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My 7-year-old son, Carl, realized that it was Tuesday and asked why Robert was not coming to our house that day. Robert had been a caregiver for my husband, Ady Barkan, for more than five years, helping with Ady’s day-to-day activities as he became progressively paralyzed because of the neurodegenerative disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or A.L.S. (Rachael Scarborough King, 1/1)

While vital organs—and families—wait for a second chance at life, growing demand also prevent Americans from easily seeing a doctor. Today, the average wait to see a doctor is 26 days. That's a lifetime to receive care, and prolonged delays can have cascading consequences, whereby a whimpering flu evolves into a roaring pneumonia. (Derek Streat, 12/27)

In late 2017, Julie learned she had advanced ovarian cancer. Since then, she’d endured one nine-hour surgery, six rounds of chemo, three recurrences and two clinical trials. “Enough,” my sister told her oncologist a few days before her 61st birthday, in April of this year. “I’ve decided to end treatment,” she added, to make sure he understood, and then sang, off-key, the famous Carol Burnett song, “I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together.” She asked, “How much time do I have left?” His reply: “Two or three months, at the most.” (Stephen Petrow, 12/28)

2023 was a year of milestones and challenges in global public health. In May, I declared an end to COVID-19 as a public health emergency of international concern. This marked a turning point for the world following three years of crisis, pain and loss for people everywhere. (Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, 12/31)

The symptoms of empathic distress were originally diagnosed in health care, with nurses and doctors who appeared to become insensitive to the pain of their patients. Early researchers labeled it “compassion fatigue” and described it as “the cost of caring.” The theory was that seeing so much suffering is a form of vicarious trauma that depletes us until we no longer have enough energy to care. (Adam Grant, 1/1)

The enormous focus hospitals placed on preventing the spread of COVID-19 had little impact on the spread of other dangerous pathogens. Indeed, hospital-acquired infections surged during the pandemic, in some cases erasing a decade of progress preventing them. (Leah Binder, 1/2)

The blue muffin challenge. Food sensitivity tests. Microbiome test kits. Self-help gastrointestinal health is all the rage. Rightly so: One in four Americans is affected by digestive disorders. And we’re all eating worse, sleeping less, and experiencing more stress, leaving our guts feeling twisted. (Sameer Berry, 1/2)