Hospitals

BOSTON - As 3 o'clock neared Monday afternoon, officials at Brigham and Women's Hospital, one of Boston's premier medical centers, expected this year's marathon would be a nonevent. "We were winding down," said Barry Wante, the hospital's emergency management director. The slow pace was welcome after last year, when unseasonably warm weather led to a rash of heat injuries among runners, inundating the city's hospitals. Full coverage: Explosions at the Boston Marathon But on Monday, the hospital's radios suddenly crackled with reports from the finish line.

BOSTON - More than 144 people hurt in the Boston Marathon bombing were sent to hospitals, officials said, and three were killed. Seventeen of the injured were in critical condition Monday night.  The two bombs hundreds of yards apart created a "very powerful blast" that caused mostly lower-body injuries to bone, soft tissue and blood vessels, doctors said. Ten victims needed amputations. More will need surgery Tuesday, officials said. Also Tuesday, information is to be released about those who died in the blasts.

The leafy and historic neighborhoods just north of downtown Los Angeles feature bungalows perched on steep hillsides, businesses huddled on commercial streets and an iconic baseball stadium. But all are dominated by Elysian Park, the 600-acre expanse that makes up the city's oldest and second-largest park and serves as a backyard for many neighborhoods around it. And near the edge of that park sits the venerable Barlow Respiratory Hospital, a clutch of historic cottages and buildings on a pastoral 25 acres.

Kobe Bryant wasn't at Staples Center for obvious reasons Sunday. But his prerecorded message to teammates hung in the air of the Lakers' locker room after their 91-86 victory over the San Antonio Spurs. It can't be printed here, the curse words definitely of the stronger variety, but Bryant's appeal was delivered Saturday by a 30-second video recorded on General Manager Mitch Kupchak's cellphone. Kupchak visited him earlier that day before Bryant underwent surgery for a torn left Achilles' tendon.

WASHINGTON - The man who shot Ronald Reagan and three other men in 1981 has been behaving normally when he leaves the mental hospital in Washington, D.C., where he is being treated, according to Secret Service observations in newly released court documents. John Hinckley Jr., 57, shops at Wal-Mart, Target and PetSmart during visits to his mother's home in Williamsburg, Va. One of his first stops is often a Wendy's. At home with his mother, he performs lots of chores, plays guitar and makes art. He shows few of the symptoms that led to the 1982 finding that he was insane, and therefore not guilty of attempted murder and other charges in the assassination attempt.

Three middle school students in Orange County were  hospitalized Wednesday after eating a marijuana brownie while on campus, school officials said. It was the second such incident in as many months at a school in Costa Mesa. Two seventh-graders went to the front office at TeWinkle Middle School at 12:40 p.m., complaining of stomach problems, Newport-Mesa Unified School District spokeswoman Laura Boss said. A short time later, a third seventh-grader came to the office complaining of similar symptoms, she said.

The second of two hikers rescued after being lost for days in Orange County's brushy back country is in improved condition and will be released from the hospital Monday after being treated for dehydration and other injuries. Kyndall Jack, 18, was rescued from thick brush in the Trabuco Canyon area midday Thursday, the day after her hiking companion, Nicolas Cendoya, was found shoeless and disoriented. The two had become separated after taking off late Easter Sunday on what was to be a routine day hike toward Holy Jim Canyon, a moderate roundtrip trek of less than 3 miles.

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa -- South Africa's former president, Nelson Mandela, has been discharged from the hospital after 10 days undergoing treatment for pneumonia,  officials said Saturday. Mandela's discharge was a huge relief for South Africans, after the anti-apartheid hero was hospitalized with breathing difficulties last month. His late-night admission alarmed South Africans, who revere Mandela for his role in fighting apartheid and ushering in a period of reconciliation after the first democratic vote in 1994.

When Keith Yaskin and his wife, Loren, rushed their 2-year-old son to the hospital with a dangerous infection in his neck, they weren't thinking about how much his care would cost. After his three-day inpatient stay with nonstop intravenous antibiotics, they were hit with $8,900 in charges. But the toughest lesson for the Scottsdale, Ariz., couple came a month or so later when they began to sort out the hospital bills. Their insurance policy had a $10,000 deductible. So they scrutinized every item, made some calls and had a few surprises.