Saturday, October 31, 2009

Proxy list: 30-10-09

Well, i have got a new blog dedicated to the proxy lists.  All that shall be on here is proxy lists. I will update it with atleast 2-3 small-ish proxy lists a day. Enjoy them! Contact me if u need so.

Tested: 30th October, 2009. 13:29 GMT London.
# of proxies: 73

Preview:
152.003.138.005:3124
152.3.138.5:3128
128.238.88.64:3127
132.239.17.226:3124
208.43.64.238:808
205.216.16.178:80
68.51.89.68:80
87.106.216.114:80
200.23.223.7:3128
148.233.239.23:3128
200.65.129.2:3128
148.233.239.23:80
148.233.239.24:3128
148.233.239.24:80
200.65.129.001:80

Download: http://sharecash.org/download.php?file=121540

Medical Errors Continued

To continue on with my earlier discussion of medical errors in America… and these are all just personal accounts of things that have happened with me and my family.

When I was four years old I had horrible stomach pain that was assumed to be the flu for three days until further examination revealed my appendix was about to rupture. The doctors preformed an immediate removal of my appendix and somehow managed to screw up one of the most basic operations around…right along side of removing ones tonsils.

I am uncertain what it was they did wrong but they insisted the surgery must be redone and went back in, yes they opened me up in the same spot for a second time. Then shortly following that I developed a severe infection from the second operation which required them to open me up in the exact same spot for a third time because they didn’t know how to do their jobs.

As a result I had serious scarring that still to this day causes abdominal pain and tightness. Not to mention one of the ugliest scars you could possibly get from an operation as basic as having ones appendix removed.

Again when I was four years old, I fell out a second story window in an apartment building…onto asphalt while being babysat by my oldest sister. I was in the hospital for over 24 hours and got a visit from my Aunt who happened to notice I was limp wristed and unable to feed myself. She immediately insisted they X-ray my wrist and sure enough it was broken. Something the doctors clearly couldn’t figure out on their own.

Again when I was 17 I started having really bad dizzy spells that kept me in bed for as much as a week at a time and that went on for approximately one year before I went to see the doctor. After much evaluation the doctors presumed I must have a brain tumor and would soon be dying…they made that diagnosis without any proof or imagery of my brain to show any such growth.

They offered me a cat scan but informed me that even under my parents insurance that would cost around $900 to do the cat scan. Yet at 22 years old, here I still am and I never got that cat scan because I couldn’t afford $900 out of pocket!

Overall my point is that medical errors and mistakes are a naturally occurring event in all countries, under any circumstance and in every medical system. DO NOT blame National Health Care for things like that, you have to see that it happens everywhere. That is just yet another poor excuse and half baked, fraudulant reason to not want National Health Care.

Thursday, October 29, 2009

Two Thumbs Up: ePatient Connection Conference

I was in downtown Philadelphia earlier this week for the inaugural ePatient Connection 2009 conference, a first-time event by the relatively new Kru Research (headed up by Kevin Kruse). I’ve known Kevin for years through our mutual work in pharma training/eLearning, but this was his first venture into organizing a conference.

Count me impressed.

Unlike last week’s Digital Pharma conference, which took encouraging steps in the direction of a more “unconference” format (review here), ePatient Connection had a more traditional, structured format. But unlike others – and I’ve been to MANY over the years – it was fresh, interesting, and basically…it rocked. The two days each flew by quickly.

I’m not going to attempt a content overview – that has actually been nicely done by Eric Brody here. And PharmaExec on-line gives a nice quick scan here, including some of the juicier quotes. Suffice it to say that the speakers were diverse, knowledgeable, and well-chosen. I’m saving my two thumbs up for the following:

This event was tight. By that, I mean it was run incredibly efficiently and smoothly. Sessions started on time, ended on time, did not drag, and the speakers were clearly prepped with directions to keep it focused and well-structured. The audio/visual setup was one of the best I’ve seen, even to the point of having a photographer going about the entire time taking a tremendous variety of pictures (immediately uploaded to Flickr). The Wi-Fi was strong. There were outlets/extension cords along one entire side. There was a Twitterscreen. Sessions were captured on video. The attendee goodie bag was one of the best ever, including several books, and even an iPod Touch! There were standard presentations, panels, interviews, open forums, 1-on-1 sessions, and even a Pecha Kucha (20 slides, each for 20 seconds) slot. Vendors had a chance to briefly show their wares up front, which is a great way to give them exposure without turning sessions into sales pitches. All in all, other conference organizers could learn a lot from this freshman endeavor. Kudos to Kru & crew for pulling this off.

