Heart

Hernias are a common ailment among Americans; more than 4 million people develop the painful condition. And although both men and women develop hernias, female patients may be harder to diagnose. Doctors and patients may not realize the abdominal pain a woman is feeling is because of a hernia. Dr. Hien Nguyen, assistant professor of surgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said the pain can be mistaken for other conditions with similar symptoms, such as adhesions from prior surgery, endometriosis, fibroids and ovarian cysts.

Congress passes laws and usually the appropriate agency can write regulations implementing the law. However, the regulations cannot contradict the law. Nevertheless, with respect to the tax law provision 501(c)(4), that is exactly what happened. Under this provision, the government provides a tax exemption to nonprofit organizations who operate exclusively for social welfare ("White House aide: Obama didn't know of IRS policy," May 20). The implementing regulation and the advice from the IRS is self-contradictory.

Elizabeth Warren is a native of Oklahoma, but she might as well be from Baltimore based on the reception the city gave her Thursday night. She spoke at a town hall meeting held by Rep. Elijah E. Cummings to talk about the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau she’s setting up. Given the big applause and standing ovation, you might assume that there wasn’t a banker or anyone from the industry in the crowd. But not true. Kathleen Murphy, president of the Maryland Bankers Association, sat in the first row. Cummings gave a shout out to Murphy for coming to the event.

Love your pet with all your heart? It may not be just an emotional thing. Researchers said recently that having a pet may help reduce heart disease in humans. The American Heart Association released a study that said pet ownership, especially dog ownership, is associated with a decreased risk of heart disease and increased survival among patients. Why is dog ownership more beneficial? Experts said it's probably because owning a pooch provides cardiovascular benefits -- all those walks and games of fetch add up!

For the last year and a half, this column has focused on a wide variety of home and garden stories—how to pick the best flooring for your needs, and what colors are going to be trendy next year, a behind-the-front-door glimpse into some of Baltimore's most intriguing residences. Unlike many of my colleagues, I have gotten to tell happy stories. I hope I have been entertaining and helpful along the way. So in this, my last column (at least for now), don't expect some tawdry expose of how people "really live" behind closed doors.

We bought our house almost 30 years ago, but even then the real estate agent was selling us on the big kitchen — relatively speaking. The dining room and the living room were no bigger than sandboxes, but she made the point that families never spend much time in those formal rooms anyway. So the builder had devoted most of the first-floor space to the kitchen, with room for a table and chairs, a highchair and a toddler's playthings. All these years later, the kitchen — the heart of the home, I think — has officially morphed into an entertainment area, where friends and family gather while the cook cooks.

Sometimes, it's the small things that make you happy about where you are. Here's what I mean. It was an early spring day and I was walking back from the post office when I heard a bunch of commotion from kids, so I crossed the street to steer clear of it, anticipating the worst. As I progressed up the street a bit further, I saw what the racket was. Like a row of teeth with one knocked out, there was a grass lot in the line of row homes where a house used to be (it blew up a few years back, and now it's just an empty grass lot)

I t's Valentine's Day 2010, and Janet of Janet's World is nowhere to be found. Apparently, she has taken the day off to engage in a love fest of activities. These include, but are not limited to: cooking with chocolate, watching romantic comedies and writing the kind of sappy poetry she penned while growing up in a constant state of crushes on guys who could not possibly know she existed - from David Cassidy of "The Partridge Family" to Ron Howard of "Happy Days." In her stead, a special guest columnist appears today, Aunt Tenaj, who will answer your urgent, family-friendly love questions.

Washington. -- For a quick course in why health-care spending continually eludes stringent efforts at cost control, consider a family of wondrous mechanical devices headed for the medical marketplace to take over from failing hearts -- which now number 700,000 a year in the United States.There's a long way to go in perfecting these devices, but they are already considerably more sophisticated and effective than the cumbersome Jarvik-7 artificial hearts that created a sensation in the 1980s.

ONCE THERE lived a teacher who enjoyed working with children. Frequently the teacher said that she preferred the company of children to adults. Every day, she would teach her students and at night head home feeling tired but happy. At about the beginning of April, just as the earth was starting to smell like daffodils and butterflies, a scary thing happened. After a wonderful day in the classroom, the teacher went home feeling ill. She did not feel too bad at first - just a little different, as if she had a small tickle in the back of her throat.

