Julie Cherie Rodriguez died in her sleep last week at the University of Colorado Medical Center in Denver. Only 2 years old, Julie made surgical history by living for a record 13 months after a liver transplant, the most difficult organ transfer yet attempted. Death resulted from a recurrence of the cancer that first made the transplant necessary. The postmortem showed the new liver, despite some cancerous invasion, worked well to the last.

"Wanted: Employment as mercenary on full-time or job contract basis. Preferably in South or Central America, but anywhere in the world if you pay transportation. Contact Gearhart, Box 1457, Wheaton, Md. 20902." That ad appeared last January in Soldier of Fortune, a magazine aimed at military buffs and mercenaries. It got Daniel Gearhart, 34, a Viet Nam veteran who was deeply in debt from family medical bills, a job the next month as a mercenary in the Angolan civil war. ...

When I was a medical student, I worked with a doctor who lied. One day, she lied by ordering a kidney stone CT scan on a patient whom she thought had appendicitis. Let me explain. I was working in the emergency department with this physician Here was the rub: the type of CT scan used for possible appendicitis cases — a CT scan with contrast — is a time consuming process. The patient has to drink a container ...

For the first time in 13 days, a lull has descended upon the fierce fighting between armed tribesmen and forces loyal to Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The consistent shelling and gunfire in the capital city of Sana'a have been replaced by a tense quiet, with most residents still choosing to stay in their homes or flee to ancestral villages. After an attack on his presidential compound, Saleh, 69, is now lying in a Saudi hospital recovering from ...

Helen Clark of Kennebunk, Maine, is a smuggler of sorts. At 77, the retired registered nurse doesn't look the part. She still does volunteer work--administering flu shots, cutting toenails and organizing blood drives--at the Southern Maine Medical Center, where she worked for more than four decades, first in the maternity ward and later in the operating room. Clark is a model of frugality as well. She and her husband Dorrance raised 10 children on modest salaries. When he developed lung ...

"Gifted" researcher is punished for faking data "Dr. Darsee is clearly one of the most remarkable young men in American medicine. It is not extravagant to say that he became a legendary figure during his year as chief resident in medicine at Grady Memorial Hospital." With that exuberant commendation, Cardiologist Paul Walter of Emory University endorsed the selection of his former colleague John Darsee for one of the biggest plums in academic medicine: an appointment to the Harvard Medical School ...

The doctor was firm and combative. "There's no rational argument against this," said Dr. Kevorkian as he sat down with TIME's Midwest bureau chief Jon Hull. At the time, the Michigan legislature was rushing to make assisted suicide a crime punishable by four years in jail. But Kevorkian seemed unperturbed. Asked if he would defy the law, Kevorkian simply said, "I never speculate about the future. All I do is what's right for the patient." Ever since the passage of ...

A former animal research technician was sentenced Friday to 44 years in prison for killing a Yale University graduate student days before her wedding in 2009 after anguished relatives described how plans to celebrate her marriage suddenly turned to unimaginable grief as they returned home with her in a coffin. Raymond Clark III, 26, apologized in New Haven Superior Court for strangling 24-year-old Annie Le of Placerville, Calif. Her body was found upside ...

Melinda Amedee was scheduled to have a tumor removed from her kidney at a New Orleans hospital on August 30. She lives far enough away from the city to have missed serious damage from Hurricane Katrina. But when the 17th Street Canal levee broke the day before, she knew she wouldn't be having an operation at the Ochsner Cancer Institute anytime soon. With a 25-year history of kidney problems, Amedee, 39, was worried about the delay, and ...

Health care in America is suffering a total nervous breakdown, but it isn't just because doctors are striking and maternity wards are closing. Health-care premiums are rising at unsustainable rates. Some economists estimate that unnecessary tests and procedures, ordered by doctors to build a record just in case there is a lawsuit, cost more than $100 billion a year--enough to provide health insurance for the 40 million Americans who have no coverage. Modern medical technology is bringing us miracle cures, ...