This event was well-targeted. It’s way past time to start bringing together people from the pharma/device industry, the ePatient community, and other stakeholders in healthcare. Hearing from bloggers with medical conditions, and getting their perspectives (not only on stage, but actively throughout the conference on Twitter), was both inspiring and enlightening. Folks on the business side and on the consumer/patient/people side need to better understand one another, and this was a very helpful format to move the dialogue forward. The fact that we had a late entrant show up from FDA/DDMAC (Paul Loebach, a really nice guy) was a huge bonus.

I had the privilege of co-facilitating, with Jack Bilson and John Mack, two lunchtime discussions on Developing Guidelines for Social Media. Those sessions could have gone on for hours – very rich interaction and a high level of interest among the participants. But, of course, everything was running on time (I told you it was tight!), so we had to move along by 1:45 pm!

It does seem to me, after the last few weeks, that we really have turned the corner when it comes to use of Twitter in pharma/healthcare industry conferences, as there was an incredibly active and informative Tweetstream (hashtag: #ePatCon). Many, many people were “tuned in” to parts of this conference from around the globe, and participating virtually. And, of course, we enjoyed social occasions and a tweetup, where many of the pharma “early adopters” renewed friendships or met each other for the first time – always very rewarding.

This event was an exhausting and exciting pleasure to be a part of. Looking forward to the sophomore edition!

———-

Pharma Social Media resources: SocialRx

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About Acne Scars and Their Treatment

As if dealing with the stress and discomfort of acne weren’t enough, those with serious acne are also faced with the reality of unsightly scarring. According to the Acne Resource Center Online (www.acne-resource.org), some 60 million Americans have active acne and some 20 million have it badly enough to cause some form of scarring.

If you have been following our previous articles, you are aware that scarring is the body’s natural response to trauma to the skin. In the case of acne scarring, there are two general types, those caused by increased tissue and those caused by tissue loss.

Scars caused by increased tissue are known as Keloid or Hypertrophic scars. These are enlarged skin overgrowths associated with the body’s overproduction of Collagen in response to skin injury. The excess Collagen builds up and forms firm, irregularly shaped raised scars.

Scars caused by loss of tissue are commonly referred to as Ice Pick Scars and are very similar to scars associated with Chicken Pox. These are scars that form an indentation or pit in the skin that may be quite deep or very shallow depending on the severity of the trauma to the skin. These Ice Pick scars are much more commonly caused by Acne than are Keloid or Hypertrophic scars.

There are several possible treatments for Acne scars. One should study the options carefully and discuss them with a qualified physician prior to making a decision. The best option for one person may not be the best option for the next person. Below I will briefly describe some of the more common treatements.

Soft Tissue Fillers – Involves injecting either collagen or fat under the skin and or into the scar to fill them out and make them less noticeable. Results from this procedure are temporary and would therefore need to be repeated periodically to maintain the desired appearance.

Laser Treatment – Involves the use of a YAG or CO2 laser to destroy the outer layers of skin. As the wound heals, new skin forms. After several treatments, the scars should appear less noticeable.

Dermabrasion – Involves the use of a rapidly rotating wire brush to remove the top layer of skin. Surface scars may be erased using this procedure and deeper scars may be made less noticeable.

Microdermabrasion – Involves the use of a device that blows crystals onto the scar. The crystals break down the scar. A vacuum that is part of the device then removes the crystals and skin cells. Results from this procedure are generally subtle and the scar may still be noticeable.

Chemical Peels – Involve the application of a chemical cream or lotion on the affected area. After a period of time the chemical is removed and the old skin cells flake off. This allows the skin to regenerate and repair itself.