After more than 100 pitches, the fastball had lost some steam and the breaking ball that baffled batters earlier in the game didn't have the same snap. South River senior pitcher Scott Mitchell, his dirty jersey showing the effects of an already demanding day, took a deep breath as pitching coach Gary Gubbings approached the mound for a second visit in the seventh inning. "Can you get this last guy out?" Gubbings asked as he looked the No. 5 Seahawks' ace in the eyes. Mitchell's response was quick and direct: "I got him. " With two runners on against No. 10 Severna Park in an Anne Arundel County matchup, Mitchell threw a high fastball that Falcons second baseman Danny Fulton swung through for the third strike to end the Seahawks' 2-1 win in early April.

As a high school head wrestling coach for 34 years and a high school and college wrestler before that, it isn't hard to pin down Bill Hyson when it comes to talking about the sport. "Wrestling is an unique ...sport," said Hyson, a coach and teacher at Francis Scott Key High School. "In wrestling, you're putting it all out there on the mat. " The sport that places strict demands on an athlete on and off the mat, especially in terms of diet and conditioning, has been part of Hyson's life since he arrived at the school in Union Bridge in the early 1970s.

The devil may have taken Skylar Marion away, his father says, but God had to figure out how to spread him around. Skylar, a 15-year-old Chesapeake High School freshman who loved to tinker with bicycles and spend time outdoors, was killed in a hit-and-run just a quarter-mile from his home in Pasadena in April. The driver of the vehicle that hit him has yet to be found. But in a turn of events that surprised two families in the tight-knit Pasadena community, part of Skylar will continue to live on. His heart, transplanted into the body of an ailing friend, will bind two families together for the rest of their lives.

Few Americans are on the road more than the manager of a major league baseball team. But Buck Showalter, the Orioles' famously persevering manager, rarely stays put even in the offseason, when he's canvassing the country for new talent. After all, being stagnant would never have earned him two American League Manager of the Year awards or helped him turn around the Orioles' 14-year stretch of losing seasons. His most recent motivator? "When we [the Orioles] were leaking a little oil in mid-season (2012)

Jamila Ward and Lionel Jennings had been house hunting on and off for two years when their agent pointed the couple in a new direction: a formerly condemned property in a revitalized area of Baltimore. Some city neighborhoods, just years ago marked by abandoned or deteriorating single-family homes, are becoming places of renewal, with nonprofit agencies buying up properties and renovating them for sale to first-time homebuyers. Ward and Jennings, her fiance, qualified for one of these properties in the Johnston Square neighborhood on the city's east side.

"Come casual … dine fine. " That's the motto sprinkled across Christopher Daniel's menu and signage. The concept - good food served in a low-key setting - is a worthy one. But while the service is top-notch, the food portion of "fine" dining needs a boost. The restaurant has been popular since its opening in 2005, though during our visit on a Wednesday evening the Timonium space was only about half full. Even with a big table of chatty women, the atmosphere was hushed, making the conservatively decorated space feel more formal than "come casual" suggests.

It may have been icy cold outside, but inside the 5th Regiment Armory, hints of spring were everywhere at the American Heart Association's Heart Ball. Large backdrops painted as forests lined the walls, while corners of the room boasted clusters of real trees. Dining tables sprouted centerpieces of forsythia branches, daffodils and iris. Dinner began with a taste of winter, though. Each guest was greeted at his seat with a seafood appetizer sitting on a block of ice carved into a heart.

A Sinai Hospital cardiologist is launching a clinical trial of a type of coronary artery disease drug not yet tested in humans, building on a history at the Baltimore hospital of research to develop more effective treatments to prevent blood clotting. Dr. Paul Gurbel is studying an intravenous drug for patients undergoing cardiac stenting, when mesh tubes are implanted to widen blocked arteries. The drug, known for now as PZ-128, would be given to patients after stent implantation to prevent platelets from sticking together around the device, potentially leading to heart attack.

At one point Saturday, City Hospital in Martinsburg, W.Va., was so overwhelmed with patients injured on the Tough Mudder obstacle course that it had to turn people away from its emergency room. Two people who participated in the race in nearby Gerrardstown, W.Va., suffered heart attacks, according to Teresa McCabe of West Virginia University Hospitals-East, which runs City Hospital. Ten people had hypothermia, orthopedic injuries or head injuries. And two people were treated for drowning, including Avishek Sengupta, a 28-year-old Ellicott City man who died Sunday.