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7 mindblowing medical breakthroughs that could occur in our lifetime

One day soon, you might be able to grow new teeth. Seriously.

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My family has a history of Parkinson's Disease, so I always see the headlines that promise some major scientific breakthrough in regards to the disease based on small, lab-based experiments or trials run on animals. They give us a glimmer of hope but, far too often, these treatments never see the light of day. The road from promising idea to having a real treatment available for patients is extremely long and arduous. Most potential new medications and therapies don't survive.

But... things do sometimes happen! There are massive medical breakthroughs being achieved all the time. Sometimes it's a new discovery, sometimes it's a successful clinical trial, and sometimes it's the fruit of all that labor finally becoming publicly available to people who need it the most. For example, an RSV vaccine just became available in 2023 for the first time. A powerful non-opioid pain killer was approved in 2024. A new drug came out to treat schizophrenia that was completely different than anything that had come before. Progress is being made every single year.

In our lifetime, say the next five to 20 years, we could see unbelievable advancements in treating certain medical conditions. Here are a few pretty amazing potential developments that are on the horizon.

Scientist working in a laboratory setting. Photo by Adam Bezer on Unsplash

1. Growing new teeth

Unlike sharks, humans are known to grow only two sets of teeth, our baby teeth and permanent adult teeth. If one gets knocked out or lost due to decay or infection, you're out of luck!

But researchers say growth buds exist in our gums for a third set, and scientists in Japan have had success in activating them to grow naturally. It could be a major gamechanger that could one day replace dentures and prosthetics. The team has moved onto human trials and has a target date of having a drug ready by 2030.

2. Cancer vaccines

Medical scientists have made amazing strides in cancer research, especially in the field of vaccines.

Did you know that lung cancer is considered to be the most deadly of the bunch? A lung cancer vaccine could be available very soon. If a cancer vaccine sounds odd, think of it this way: Cancer can be treated by chemotherapy and radiation, but there's always a chance of it coming back. People who have survived cancer could theoretically take the vaccine and massively improve their chances of reoccurrence.

A similar vaccine is showing promising results in clinical trials for pancreatic cancer.

3. Better treatment for Alzheimers

Alzheimer's Disease is one of the most destructive and heartbreaking conditions imaginable. It's also extremely difficult to treat, with most currently available therapies and medications focusing on slowing or temporarily relieving certain symptoms.

One new avenue scientists are exploring is a vaccine that could target a protein called tau, which clumps together and tangles up crucial neurofibers that deliver information in the brain. One such medication aims to activate a patient's immune system and produce "a strong antibody response against both pTau and its harmful aggregated form." The drug was recently fast-tracked by the FDA and has shown promising results in human clinical trials.

Another relatively new development is the availability of monoclonal antibody treatment, which helps slow the progression of the disease. Currently, the treatments are not particularly cost-effective but may become moreso in the near future.


smiling woman in gray cardigan Photo by Tatiana Zanon on Unsplash

4. Breakthrough treatment for Huntington's Disease

Huntington's is a fatal central nervous system disorder that shuts down key brain functions in patients like speech, walking, and cognitive function. Some of the symptoms can be treated but, so far, little can be done to slow or stop the progression of the disease.

However, a new drug known as PTC518 was recently fast-tracked by the FDA due to promising results in clinical trials. It attacks mutant Huntington protein in blood cells and in cerebrospinal fluid and has been shown to improve symptoms of the disease in a 12-month trial run. What's especially exciting is that this drug attacks the disease itself rather than just treating symptoms at the surface level.

5. Targeted viruses that kill antibiotic-resistant bacteria

Bacteria is getting smarter and evolving. Antimicrobial resistance is a grave threat to the global population as well-known antibiotics become less effective against infection and new antibiotics are expensive and difficult to develop.

(If you've ever dealt with a staph infection, you know how scary it is when drugs just... don't work.)

This is where special viruses, called bacteriophages or just phages, come into play. These viruses selectively target and kill bacteria, and were actually first used about 100 years ago. Scientist are coming around to using them again. In select settings, they've proven to be incredibly effective against resistant infections, but will need more testing before they become widely available. However, it's definitely possible that this become a viable alternative to antibiotics in some cases in the next few decades!

6. Synthetic and bioprinted organs


human heart Photo by camilo jimenez on Unsplash

There are simply not enough donor organs going around for all the people who need a healthy liver, heart, or kidney.

Luckily, incredible strides have been made in creating artificial organs that can function like the real thing. A man in Australia just lived for 100 days with a titanium heart while he awaited a transplant! And bioprinting technology – quite literally 3D printing using real tissue and living cells — has the potential to create new working organs from scratch in the near future. Genetically modifying animal organs to function in humans temporarily or maybe even permanently has also come an extremely long way and is a process that will drastically improve in the coming years.

