might be part of the story.

I’ve come to believe that this gap is one of the more fixable …

What causes the orgasm gap, and how can couples close it?

Neil Baum, MD & Sam Siddighi, MD

November 2, 2026Nov 2, 20262

Everyone, both men and women, deserves to experience an orgasm or the climax of sexual arousal. There are several disparities between men and women, including longevity between men and women, gender pay disparity, and orgasm disparity. The orgasm gap, or pleasure gap, is a social phenomenon referring to the general inequality between heterosexual men and women in terms of sexual satisfaction, more specifically, the unequal frequency in the achievement of …

TMS and esketamine work. Community clinics are the test.

Ravi Singareddy, MD

November 1, 2026Nov 1, 2026

For most of the past two decades, community practice has managed treatment-resistant depression (TRD) the way STAR*D described: one medication after another, with remission rates falling below 15 percent by the third trial. Repetitive and deep transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), FDA-cleared since 2008, and intranasal esketamine (Spravato), approved in 2019, have changed what a community psychiatrist can offer. In pooled trial data and in real-world cohorts, the two …

Organ cryopreservation could ease the organ shortage

Rao M. Uppu, PhD

November 1, 2026Nov 1, 2026

Nature's own cryoengineering Here is the story of the wood frog, nature's cryoengineer, a little animal that many may find interesting. I talk about this often in my molecular toxicology class. The wood frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) lives across the northern…

Nature’s own cryoengineering

Here is the story of the wood frog, nature’s cryoengineer, a little animal that many may find interesting. I talk about this often in my molecular toxicology class. The wood frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) lives across the northern United States and Canada, all the way into Alaska. It is one of the few amphibians known to live north of the Arctic Circle. What makes this frog special is something …

Menopause and hearing: the missing piece in women’s health

HearUSA

October 30, 2026Oct 30, 2026

Women are encouraged to pay closer attention to their health during perimenopause and menopause. From monitoring changes in sleep, mood, bone density, and cardiovascular health, to having conversations with their health care providers about what to expect, there's one important…

Hearing is fundamental to how we navigate the world, maintain relationships, and participate in our communities. Yet because hearing changes often develop gradually, they …

Chronic pain and cognitive decline feed each other

Kayvan Haddadan, MD

October 30, 2026Oct 30, 2026

Chronic pain and cognitive impairment frequently coexist in older adults, creating a self-reinforcing loop that accelerates functional decline, increases disability, and reduces quality of life. More than half of patients in pain clinics report cognitive difficulties, and roughly 45 to 50 percent of people living with dementia experience chronic pain. Longitudinal evidence demonstrates that persistent pain is associated with accelerated cognitive decline and elevated dementia risk. In a large nationally …

Lianne Mandelbaum, PT, on food allergy safety: a KevinMD subscriber spotlight

Subscriber Spotlight by KevinMD

October 30, 2026Oct 30, 2026

Lianne Mandelbaum, PT, is a physical therapist and a leading advocate for airline safety measures to protect food-allergic passengers. She is president of No Nut Traveler, a food allergy nonprofit, and airline correspondent for Allergic Living. She has published 18…

…

3 pediatric migraine traps that keep kids in pain

Deb Mojumder, MD, PhD

October 30, 2026Oct 30, 20262

On a recent Monday morning, 13-year-old Maya sat at her family's kitchen table with the blinds pulled shut, shielding her eyes from the sliver of sun cutting across the counter. Her breakfast sat untouched. She pressed both palms into her…

On a recent Monday morning, 13-year-old Maya sat at her family’s kitchen table with the blinds pulled shut, shielding her eyes from the sliver of sun cutting across the counter. Her breakfast sat untouched. She pressed both palms into her temples, dreading the first-period math test she was about to miss.

Her mother, exhausted after months of watching these episodes escalate, spotted a crumpled candy wrapper from the night before. She …

What a penile filler death should teach us about safety

TJ Tsay, MD

October 29, 2026Oct 29, 2026

Igho "Tiny" Ubiribo was forty-three when he died after receiving penile filler injections in Bangkok. My condolences go to his wife and family. As we discuss what happened, I want to be mindful of the pain they are going through.…

Igho “Tiny” Ubiribo was forty-three when he died after receiving penile filler injections in Bangkok. My condolences go to his wife and family. As we discuss what happened, I want to be mindful of the pain they are going through.

His death made headlines because he was known publicly. But the questions it raises matter to anyone considering this procedure. We should be asking the same questions even if this case …

Conditions and diseases

Latest articles

Real physician voices, twice a week

The Podcast

Latest episodes

Most popular

The Podcast

Latest episodes

Most popular