Medicine's most revolutionary advances have occurred since 1900. By the end of the 20th century, medical advances helped to increase the average person's life expectancy by almost 30 years. As people lived longer, new medical challenges emerged. Heart disease, cancer, stroke, and other conditions often associated with aging replaced infectious diseases as the leading causes of death. Physicians began to devote greater attention to preventing disease and keeping patients healthy into advanced age. Biomedical research also shifted focus to the most basic causes of diseases, including defects in individual genes.
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