7. A one-pill cure for Hepatitis B

Hepatitis B is a potentially fatal infection of the liver that affects hundreds of millions of people worldwide. There is a safe and effective vaccine available to some people, but it's only preventative and won't treat active infections.

A research team in Israel recently discovered that a low dose of well-known chemotherapy drug, Curaxin-137, completely destroyed a crucial and mysterious protein that the Hepatitis virus depends on. The testing was done in a lab setting, so the next step is clinical trials. The team hopes that one day in the not-so-distant future, patients could take a single dose and completely eradicate the virus in their system. That's about as close to a miracle-cure as you can get!

Not all of these potential breakthroughs will come to fruition, but it's pretty amazing to dig into the advancements and discoveries that are being made every day. This list is just scratching the surface, to say nothing of robotic surgeons that will make major surgeries less invasive, new treatments for baldness, nanotechnologies that can deliver medicine to specific parts of the body, and more. Ultimately, good news is coming relatively soon for people who need it.


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Conjoined twins with fused brains separated; surgeons practiced for months in virtual reality

Arthur and Bernardo finally get to see each other face to face.

Image by sasint/Canva

Surgeons prepared to separate 3-year-old conjoined twins in Brazil using virtual reality.

The things human beings have figured out how to do boggles the mind sometimes, especially in the realm of medicine.

It wasn't terribly long ago that people with a severe injury had to liquor up, bite a stick, have a body part sewn up or sawed off and hope for the best. (Sorry for the visual, but it's true.) The discoveries of antibiotics and anesthesia alone have completely revolutionized human existence, but we've gone well beyond that with what our best surgeons can accomplish.

Surgeries can range from fairly simple to incredibly complex, but few surgeries are more complicated than separating conjoined twins with combined major organs. That's why the recent surgical separation of conjoined twin boys with fused brains in Brazil is so incredible.


The twins, Bernardo and Arthur Lima, are almost 4 years old and have never seen one another's face. They've spent their lives conjoined at the top of their heads, facing opposite directions. Born as craniopagus twins (joined at the cranium), their brains were also fused together, making their separation extremely complex. According to the BBC, they've been cared for at the Instituto Estadual do Cérebro Paulo Niemeyer (Paulo Niemeyer State Brain Institute) in Rio de Janeiro for the past two and a half years.

Surgeon Noor ul Owase Jeelani is the founder of medical charity Gemini Untwined, which funded the surgery. He helped lead the team of nearly 100 medical workers who worked for months to prepare for the boys' separation, which was one of the most complicated of its kind.

Jeelani told the BBC that it was the first time surgeons in separate countries practiced by operating in the same "virtual reality room" together, wearing VR headsets.

"It's just wonderful," he said. "It's really great to see the anatomy and do the surgery before you actually put the children at any risk. You can’t imagine how reassuring this is for the surgeons. To do it in virtual reality was just really man-on-Mars stuff."

Watch Jeelani explain how they prepared for the procedure:

Prior attempts to separate the twins had been unsuccessful, making the surgery even more challenging due to scar tissue. However, after multiple surgeries that took more than 33 hours collectively, the boys were successfully separated in June.

“It was without a doubt the most complex surgery of my career,” said neurosurgeon Gabriel Mufarrej of the Paulo Niemeyer State Brain Institute, according to EuroNews. “At the beginning, nobody thought they would survive. It is already historic that both of them could be saved."

Jeelani told the BBC that the boys' heart rates and blood pressure were "through the roof" for four days after the surgery—until they were reunited and touched hands.

According to Reuters, Bernardo and Arthur are the oldest twins with fused brains to be successfully separated. They will spend the next six months in rehabilitation.

Congratulations to the Lima family and to the global team that combined dedication, perseverance and the miracle of modern technology to create a brighter future for these young boys.


This article originally appeared on 08.04.22

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Doctors discover and cure woman's mystery mental illness after attempting to jump off Golden Gate Bridge

The doctor who found the cause only worked at the hospital three times a year.

CBS News|YouTube

Woman is cured after trying to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge.

Editor's Note: This story discusses suicide. If you are having thoughts about taking your own life or know of anyone who is in need of help, the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline is a United States-based suicide prevention network of over 200+ crisis centers that provides 24/7 service via a toll-free hotline with the number 9-8-8. It is available to anyone in suicidal crisis or emotional distress.


Mental illness is something many people experience, but we don't always correlate physical ailments with declining mental health. Chronic illnesses that include intense pain or some other uncontrollable condition, like seizures, can cause a person to experience depression. According to the Cleveland Clinic, "Depression is one of the most common complications of chronic illness."

Debbie Menzies, a woman living in the Bay Area of California, knows all too well the struggles of chronic illness and depression. For decades, she had suffered unpredictable frequent seizures and deep depression, which impeded her life. Menzies was diagnosed with epilepsy as a child, but medication didn't seem to help. After a lifetime of suffering, she decided to take her own life by jumping off the famous Golden Gate Bridge.