Punch Grafts – Involves cutting the scar with a round sharp cookie cutter like tool. The tool comes in various sizes to treat different sized scars. Once the scar is cut out the surgeon will either pull the edges of the skin together and stitch it, or in some cases might take a skin graft and place it in the void left by the removed scar.

Topical Treatments – Involves the application of a cream, gel or sheet to help shrink the size of the scar. This is only effective on raised Keloid or Hypertrophic scars. There is solid evidence that silicone based topical products can help reduce the size and intensity of raised scars. It is important to note that these types of products are generally only useful on newer, active scars. For more information on topical scar treatments visit www.scarfade.com.

The treatments listed above are by no means the only options available. It is always a good idea to enlist the advice of a qualified professional prior to making a decision. And it may be wise to speak with two or more such professionals in some cases.

Tuesday, October 27, 2009

I'm Having A Random Day

So I bought Alcohol today.

That’s not something I normally do, as anyone who knows me would tell you. I was wandering around in Morrison’s on my way to the checkout and I passed down the alcohol isle. For me it normally doesn’t even warrant a second glance, but for some reason today I bought Smirnoff. I’ve had one glass so far, and have no idea when I’ll have the next. Two drinks in two months is a new record for me.

I applied for a job, in a company that I hate. Again, pretty random. I applied to work in the Starbucks near where I live. They are interviewing this week and looking for part time staff, so I filled out the form and handed it in on the spot. I might get it, I might not.

I read an interesting article today.

Who Is Excluded From Giving Blood?

 

It discusses the decision of the advisory committee; the safety of blood, tissues and organs (SaBTO), to review the current exclusions to giving blood. These exclusions range in their specificity but include conditions like: Any man who has had sex with another man – under any circumstances. Any woman who has had sex with a man, who has had sex with another man – under any circumstances.

I understand that these restrictions were put in place as a result of the fear that gay sex increases the risk of HIV and therefore this is considered a precaution. But the rule extends to include even people who have recently tested Negative for HIV! Some of the exclusions are over cautions and in my opinion needlessly reduce the amount of blood available in the bank. What do you think? Feel free to comment.

Now! Time to rewrite my biology notes in an attempt to learn the stuff that I have missed.

Ja, Matta Ne!

Robert

Houses made of hemp could help combat climate change!

We have recently come across this very interesting press release from Professor Peter Walker at the University of Bath (U.K) who is leading the research into the use of hemp-lime in construction.  Buildings and other infrastructure currently accounts for almost 20% of the UK’s eco-footprint.  This is another example of how this wonderful plant can help save reduce carbon dioxide emissions.  Recently we brought you the news that Hanes – one of the worlds biggest consumer brands – has been investing in a new hemp technology called Crailar which requires only a fraction of the water needed to make cotton; and we are very happy to announce that it is the subject of another of our articles, a Dutch company called Hempflax who has won the contract to supply the raw materials to Hanes – i.e. the HEMP!

Here’s the press release:

Houses made of hemp, timber or straw could help combat climate change by reducing the carbon footprint of building construction, according to researchers at the University of Bath.

Currently the construction industry is a major contributor of environmental pollutants, with buildings and other build infrastructure contributing to around 19% of the UK’s eco-footprint.  Researchers at the BRE Centre for Innovative Construction Materials are researching low carbon alternatives to building materials currently used by the construction industry.  Although timber is used as a building material in many parts of the world, historically it is used less in the UK than in other countries. Researchers at the Centre are developing new ways of using timber and other crop-based materials such as hemp, natural fibre composites and straw bales. Their work using straw bales as a building material has already been featured on Channel 4’s Grand Designs series.

Professor Peter Walker, Director of the Centre, is leading the research. He said: “The environmental impact of the construction industry is huge. For example, it is estimated that worldwide the manufacture of cement contributes up to ten per cent of all industrial carbon dioxide emissions.  “We are looking at a variety of low carbon building materials including crop-based materials, innovative uses of traditional materials and developing low carbon cements and concretes to reduce impact of new infrastructure. As well as reducing the environmental footprint, many low carbon building materials offer other benefits, including healthier living through higher levels of thermal insulation and regulation of humidity levels.”

