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That's what an 83 year old woman in Belgium did. Her seriously infected jaw needed to be removed, but reconstructive surgery would have been too dangerous for such an elderly patient. That's when the doctors fired up the 3D printer. More »
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Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is an incredibly complex disease — both in terms of treatment, and society's view of it. While some even go so far as to claim it doesn't exist, there's still a huge amount of research going into the topic, including trying to pick apart what might trigger the disorder. And now, new research published by the Mayo Clinic seems to have spotted one possible cause for the disease. More »
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For 21 years, 34-year-old Wang Youping of China's Shaanxi Province hasn't been able to shut his mouth due to his giant tongue. More »
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This may just be a less savory medical paper than the case of the STD-giving blow-up doll. In a recent study — "Subcutaneous Penile Insertion of Domino Fragments by Incarcerated Males in Southwest United States Prisons: A Report of Three Cases" — from the Journal of Sexual Medicine, researchers investigated a series of dire events that had nothing to do with a Van Morrison song: More »
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For years, the US Department of Health and Human Services has distributed brochures like this one to people who are considering surgery. The packets are full of things you need to know and questions you should ask your surgeon before going under the knife. More »
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The Garamantian civilization of ancient North Africa survived and thrived in the Sahara Desert from 1,100 BCE to 600 CE. Three newly discovered skull reveal that the Garamantians practiced medicine. Unfortunately, it involved making tiny holes in people's skulls. More »
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From the British Medical Journal, Aug 27, 1949, where Dr. B.B. Rapackl describes a case he encountered in Poland in 1936. More »
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The 1974 movie The Terminal Man is one of those quiet, slow-moving masterpieces of early 1970s science fiction... and then you get to a totally horrific, violent scene like this one, where the main character's brain implant finally goes wrong. More »
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In this cheeky little video, PhD at the Johns Hopkins University Laboratory for Computational Sensing and Robotics use their high-tech da Vinci Surgical System to rig a game of Operation. It's also pretty good at sewing footballs and peeling grapes. More »
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Last year, some brave minds realized that, "To the best of our knowledge, there have been no previous studies evaluating the correlation of the US economy and hand surgery volume." I know, I'm shocked too. So they set out to determine whether the amount of hand surgeries could predict the strength or weakness of the US economy. The answer may surprise you. More »
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And that is a scary, scary thing. A very old textbook shows how noses were re-shaped in the late fifteen hundreds. More »
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Medical science finally has an answer to an age-old, all-important question: how do you free a trapped penis from a PVC pipe? Our male readers may want to keep this paper handy...you know, just in case. More »
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For aesthetic reasons, plastic surgeons are sometimes required to re-position male nipples – after dramatic weight-loss for example. In such a case they are presented, in effect, with a substantially blank canvas. More »
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A recent historical survey reports that men who've undergone a penectomy will occasionally experience a phantom John Thomas, and it's usually not a painful experience. In fact, some men will experience phantom erections and illusory ejaculation. What a silver lining! More »
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In 1999, an accidental shotgun blast severely damage the face of 16-year-old Chrissy Steltz. 11 years later, Steltz was fitted for a prosthetic face that allows her to go out in public without wearing her usual cloth facial mask. More »
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Need to see a thousand meters in the dark? Want one eye that's perfect for reading and another for long distances? Some eye surgeons are already at work reshaping corneas not only to fix patients' vision, but fit their careers. More »
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The next time you have to go under the knife, a robot may be doing the cutting. Engineers at Duke University are pushing the envelope of cutting edge surgery with a robot arm they've built that can perform simple procedures all by itself. The system guides itself using 3-d ultrasound imaging as its eyes, and has shown it can accurately guide two needle probes through tissue in a simulated biopsy and blood vessel graft. The bot's still in its experimental phase, but ultrasound specialist Stephen Smith and his research team believe the day is near when robots will autonomously conduct surgery without the need for human guidance. More »
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Organ failure is one of those annoying problems many of us face — often sooner than we want to. The good news is that there are a lot of organs you can live without. You probably already know, for example, that your appendix and tonsils can be removed entirely without any harm done. But there are several other organs you can live without, or replace with synthetics, that you didn't know about. Get ready for a body without organs in our helpful guide to five organs you can can get rid of. More »
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Today a man in Finland has a new jaw, thanks to specially-treated stem cells harvested from his fatty tissues and grown in his stomach. It's not the first time researchers have grown bones inside a stomach (we featured a picture of some bioengineered teeth grown in rats' stomachs), but it's the first successful surgery of this type with a human. A group of Finnish doctors today announced the transplant was successful and that nobody looking at the patient would be able to tell that he'd had the procedure done. More »
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Two-year-old Lakshmi Tatma, the impoverished Indian girl who had a "parastic twin" removed from her body last week, is being used as PR by her surgical team. It seems Lakshmi, who was reportedly hailed as a reincarnated goddess in her village and, more menacingly, sought for purchase by a circus, can't escape the limelight. More »
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Washboard abs, previously available only through a diet of one grape a day plus forty billion situps at night, are now available through convenient day surgery. However, you have to be in fairly good shape already in order to get this, which makes us wonder if it's all worth it. When we want our body modification, we want it now. More »
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