Katherine Hobson

People are often told to follow a rehabilitation program following surgery to speed recovery. But starting weeks before going under the knife might help them regain function even faster.

So-called "prehabilitation" to prepare someone for an upcoming stressful event has been used quite a bit in orthopedic surgery, Dr. ...

Graphs and formulas say "Science!" to consumers, so much so that simply seeing claims about a new drug that were accompanied by data visualizations made people more likely to believe the claims.

The effect is especially true if people have a strong belief in science to begin with.

That's the ...

There's increasing evidence that interval training, which involves alternating short bursts of harder exercise with easier recovery periods, delivers more health benefits than exercising at a steady rate.

But if you've tried it, you may have decided that exercising quite hard, even for short periods of time, is about as ...

More and more kids are being diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and many are medicated — often with stimulant drugs like Ritalin or Adderall.

With so many children taking these drugs, plenty of parents and doctors are concerned about potential side effects, including the possibility of ...

Schools can be a great breeding ground for colds, stomach viruses, the flu and other bugs kids (and their parents) would rather not get.

Researchers wanted to know whether the transmission of those baddies could be reduced by telling elementary school children to use hand sanitizer in addition to the ...

After winning the Tour de France last Sunday, Vincenzo Nibali was tested for a bunch of performance-enhancing substances. But Nibali and his fellow competitors were welcome to have several cups of coffee (or cans of Red Bull), before their ride into Paris; caffeine is not on the World Anti-Doping Agency's ...

When a runner's heart stops during a marathon, it gets a lot of press – even though it's actually a pretty rare event. A more common killer among runners, and a condition that needs more prevention efforts, is heat stroke, according to a study by Israeli researchers.

During a 2011 ...

Kids can be cruel, especially about weight. So you might think overweight or obese children know all too well that they're heavy — thanks to playground politics. But that's not necessarily so, according to government data covering about 6,100 kids and teens ages 8-15.

About 30 percent "misperceived" their weight ...

Americans are waiting longer to become parents. Whatever the pros and cons of that trend, here's some potentially good news for those older moms: They may be more likely to live longer.

Women who had their last child after the age of 33 had twice the odds of "exceptional longevity" ...

When NPR photographer David Gilkey was headed off to Cuba to shoot some of our stories, I told him, as his photo editor, that there was one cliché he should absolutely avoid: cars.

He talked about it with weekend host Scott Simon (which you can listen to above). ...

There has been a major effort in the past several years to reduce the rate of early elective deliveries. Those are births that for no medical reason are hastened by inducing labor or performing a cesarean section before the pregnancy has reached 39 weeks of gestation.

While those last ...

Everybody dies.

But when doctors' time is up, they are different from the rest of us. They "go gently" rather than opt for aggressive end-of-life treatments, as one physician wrote a few years ago. They have seen the suffering of their patients at the end of life and want ...

Ask anyone who's dealt with a crabby toddler at the end of the day: Little kids need a lot of sleep. The National Sleep Foundation says that 1- to 3-year-olds, for example, generally need 12 to 14 hours of shut-eye a day.

Coming up short does more than put ...

If you're a teenage athlete, or the parent of one, you probably live in fear of a torn anterior cruciate ligament, one of the knee's key stabilizing ligaments.

A torn ACL often requires surgical repair. But so-called neuromuscular training programs can cut the risk of a serious ACL injury and ...

About a year ago, pediatric otolaryngologist Blake Papsin went into a patient's room at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. He was surprised by the roar of a sleep machine the parents had brought to help their child conk out amid the beeps and buzzes of the hospital.

When Jessica Green competed in roller derby, she wondered how training, socializing and colliding with other roller girls could be affecting her health in invisible ways.

As a member of the Emerald City Roller Girls, Green went by "Thumper Biscuit" on the track, but she is also the director of ...