Their research is being presented at the Sustainable Energy & the Environment showcase at the University of Bath.  The exhibition will be opened by David Willetts MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities & Skills, and will be attended by industrialists, research councils, local and national government representatives and other key stakeholders from across the South West.  The exhibition coincides with the launch of the Institute for Sustainable Energy & the Environment (I-SEE) at the University of Bath, which will bring together experts from diverse fields of science, engineering, social policy and economics to tackle the problems of climate change.

I  found another article on the subject which can be read here:

Hemp could be used to build carbon-neutral homes of the future to help combat climate change and boost the rural economy, say researchers at the University of Bath.

A consortium, led by the BRE Centre for Innovative Construction Materials based at the University, has embarked on a unique housing project to develop the use of hemp-lime construction materials in the UK.  Hemp-lime is a lightweight composite building material made of fibres from the fast growing plant, bound together using a lime-based adhesive. The hemp plant stores carbon during its growth and this, combined with the low carbon footprint of lime and its very efficient insulating properties, gives the material a ‘better than zero carbon’ footprint.  Professor Pete Walker, Director of the BRE Centre for Innovative Construction Materials, explained: “We will be looking at the feasibility of using hemp-lime in place of traditional materials, so that they can be used widely in the building industry.  “We will be measuring the properties of lime-hemp materials, such as their strength and durability, as well as the energy efficiency of buildings made of these materials.  Using renewable crops to make building materials makes real sense – it only takes an area the size of a rugby pitch four months to grow enough hemp to build a typical three bedroom house.  Growing crops such as hemp (cannabis Sativa) can also provide economic and social benefits to rural economies through new agricultural markets for farmers and associated industries.”

The three year project, worth almost £750,000, will collect vital scientific and engineering data about this new material so that it can be more widely used in the UK for building homes.  The project brings together a team of nine partners, comprising BRE Ltd, Feilden Clegg Bradley Studio architects, Hanson Cement, Hemcore, Lhoist UK, Lime Technology, National Non-Food Crops Centre, University of Bath and Wates Living Space.  As part of the project the University of Bath received a research grant of £391,000 from the Renewable Materials LINK programme run by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA).

Source:  http://www.bath.ac.uk

Heres the link to the article about Hanes investing in Hemp

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Dispelling Vaccination Myth.. Part 9 and 10

VACCINATION MYTH #9:

“Vaccinations are legally mandated and unavoidable…”

…or are they?

Vaccine laws vary from state to state. While every state legally requires vaccines, every state also has one or more legal exemptions from vaccines. School and health officials will seldom volunteer exemption information, and are often mistaken when they do, so it is important to check the laws in your state to find out exactly what the requirements are. Each state offers one or more of the following three kinds of exemptions:

1) Medical Exemption: All 50 states in the U.S. allow for a medical exemption. However, few pediatricians check for indications of increased risk before administering vaccines, so it is advisable for parents to research this matter for themselves if they have reason to believe that their child may be predisposed to vaccine reactions. Epilepsy, severe allergies, and a previous adverse reaction in a child or sibling are but a few of the many conditions in child or family history which may increase the chances of an adverse reaction, and thus may qualify for a medical exemption from one or more required vaccines. In general, though, medical exemptions are difficult to get, may be available only to those who have already had a serious vaccine reaction or who have a family history of serious vaccine reactions, may be granted only for the specific vaccine believed to have caused a previous reaction, and may be valid only as long as the condition giving rise to the exemption persists (i.e., may be temporary).

2) Religious Exemption: 48 states allow for a religious exemption (all but MS and WV). A state’s laws may state that membership in an established religious organization is required. However, this requirement has been held unconstitutional in New York federal courts; personal religious beliefs are sufficient for a religious exemption, regardless of which religious organization you belong to, or whether or not you belong to an organized religion at all.(66,67,68,69) In one case, the plaintiffs were awarded money damages when the court found that the state had violated their civil rights by denying them a religious exemption.

3) Philosophical or Personal Exemption: Approximately 17 states allow parents to refuse vaccination for personal or philosophical reasons.

