Clipmarks | debbyski's 'health' clips

Neuroscience: Rewiring the brain after stroke

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 17:57:43 GMT

clipped by: kmcolo

The brain can recover so well from a stroke that initially paralysed limbs can be moved again. Scientists have discovered how this happens at the level of individual neurons.

Timothy Murphy and Ian Winship of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver induced stroke in adult mice and used an in vivo imaging technique called two-photon microscopy to monitor the activity of individual neurons close to the site of damage.

In the first month — when paralysis is usually at its worst — they found that some neurons ditched their speciality for one particular limb and began processing information from multiple limbs. During the following month, as the affected brain region reorganized itself more permanently, those neurons re-specialized to a new single limb.

Tags: brain, health, stroke, science, neuroscience

Filling the Hole Within

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 07:54:32 GMT

clipped by: abailart
clipper's remarks: hole and whole

Clip Source: blogs.psychologytoday.com

We are all searching for something. What that something might be is never really a certainty, but it typically displays itself as a nagging sense of something unfinished or a thing undone that plagues our days and troubles our sleep. It is a restlessness within the human heart described by St. Augustine as "...humanity's innate desire for the infinite...

we try to fill this emptiness with things outside of ourselves -- objects, money, love, release or our perception of it, sex, drugs, new experiences, whatever is at hand. We also fail to see the sacredness in ourselves and, in doing so, visit upon ourselves all manner of violence, neglect and disregard.

What will, ultimately, fill this space? You will.

Evolving our potential is a full time occupation. It takes patience, self-acceptance, tolerance, humor, introspection and a willingness to face our own truth and speak it aloud. I

Tags: health

Raped, Pregnant, Infected with HIV, family Dead

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 19:11:47 GMT

clipped by: righthand
clipper's remarks: This is awful. Unbelievable. This surpasses anything I've read of the human spirit ability to overcome the worst that life can throw at you.

Clip Source: www.alternet.org

Raped, Pregnant, Infected with HIV -- And Happy to Help

Even in the face of extreme adversity, women around the world are using their experiences to teach and to heal.

What could be worse than being raped?

To be raped and to find yourself pregnant by your rapist. Or to be raped, pregnant and discover you've got HIV

for the unborn child to be at risk of contracting HIV

Three months after being raped by her boss, unemployed and sick, 21-year-old Mathakane Metsing was in her local clinic in Mafeteng, Lesotho

There she underwent two tests

"Two blue lines and you're pregnant,

"And two red lines here and you're HIV positive."

Four lines -- two red, two blue

Worse still, she discovered that she had passed the virus on to the man she loved and wanted to marry

later, that her family was also infected; her two sisters and her mother, who died the following year

Her mother died

Her brother died

Her sister-in-law died

friends still have unprotected sex

ignorance, stigma and superstition

Rape is widespread

Virgins

Tags: southafrica, sex, female, rape, health

U.S. Health System Unprepared

Wed, 13 Dec 2006 23:48:39 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.usatoday.com

WASHINGTON — The nation's public health system — the first line of defense against pandemic flu, a bioterror attack or other widespread health emergency — remains woefully unprepared to protect the American public, according to a report out Tuesday.

The annual study by Trust for America's Health found that emergency health preparedness remains inadequate five years after the 9/11 and anthrax attacks of 2001 raised fears of bioterrorism. The study also comes one year after Hurricane Katrina highlighted the need for the government to provide health care quickly when thousands of people are in need.

"The nation is nowhere near as prepared as we should be for bioterrorism, bird flu and other health disasters," said Jeff Levi, director of the trust. "We continue to make progress each year, but it is limited. As a whole, Americans face unnecessary and unacceptable levels of risk."

•The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)has determined that only 15 states have been certified as capable of distributing drugs and antidotes from the stockpile.

•Half the states would run out of available hospital beds within two weeks of a moderate pandemic flu outbreak.

•Forty states face a nursing shortage.

•Four states don't test for the flu year-round, something health officials regard as key to monitoring for a pandemic.

"The public believes that more is being done and that we are better prepared than we are," said trust board member Margaret Hamburg, a former New York City health officer and former top official at the federal Department of Health and Human Services. Allowing public health system weaknesses "to persist can lead to serious consequences," she says. "Our systems need to be strengthened."

Tags: health, governmen, t pandamic, woefully, unprepared

Are You Going Nuts?

Fri, 28 Sep 2007 15:44:32 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: well.blogs.nytimes.com

Am I going crazy?

It’s a phrase we’ve all uttered to ourselves from time to time, but now a new Web site helps you figure it out for sure. Check out www.sanityscore.com, which offers a simple online quiz designed to assess aspects of your mental health, including your risk for depression, anxiety and other emotional disorders.

It’s worth noting that there’s no officially sanctioned test from the mental health community for measuring one’s sanity, so you shouldn’t make important health decisions based on these results. Still, I think it’s worth checking out not only for insight into your state of mind, but because it may prompt an overdue discussion with your doctor.

