My plans for world domination continue with a fluff piece of the prevalence of PDAs in medicine . The writer had it easy; he used my email message as pretty much verbatim to fill his story.
In other news, I’m slow to post as I’m working on a top-secret new web application to do nothing all that exciting. Should be ready for comments this coming week. Over and out.
Often those that oppose national health care schemes like to claim that innovation and research suffer under the budgetting schemes of countries like Canada and the UK, but this year’s Lasker Medical Awards, “widely considered the United States’ most prestigious medical prizes,” went to two British and two Canadian researchers :
The research award for stem cell work is going to Drs. Ernest A. McCulloch and James E. Till, emeritus professors at the University of Toronto and the Ontario Cancer Institute.
…
Sir Edwin Southern of the University of Oxford and Sir Alec J. Jeffreys of the University of Leicester in England received the Lasker Award for developing two powerful technologies, Southern blotting and DNA fingerprinting, that, the foundation said, “together revolutionized human genetics and forensic diagnostics.”
The initial CT and MRI scanner creation also partially came out of Britain as well.
(thanks quote of the day !)
There’s a number of types of seizures , but here’s a short list of the most common with common descriptions (every person is unique!), in case you’re concerned in a child, friend, or loved one. Seizures are divided into partial and generalized. Partial means they affect only part of the brain, whereas generalized affect the entire brain. There are usually medications that can treat these seizures.
(This is the first in what will be a series of practical tips I’ve learned on my clerkships that are applicable to everyone, not just medical professionals.)
There are many types of seizures , not just the classical shaking ones you see on television. If someone should have one of these seizures, however, or another one where they fall down or lose consciousness, there’s some basic first aid guidelines, and also some myths that need to be dispelled. Use your common sense, keep the person safe, and reailze that in most cases, the seizure will end on its own. If it lasts more than 5 minutes, then you should call 911. From epilepsy.com , one of the best medical websites I’ve found for a specific disorder
After the seizure, the person should be placed on her left side, in the recovery position . There’s a small risk of post-seizure vomiting, before the person is fully alert. The left side is better than the right because the left side has a sharper angle of the lungs , so there’s probably a slightly smaller risk of vomit going into the lungs. Therefore, the person’s head should be turned so that any vomit will drain out of the mouth without being inhaled. After the seizure, the person enters the postictal state, which is just medical lingo for post-seizure. People can be very sleepy or confused at this time, so stay with the person until she recovers (5 to 20 minutes).
That’s right, folks. Starbucks now spends more on health insurance for its workers than it does for the primary product it sells: coffee. We’re in trouble, folks:
Howard Schultz, chairman of Starbucks, announces his plans to spend more on health insurance for its employees this year than on raw materials needed to brew its coffee.
According to Schultz, the Seattle-based company has had double-digit increases in insurance costs for the last four years.
Schultz made the announcement at a Washington, D.C. meeting with lawmakers from his home state – one of several organized by Schultz to address “a growing health care crisis.”
Shultz said he hopes congressional leaders will put the issue “at the front of their agenda.”
It’s similar to the American car manufacturers; they spend more on health insurance than on the steel to build their cars.
Something’s got to change, but mark my words–if it hasn’t changed by the time the avian flu hits (if the epidemiology predictions are right), it’ll definitely change after.
I’ve always thought that one way to tell if you’re truly fluent in another language is if you can make a joke in the language–humor requires not just meaning and proper grammar, but a level of comfort with the language and a good sense of comic timing. It’s totally true for the medical languages, too.
Case in point: at the beginning of this month’s rotation, I attended a weekly neuroradiology conference where the attendings kept making these only-funny-to-neurologist jokes about patient’s MRI scans, and I didn’t get a single one. They all went right over my head, but everyone else in the room was just cracking up.
Yesterday in clinic, I found myself making an only-funny-to-neurologist joke while evaluating a teenager with chronic daily headaches. As I sat down to present to the attending, I said, “Looks like a pretty classic case of giant cell arteritis,” and I got a good laugh from her.
Giant cell arteritis is a headache disease, but only presents in people over the age of 55. Ha! Err… ha. Sigh. Soooo lame.
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… is up at Sneezing Po . Go read this week’s best in medical weblogging.
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Rachel Gets Fruity is a sexually clever ad to encourage men to perform regular testicular self-examinations to help prevent testicular cancer.
Unfortunately, The US Preventative Screening Task Force doesn’t think testicular screening will be all that helpful ; Rachel’s ad would have been better served encouraging screening for colorectal cancer , but we all know that putting something up your butt automatically turns you gay. I guess if that happened, Rachel’s ad wouldn’t be as effective anymore.
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Dear Google and Karen Wickre,
I loved your story “ We Get Letters (2) ” about new parents finding information to help prevent a blood transfusion of their newborn, but it’s inaccurate that the blood transfusion would be “extremely dangerous,” as the parents report. Blood transfusions are generally *extremely safe*, and the “danger” is a myth medical professionals have to dispel all the time. It’d be great if you noted this in your entries.
From Nelson’s Pediatrics :
“a current estimate for risk of transfusion-associated HIV is 1/1 million donor exposures, with estimates ranging from 1/800,000 to 1/2 million donor exposures. Similarly, the risk of viral hepatitis C is 1/1 million donor exposures. Transfusion-associated cytomegalovirus can be nearly eliminated by transfusing leukocyte-reduced cellular blood products or by selecting blood from donors seronegative for antibody to cytomegalovirus.”
Sincerely,
Me.
Okay, I’m probably sacrificing my overall attractiveness with this one, too, but it’s all in the name of patient care and relieving suffering, which I hope are valiant and attractive enough to outweigh the too-much-information-eww-gross-disgusting part.
I used to make fun of my college friend Sam for doing this, because it really is pretty gross, and he did it in the public bathroom, but I’m sorry, Sam. You were right.
I’ll just lay it out there now: suck warm salt water up your nose.
If you feel a sore throat or cold coming on, get a mug of warm salt water, and suck it up each nostril. I have absolutely no evidence to support this, as I’m just not in the mood to search PubMed, but I’ve had good results.
And for you post-nasal drip sore-throaters like me, this will most likely cure your sore throat. It flushes the mucous off your soft palate that’s collected during the night. Gross? I guess. But if it saves one person a sore throat, I’m okay with that.