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I started training to be a doctor in the aftermath of the gulf war. It was a dark time to commit to a career of healing. U.S. sanctions and relentless bombings had decimated our medical infrastructure and endangered our access to medical supplies. Surrounded by devastation, we fought to heal, to operate, to comfort — often with the barest of resources. Every day was a battle in itself, trying to save lives as our facilities crumbled around us. (Omar Dewachi, 12/16)

Eight years ago, I unexpectedly joined the other 38 million unpaid caregivers in the United States. The AARP estimates that 11.5 percent of the U.S. population are caring for family members in 2023. We are many, and somehow, we are still grossly overlooked and under supported in nearly every way. (Emma Nadler, 12/18)

When faced with a loved one’s progressive neurodegenerative disease, like Alzheimer’s, or your child’s rare respiratory disease, you question why researchers and resource-backed pharma cannot bring a drug to market quickly enough to help your loved ones. Many people faced with this horror get involved to fight for better treatments. (Jon Hu, 12/18)

It’s been a year of incredible change in healthcare, and there’s no reason to expect 2024 to be any different. (Mary Ellen Podmolik, 12/18)

Fidel Strub was 3 years old when his face began rotting away. “It’s hell. It’s like you have a burning face,” he told me. “You can’t even open your eyes because it’s just that bad. It’s just burning.” No one in his village in the West African country of Burkina Faso knew what was happening to him. His grandmother took him almost 200 miles for evaluation at a clinic, where, he said, the doctor “had absolutely no hope” that he would survive. This past summer, I had the chance to speak with Strub and several others to learn more about the little-known disease noma. (John Button, 12/16)