Tags: mental, health, quiz

Bush Choose War And Tobacco Profits Over Children's Heatth Care

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 17:43:59 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.opednews.com

As promised, George W. Bush has vetoed a highly popular bipartisan bill that would provide health care for uninsured low-income American children.

But Bush has no empathy for these children. He has always enjoyed the best medical care when he's needed it. And, as he once told one of his professors at Harvard Business School, Bush believes that "poor people are poor because they're lazy." Absurd and pathetic as that attitude may be, it is even more absurd and pathetic to make the children pay the price.

But Bush would rather side with the tobacco corporations. No more taxes on cigarettes. According to Bush, everyone should have access to reasonably priced cigarettes. That's more important than access to health care.

The vetoed bill would cost $35 billion over five years, and Bush tries to use that as an excuse for his veto.

But consider this: The Iraq war is costing us about $8.4 billion per month.

Think about that.

Tags: health, care, legislation

Mind Over Manual

Thu, 13 Sep 2007 12:34:46 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

EARLIER this summer, the American Psychiatric Association announced that a 27-member panel will update its official diagnostic handbook, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The fifth edition, which is scheduled to come out in 2012, is likely to add new mental illnesses and refine some existing ones.

One manifestation of our limited knowledge is that many patients meet several diagnostic definitions at once. Roughly half of adults with clinical depression, for example, also have symptoms that fit the definition of an anxiety disorder. Do these patients actually suffer more than one illness, or do they just appear to?

Why aren’t we closer to understanding the relationship between manifest illness and its underlying causes? One obstacle is the staggering complexity of the brain. Another may be what Dr. First calls the “unfortunate rigidity” that all-or-nothing diagnostic checklists and sharply bounded categories impose.

Tags: mental, health, disorders

The Great ADHA Myth

Tue, 13 Mar 2007 22:11:01 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

The psychiatrist who identified attention deficit disorder - the condition blamed for the bad behaviour of hundreds of thousands of children - has admitted that many may not really be ill.

Dr Robert Spitzer said that up to 30 per cent of youngsters classified as suffering from disruptive and hyperactive conditions could have been misdiagnosed.

They may simply be showing perfectly normal signs of being happy or sad, he said.

'Many of these conditions might be normal reactions which are not really disorders,' he continued.

Dr Spitzer developed the bible of mental disorder classification in the 1970s and 1980s, which identified dozens of new conditions including ADD and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Since then hundreds of thousands of children have been diagnosed with ADD, a behavioural disorder linked to poor attention span, and ADHD, which adds an element of hyperactivity.

Tags: mental, health, disorders, diagnosis

75 percent of Americans Overweight

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 20:58:55 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.msnbc.msn.com

WASHINGTON - If people keep gaining weight at the current rate, fat will be the norm by 2015, with 75 percent of U.S. adults overweight and 41 percent obese, U.S. researchers predicted on Wednesday.

“Obesity is a public health crisis. If the rate of obesity and overweight continues at this pace, by 2015, 75 percent of adults and nearly 24 percent of U.S. children and adolescents will be overweight or obese,” Dr. Youfa Wang, who led the study, said in a statement.

They defined adult overweight and obesity using a standard medical definition called body mass index. People with a BMI of 25 or above are considered overweight, while those with BMIs of 30 or above are obese and at serious risk of heart disease, diabetes and some cancers.

Studies show that 66 percent of U.S. adults were overweight or obese in 2003 and 2004. An alarming 80 percent of black women aged 40 or over are overweight and 50 percent are obese.

Tags: obesity, health

The Unsung and UnSeen

Mon, 11 Jun 2007 11:38:09 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

LISA WOOD describes herself as a woman in the middle — a daughter and mother struggling to nurture one new life and, with equal tenderness, attend another on a fitful journey to its end.

At 44, she cares for a 5-year-old daughter and a once fiercely independent mother with early Alzheimer's disease, who at times can be as demanding and exasperating as her child. The result, says the Sunland resident, is a life lived on a hamster wheel of constant motion and little progress.

"There are times when I'm so stressed I know [my blood pressure] has to be high," says Wood. "I feel trapped sometimes; on the bad days I feel trapped."

Studies show that few will regret the time spent caring for an ill or dying relative, but new research suggests that many will pay dearly in terms of family income and their own mental and physical health.

Tags: health, caregiver, emotional, baby, boomers

Dying of Hospital Indifference

Wed, 23 May 2007 17:06:06 GMT

clipped by: debbyski
clipper's remarks: This is America and we can do better than this.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

When he saw The Times' story about the woman who died on the floor of the King-Harbor hospital emergency room while staffers ignored her pleas for help, Eric Johnson was more relieved than shocked.

The 47-year-old South Los Angeles man counted himself lucky that his own recent visit to King-Harbor hospital hadn't ended the same way.

