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Lesbian and bisexual women are disproportionately overweight in comparison with heterosexual women. But if doctors offered more targeted health guidance, could it help? To try to answer that question, researchers enrolled women who self-identified as both overweight and lesbian or bisexual in a study in which doctors stressed health care interventions specifically tailored to them. Focus groups suggested, for instance, that lesbian and bisexual women generally did not respond well to weight-loss appeals emphasizing appearance or body size. The study was published in Women’s Health Issues. (Samuel, 7/8)

The story is a familiar one: the saga of a loving parent's quest to save a child. This time it's about the mother of a boy with autism. The mother scours the medical literature in search of any kind of treatment, however far-fetched and experimental. She finds one that seems promising, something involving magnetic fields, and moves mountains to get it for her son as part of a research protocol. Then, seeing that it helps, she devotes herself to getting more of it. Ultimately the mother starts a foundation to promote research into the new treatment, hoping to prove its value and one day make it part of standard care, not just for her son but for other children with autism, too. This particular version of the story, though, is tinged with irony. (Marantz Henig, 7/9)

Lighting in tune with your body clock, a vitamin-infused showerhead, on-demand aromatherapy, custom blackout shades, filtered tap water, air purifiers that remove pollen, pet dander, and your neighbor’s unwelcome cooking odors ... These amenities are all part of a wellness pilot program at a new apartment building in Cambridge. The developers want to see whether renters come sniffing around or just sniff at it. Fuse Cambridge, a 244-unit apartment building in the Fresh Pond neighborhood that opened June 22, is offering options that go beyond the usual standards associated with “healthy” buildings. (O'Leary, 7/9)

With more than 120,000 people on the national waiting list for a kidney or other donated organ — but only about 30,000 transplants performed each year — new moves are getting underway to try to ease the critical shortage. Efforts range from smartphone apps letting would-be donors register with a few clicks, to helping transplant centers use some organs that today would be discarded for fear they're not good enough. (Neergaard, 7/11)

Early-onset Alzheimer's strikes less than 5% of all people with the degenerative brain disease. But the death of legendary college basketball coach Pat Summitt, who was diagnosed at age 59, has turned a new spotlight on the issue. Here are a few commonly asked questions about early-onset Alzheimer's. (Smith, 7/7)

As early detection technology outpaces the ability to distinguish innocuous cancers from dangerous ones, some fields of oncology are grappling with "overtreatment" and "overdiagnosis." In other words, treating cancer more aggressively than needed for a cure, or worse, treating tumors that would never cause harm if left undiagnosed. (McCullough, 7/10)

A new study on the worst pollution event in recorded history, what’s known as the London Smog, finds a staggering link between pollution and asthma. ...In the study, the youngest Londoners turned out to be five times more likely to have asthma. Nearly 25 percent of those in London during the Great Smog reported having asthma; those not in the city at the time reported a 5 percent rate. (Tong, 7/8)

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's drinking water standard for nitrates is 10 parts per million — picture a bucket with 1 million drops inside, 10 of which are nitrates instead of water. Water at the Dublin Road plant, which usually contains 5 to 6 parts per million, rose above that threshold, triggering the advisory. ... The advisory was lifted five days later. But for some, questions linger. What problems do excessive nitrates actually pose? And why wasn't everyone cautioned to avoid the tap water? (Kurtzman, 7/11)