When used to perform living-donor nephrectomy—the removal of a kidney from a living donor for transplantation into a recipient—a robotic surgery system offers a number of benefits. For example, the donor’s stay in the hospital may be shortened and recovery may happen more quickly.

Though many such donation surgeries already are being done using a minimally invasive procedure that offers living donors similar benefits, the robotic procedure allows for additional improvements.

Wake, sleep, repeat. Day in, day out. It’s a pattern we’re so familiar with that most of us give it little, if any, thought. The sleep-wake cycle is simply one of life’s daily rhythms. In fact, it’s one of our circadian rhythms. Put simply, circadian rhythms are physical, mental and behavioral changes that our bodies experience over a 24-hour cycle. They affect our sleep, our body temperature, our appetite, our hormones and more. And it turns out these daily rhythms may play a key role in cancer treatment.

In a preliminary study of COVID-19 patients with mild-to-moderate disease who were attempting to recover in their homes, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine have found that the anti-depressant drug fluvoxamine seems to prevent some of the most serious complications of the illness, and makes hospitalization and the need for supplemental oxygen less likely.

The study involved 152 people infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. Researchers compared the outcomes of those treated with fluvoxamine to the outcomes of those given an inactive placebo. After 15 days, none of the 80 people who had received the drug experienced serious clinical deterioration. Meanwhile, six of the 72 given placebo (8.3%) became seriously ill, with four requiring hospitalization.