San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge has attracted people like Menzies in the past and sees an average of 30 jumpers a year. This high number has prompted a bicycle patrol, security cameras and suicide hotline phone numbers. In 2014, Bay Area officials approved a plan to install a net under the bridge to catch people who jump, but that project keeps hitting snags and delays. As it turned out, Menzies didn't need the net. Serendipity stepped in, not only saving her life but changing the quality of it.

half of a plastic brain

Brown brain decor in selective-focus photography

Photo by Robina Weermeijer on Unsplash

When Menzies was about to jump, a bridge worker intervened by tapping the desperate woman on the shoulder and calling an ambulance. What happened next seemed to be a cosmic intervention, because while she was hospitalized, Menzies continued to experience her bizarre seizures. These seizures caused her to laugh and smile, and she also explained to CBS News that she would get electric shock sensations in her head. The hospital staff took notice and called in reinforcements.

Dr. Paul Garcia, a neurologist who only worked at the hospital a few times a year, was the doctor on call. Upon hearing about Menzies' behaviors during her seizures, he was intrigued and completed an MRI of her brain. It was there that he spotted a small growth on her hypothalamus the size of a lemon seed. The doctor explained the hypothalamus controls a lot, including the nervous system.

Since the growth was deep in her brain, surgery was the only option for Menzies. After everything the woman had been through, the decision was a no-brainer...pun definitely intended. All the things that had to line up in order for Menzies to get the proper diagnosis and treatment is mind-boggling, but still, the procedure to destroy the growth was risky.

Menzies accepted the risk and received her surgery, which was a success. What's even better is that it didn't take long for the desperate woman to feel relief. Immediately after surgery, Menzies stopped having seizures and no longer experienced depression.

"It's amazing. Talk about perfect timing," Menzies told CBS.

You can watch the entire video below:

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Woman breaks down in tears at being able to smell coffee after long COVID treatment

She hasn't been able to smell anything since she contracted COVID-19 two years ago.

CBS News/YouTube

Jennifer Henderson smells coffee for the first time in two years.

When we think about how hard it would be to lose one of our senses, we usually imagine losing our sight or our hearing. But what about losing our sense of smell?

Being able to smell may not seem as important as being able to see or hear, but that doesn't mean it's not a big deal if you can't. Our sense of smell functions as an early-warning safety alert system, for one thing, so losing it can put us at risk. But smell is also one of our biggest memory triggers; a familiar scent can transport us to a specific time and place in the past in an instant. Pleasant smells can also evoke joy, whether we're inhaling the fragrance of our favorite flower or basking in the mouth-watering scent of our mom's cookies.

One of the most beloved scents in the world, even for people who don't like the taste of it, is the smell of coffee. So when 54-year-old Jennifer Henderson got to experience her first whiff of coffee after two years of not being able to smell anything at all, her reaction was understandably emotional.

Henderson has been dealing with "long COVID," a term referring to new or lingering symptoms long after an initial acute COVID-19 infection wanes, since she contracted the virus two years ago. Long COVID can manifest in many ways, one of which is the senses of smell and taste going awry. For Henderson, long COVID has resulted in bananas tasting like metal, garlic tasting like gasoline and her sense of smell being nonexistent for two years, according to WOIO News.

However, Cleveland Clinic anesthesiologist and pain medicine specialists Christina Shin, M.D. and Jijun Xu, M.D., Ph.D. have found that a common pain medication treatment seems to help many COVID long haulers regain their sense of smell and taste. The doctors told WOIO they don't really konw why it works, but it does offer hope for many who are suffering with long COVID like Henderson.

"You feel like you're in this box," Henderson said in a video shared by CBS. "For two years, two senses are gone, completely gone. And now I just feel like I'm getting my life back. I'm getting back to normal."

Watch the moment she realizes she can smell the coffee:

People struggling with long COVID often feel forgotten as the world increasingly moves away from focusing on the pandemic. It doesn't help that there's still so much we don't know. As can be expected in a novel viral pandemic, data has taken time to collect and analyze, and even defining long COVID has been a challenge as researchers learn in real-time about the long-term effects of COVID infection.

The Kaiser Family Foundation reports that as of January 2023, the estimated workforce numbers affected by long COVID range from fewer than 500,000 to as many as 4 million. A study published in Nature in January 2023 estimated that long COVID occurs in at least 10% of acute SARS-CoV-2 infections, with more than 200 symptoms impacting multiple organ systems being identified with the condition.

Thankfully, breakthroughs like the one from the Cleveland Clinic do offer hope for people who have had far more questions than answers about their symptoms. Hopefully, we will see more people get relief like Henderson did as doctors and scientists keep working to decipher the long COVID puzzle.

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