Cleveland Clinic

A yearlong study of boxers' and mixed martial-arts fighters' brain activity has found those who fight for more than six years begin to experience damage and those who fight longer than 12 years expose themselves to an even greater decline each time they return to the ring. "What we've found suggests changes and damage in the brain happens years before symptoms emerge," said Dr. Charles Bernick, author of the study. "It's what we see in Alzheimer's and Parkinson's patients. " Bernick has supervised MRIs and computerized and cognitive tests of an estimated 170 fighters at the Cleveland Clinic's Las Vegas center in the past year.

If you believe what you read in the cereal aisle, the right breakfast choice can lower your cholesterol — and cut your risk of heart disease. For the last few years, Cheerios boxes and ads have promoted the cereal's ability to help lower cholesterol; last year, for a time, ads promised the cereal could lower cholesterol by a very specific 4% in six weeks. (Cereal maker General Mills removed that particular claim from boxes after receiving a warning letter from the Food and Drug Administration in May stating that the claim had not been approved by the agency.

Like most card-carrying conservatives, Texas Gov. Rick Perry opposes research on embryonic pluripotent stem cells.   But the presidential candidate apparently has a very open mind toward therapies developed using adult stem cells, which can be collected from a patient's own body.  So open, in fact, that on July 1 he apparently received experimental stem cell surgery on his own back.  In the procedure, doctors removed some of Perry's fat cells,...

Bob Dole, the 1996 Republican presidential nominee, underwent an experimental procedure to treat an aneurysm in his aorta, the body's main blood vessel. Dole, 77, was recovering at the Cleveland Clinic after the treatment for an abdominal aortic aneurysm, a surgeon said. His wife, Elizabeth Hanford Dole, and his daughter were with him. Dole is expected to be released by the end of the week.

Yes, you read that right. A Chinese man had to have an eel surgically removed from his bladder after a mishap while undergoing an unusual spa treatment. Zhang Nan, a 56-year-old resident of Hubei province, was bathing with live eels, in the hopes that the tiny, serpentine critters would nibble away layers of dead skin, revealing more youthful-looking skin below. It's similar to those unusual pedicures that have fish eat dead skin off people's feet -- except that you're fully submerged, and you're probably naked, and there are eels all over you. Anyway, Nan felt a sharp pain, realized a 6-inch eel had entered his penis and was wriggling up through his urethra.

It seems like the pinnacle of medical science: For just a few hundred dollars, you can walk into just about any hospital in Southern California and ask a doctor to check your arteries for buildup of heart-attack-inducing calcium plaque. Most of the time, what goes on inside our bodies is a mystery, but there's something satisfying in the thought that a sophisticated piece of equipment can measure just how clogged our arteries really are (and how much more junk food we can afford, or not afford, to eat)

Cleveland Browns offensive guard Ted Banker underwent major surgery at the Cleveland Clinic on his left knee to repair a variety of injuries sustained in Sunday's 37-21 playoff loss in Denver. Banker, 28, will need to recuperate for 11 to 12 months, Browns spokesman Bob Eller said. Dr. John Bergfeld, the team physician, repaired a torn anterior cruciate, torn medial collateral ligament, torn posterior medial capsule ligament, partially torn kneecap tendon and torn lateral meniscus, Eller said.

An outbreak of Legionnaires' disease at a Ford Motor Co. castings plant claimed its second life late Friday when David Hinderman, 53, died at the Cleveland Clinic. Officials said Hinderman, who worked at the plant, had inhaled Legionnaires' bacteria spread by mist from contaminated water, suspected of emanating from a cooling tower being repaired at the suburban Brook Park facility.