New research in the journal Fertility and Sterility suggests that a link between mental health and fertility may exist for women and men. The study involved data from 1,650 women and 1,608 men at six U.S. sites. While the number of men with major depression in the analysis was small — just 34 — an analysis found differences between them and the other men in the study. Those with major depression were 60 percent less likely to have a live birth than men who did not have major depression.

Kaiser Permanente to open med school

Kaiser Permanente, the health system that combines a nonprofit insurance plan with its own hospitals and clinics, announced that it would open its own medical school in 2019. The system's leaders said their central goal was to teach Kaiser's model of integrated care to a new generation of doctors who will be under pressure to improve health outcomes and control costs by working in teams and using technology. Its medical school, planned for Southern California, would be one of the first run by an integrated health system without an academic partner, said Dr. George E. Thibault, president of the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation.

Few at risk use lung cancer screening

Lung cancer screening has proved to be stunningly unpopular. Five years after government and private insurers started paying for it, less than 2 percent of eligible smokers have sought the free scans, researchers reported. Experts say possible explanations include worries about false alarms and follow-up tests, a doctor visit to get the scans covered, denial of the consequences of smoking and little knowledge that screening exists.

"People are not aware that this is a test that can actually save lives," said Dr. Richard Schilsky, chief medical officer of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. "It's not invasive, it's not painful, there's no prep, nothing has to be stuck into any body cavity," so to see so little use "is shocking."

A big study found that annual low-dose CT scans could find cases sooner and lower the risk of dying of lung cancer by 20 percent for those at highest risk. That's people ages 55 through 79 who smoked a pack of cigarettes a day for 30 years or the equivalent, such as two packs a day for 15 years.

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