Johnson, in excruciating pain, was told by his doctor on the morning of May 11 to go immediately to King-Harbor for an ultrasound test. His doctor suspected he had kidney stones. Johnson says he arrived at the urgent care unit at 11:30 a.m. By his account, it took two hours before they took his temperature, two more hours for a urine test, and two more hours for a blood test.

All the while, he was in terrible pain and noticed that other patients arrived after him and were treated ahead of him.

"I'm not a selfish person, but I said, 'Hey, I'm in a lot of pain here.' "

Tags: health, care, problems, emergency, room

Letting Go Of Antidepressants

Sun, 06 May 2007 12:10:29 GMT

clipped by: debbyski

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

In the past I experienced what happened if I didn’t take it on time. When I missed my morning dose, by 2 p.m. I would begin to space out. A prickliness in my neck would give way to a restless agitation that left me edging toward panic. All I would be able to think of was how far away I was from home, my pill, relief. Within 20 minutes of taking the pill, I would feel better. I would feel better just knowing I’d taken it.

“I was thinking of getting off Effexor,” I told him.

“Do you feel O.K. on it?” he asked.

I said I did.

“Then why go off it?”

“In my experience,” he said, “most people who go off eventually go back on.”

Somehow I couldn’t believe I had to take this pill for the rest of my life. I was feeling fine. At least I thought I was feeling fine. The image that came to mind was of Dumbo the elephant believing that what allowed him to fly was the feather the crows had given him. Only when he drops the feather does he realize that he truly has the gift of flight. Could I let go?

Tags: mental, health, anti, depressants, addictive

From Geek to Freak: 34 lbs. of Muscle in 4 Weeks

Tue, 01 May 2007 15:30:41 GMT

clipped by: BigBadWolf

Clip Source: www.fourhourworkweek.com

After holding off for nearly two years, I’m posting this because too many people have asked for it. The lasses should read it, too, as the same principles can be applied to bodyfat loss.

I weighed 152 lbs. for four years of high school, and after training in tango in Buenos Aires in 2005, that had withered to 146 lbs. Upon returning to the US, I performed an exhaustive analysis of muscular hypertrophy (growth) research and exercise protocols, ignoring what was popular to examine the hard science. The end result? I gained 34 lbs. of muscle, while losing 3 lbs. of fat, in 28 days.

From Geek to Freak: How I Gained 34 lbs. of Muscle in 4 Weeks

The 4-Hour Body, Physical Performance

Tags: fitness, health, lifestyle

911 First Responders

Fri, 27 Apr 2007 19:04:12 GMT

clipped by: debbyski
clipper's remarks: No matter what you feel about your government or Rosie for that matter, why are we not helping these people? These people desperately deserve our attention.

Clip Source: www.911blogger.com

http://www.rosie.com/blog/2007/04/25/first-responders-2/

on todays taped show
which will air friday
we had two 911 first responders
both horrifically sick

their lungs no longer function
that tuesday in september
in they went to the smoking pile
inhaling the toxic mess

nearly 6 years later
these once sturdy americans
r completely disabled
unable to walk up a flight of stairs

one had an oxygen tank with him
tubes in his nose forcing air in
to destroyed lungs
unbearable

there were 50 thousand people
who walked toward the fallen towers
half of them r now sick
25 thousand people

25 THOUSAND PEOPLE !!!!!!!!!!!

unreal
truly unreal
the united states
no funding for treatment of these humans

i cried
got into my car drove away from the studio
there were 3 dozen press people waiting
cameras video crews reporters

they lept at the car
like i was brittney or lindsay
pushing flashing yelling
breaking news in america

i was the story
not them
what’s wrong with this picture
nearly everything

Tags: 911, first responders, sickness, health, problems

Legal & philosophical implications of the SCOTUS abortion decision

Sun, 22 Apr 2007 04:54:10 GMT

clipped by: enbar
clipper's remarks: The underlying argument behind the SCOTUS decision on ND's partial-birth abortion ban is that women need to be protected from having abortions, according to this commentator, and this is a new argument (though long familiar to anti-abortion activists) with unpredictable ramifications.

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Adjudging a Moral Harm to Women From Abortions

WASHINGTON, April 19 — That abortion is bad for fetuses is a statement of the obvious. That it is bad for women, too, is a contested premise that nonetheless got five votes at the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

But never until Wednesday had the court held that an abortion procedure could be prohibited because the procedure itself, not the pregnancy, threatened a woman’s health — mental health, in this case, and moral health as well. In his majority opinion, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy suggested that a pregnant woman who chooses abortion falls away from true womanhood.

The shift in the court’s discourse was “enormous,” said Prof. Reva B. Siegel of Yale Law School. It was, she said, “beyond Alice in Wonderland: criminalize abortion to protect women.”

Tags: abortion, law, gender, health, philosophy, ethics, post:tumblr