It is worth noting that exempted children may be banned from attending schools during local outbreaks. But all schools, public or private, must comply with state vaccination laws and honor legal exemptions.

The best source for a copy of your state’s vaccination laws is state health officials. A phone call to the state Department of Epidemiology or Immunization (the specific name varies from state to state) may be all that it takes to get a copy mailed to you. Or, for a small fee, the NVIC and New Atlantean Press will sell you a copy of your state’s immunization laws (see contact information at the end of this article). Statutes can be searched on the internet (for example, see www.findlaw.com), but these sources many not always reflect very recent changes in the law, if there have been any. Law libraries and lawyers are, of course, a good source as well.

VACCINATION TRUTH #9:

“Legal exemptions from vaccinations are available for many—but not all—U.S. citizens.”

VACCINATION MYTH #10:

“Public health officials always place the public’s health above all other concerns…”

…or do they?

Vaccination history is riddled with documented instances of deceit portraying vaccines as mighty disease conquerors, when in fact vaccines have had little or no discernable impact on—or have even delayed or reversed—pre-existing disease declines. The United Kingdom’s Department of Health admitted that vaccination status determined the diagnosis of subsequent diseases: Those found in vaccinated patients received alternate diagnoses; hospital records and death certificates were falsified. Today, many doctors still refuse to diagnose diseases in vaccinated children, and so the “Myth” about vaccine success persists.

Conflicts of interest are the norm in the vaccine industry. Members and Chairs of the FDA and CDC vaccine advisory committees own stock in drug companies that make vaccines; individuals on both advisory committees own patents for vaccines under consideration or affected by the decisions these committees make. The CDC grants conflict-of-interest waivers to every member of their advisory committee a year at a time, allowing full participation in the discussions leading up to a vote by every member whether or not they have a financial stake in the decision.(70)

Concerns over vaccine adverse effects and conflicts of interest led the American Society of Physicians and Surgeons to issue a Resolution to Congress calling for a “moratorium on vaccine mandates and for physicians to insist upon truly informed consent for the use of vaccines.” Approved by unanimous vote at the AAPS October 2000 annual meeting, the resolution made references to the “increasing numbers of mandatory childhood vaccines, to which children are…subjected without …information about potential adverse side effects”; the fact that “safety testing of many vaccines is limited and the data are unavailable for independent scrutiny, so that mass vaccination is equivalent to human experimentation and subject to the Nuremberg Code, which requires voluntary informed consent”; and the fact that “the process of approving and ‘recommending’ vaccines is tainted with conflicts of interest.”(71)

In an October 1999 statement to Congress, Bart Classen, M.D., M.B.A., founder and CEO of Classen Immunotherapies and developer of vaccine technologies, stated, “It is clear…that the government’s immunization policies… are driven by politics and not by science. I can give numerous examples where employees of the US Public Health Service …appear to be furthering their careers by acting as propaganda officers to support political agendas. In one case…employees of a foreign government, who were funded and working closely with the US Public Health Service, submitted false data to a major medical journal. The true data indicated the vaccine was dangerous however the false data that was submitted indicated there was no risk. An employee of the NIH who manages large vaccine grants jointly published a misleading letter about the subject with one of these foreign civil servants. As you are aware it is illegal to falsify data from research funded by the US government.” Dr. Classen recommended that Congress hire a special prosecutor “to determine if public health officials are following the laws enacted to ensure vaccines are safe” and to determine “if public health officials along with manufacturers are misleading the public about the safety of these products.”(72)

In France, 15,000 French citizens have sued their government over adverse Hepatitis B vaccine reactions.(73) Former public health officials there are serving prison sentences following findings that they did not follow the law to ensure the safety of the vaccine, and school-age Hep B vaccination has been discontinued. U.S. military personnel may be even worse off: “…four letters from the FDA/Public Health Service…clearly reveal that the anthrax vaccine was approved for marketing without the manufacturer performing a single controlled clinical trial.”(74) Clinical trials are, of course, absolutely critical to determining the safety and effectiveness of any pharmaceutical product. Military personnel have been, and continue to be, unwitting subjects in an unethical experiment.

VACCINATION TRUTH #10:

“Many of the public health officials who determine vaccine policy profit substantially from their policy decisions.”

