Limb-salvage experts say many of the 80,000-plus amputations of toes, feet and lower legs that diabetics in the U.S. undergo each year are preventable if only patients got the right care for their feet.

WASHINGTON -- Time growing short, Democratic leaders in the House and Senate still face key decisions if they are to achieve President Barack Obama's goal of passing legislation to remake the nation's health care system by year's end. In the House, that means setting conditions under which the federal government would sell coverage in competition with private industry. The remaining disagreements among rank and file Democrats revolve largely around the fees to be paid doctors and hospitals under the plan, and whether they should be dictated by federal officials or established in negotiations.  

WASHINGTON -- Democratic leaders in Congress scrambled Friday to round up votes for allowing the government to sell health insurance in competition with private industry as they struggled to finalize a health care bill that meets President Barack Obama's goals. In a change in the Senate, long seen as hostile to the so-called public option, senior Democrats were considering including such a measure, officials said. Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., spent Friday calling and talking with wavering Democrats to test support for different versions of the plan.  

WASHINGTON -- The Senate has long been seen as opposed to the federal government selling health insurance in competition with private industry, but now senior Senate Democrats and White House officials are strongly considering including such a measure in health care overhaul legislation, officials say. The provision would permit individual states to drop out of the system, a design that could make it more palatable to moderates who have opposed the "public option."  

WASHINGTON -- Democrats struggled mightily to obtain their filibuster-proof Senate majority, persuading a Pennsylvania Republican to switch parties and pushing Massachusetts to change its laws to quickly replace the late Sen. Ted Kennedy.

WASHINGTON -- The Democrats' control of a hefty majority in the Senate - plus the House - would suggest that President Barack Obama is within reach of overhauling the nation's health care system this fall. But the numbers mask a more complicated reality: Obama and Democratic leaders have modest leverage over several pivotal Senate Democrats who are more concerned about their next election or feel they have little to lose by opposing their party's hierarchy.  

The researcher who helped unravel the genetic "book of human life" is now at the helm of the National Institutes of Health.

WASHINGTON -- With support from a lone Republican, a key Senate committee Tuesday approved a middle-of-the-road health care plan that moves President Barack Obama's goal of wider and affordable coverage a giant step closer to becoming law. Maine Republican Olympia Snowe said she was laying aside misgivings for now and voting to advance the bill, a sweeping $829-billon, 10-year health care remake that would help most Americans get coverage without creating a new government insurance plan. "When history calls, history calls," said Snowe.

WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama's plan to remake the nation's health care system is about to take its biggest step yet toward becoming reality. The pivotal Senate Finance Committee was poised to approve sweeping legislation Tuesday requiring nearly all Americans to purchase insurance and ushering in a host of other changes to the nation's $2.5 trillion medical system.  

WASHINGTON -- Insurance companies aren't playing nice any more. Their dire message that health care legislation will drive up premiums for people who already have coverage comes as a warning shot at a crucial point in the debate, and threatens President Barack Obama's top domestic priority.