SOME CLOSING REMARKS

In the December 1994 Medical Post, Canadian author of the best-seller Medical Mafia, Guylaine Lanctot, M.D., stated, “The medical authorities keep lying. Vaccination has been a disaster on the immune system. It actually causes a lot of illnesses. We are actually changing our genetic code through vaccination…100 years from now we will know that the biggest crime against humanity was vaccines.” After critically analyzing literally ten’s of thousands of pages of the vaccine medical literature, Dr. Viera Scheibner concluded that “there is no evidence whatsoever of the ability of vaccines to prevent any diseases. To the contrary, there is a great wealth of evidence that they cause serious side effects.”(75) Dr. Classen has stated, “My data proves that the studies used to support immunization are so flawed that it is impossible to say if immunization provides a net benefit to anyone or to society in general. This question can only be determined by proper studies which have never been performed. The flaw of previous studies is that there was no long-term follow up and chronic toxicity was not looked at. The American Society of Microbiology has promoted my research…and thus acknowledges the need for proper studies.” To some these may seem like radical positions, but they are not unfounded. The continued denial and suppression of the evidence against vaccines only perpetuates the “Myths” of their “success” and, more importantly, their negative consequences on our children and society. Aggressive and comprehensive scientific investigation into adverse vaccine events is clearly warranted, yet immunization programs continue to expand in the absence of such research. Manufacturer profits are enormous, while accountability for the negative effects is conspicuously absent. This is especially sad given the readily available safe and effective alternatives.

The positions asserted above are not coming from a handful of fringe lunatics; entire professional organizations are speaking out. Criticisms of vaccines are being sounded by an increasing number of credible and reputable scientists, researchers, investigators, and self-educated parents from around the world. Instead, it is public health officials and die-hard vaccine advocates (many of whom have a financial stake in the outcome of the debate) who are beginning to lose credibility by refusing to acknowledge the growing body of evidence and to address the very real, serious, documented problems.

Meanwhile, the race is on. There are over 200 new vaccines being developed for everything from birth control to cocaine addition. Some 100 of these are already in clinical trials. Researchers are working on vaccine delivery through nasal sprays, mosquitoes (yes, mosquitoes), and the fruits of “transgenic” plants in which vaccine viruses are grown. With every adult and child on the planet a potential recipient of vaccines administered periodically throughout their lives, and every healthcare system and government a potential buyer, it is little wonder that countless millions of dollars are spent nurturing the growing multi-billion dollar vaccine industry. Without public outcry, we will see more and more new vaccines required of us all. And while profits are readily calculable, the real human costs are ignored or suppressed.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

the o.r.

My patients are sectioned frequently.  Maybe not at a higher rate than anyone else (though standing in the freezing OR at 4 am it sure feels like it), but enough that I can find the 3-0 Vicryl suture (944J, in case you’re wondering) with my eyes closed.  I could circulate on a section asleep if I had to.  The OR and I have made our peace.

It wasn’t like that when I started, all full of big ideas about How Birth Should Be and terror of breaking the sterile field.  Then I labor-trained in a hospital where we crashed a patient about once a night on average: a true splash-and-dash crash, where you shoot films later instead of counting sharps and laps ahead of time.  The OR loses its ability to intimidate quickly when you’re under the sterile drape pushing a head back up someone’s vagina.

I love the OR, and I understand how its sense of control, of a world free even from the invisible chaos of microbiology, could appeal to a provider.  There is no control in birth, only preparation so thorough it makes a Nepalese trek look like a spontaneous walk down the block.  But anyone who thinks they control  labor or birth is lying to themselves, or to you.

The OR is different.  The worst has happened: you’re there.  The baby will be out shortly, and wrapped and weighed and measured, and dad will snap photos while mom gazes sleepily at her new baby.  It’s seductive, you bet, and no one knows that better than I do.

But I need to believe in birth, in our basic biology.  We’re not androids or arthropods.  We’re primates, and primate life is by nature messy.  In our fear of chaos, we risk eliminating what makes us most human.

H1N1 vaccine production delayed and behind schedule

It appears that a combination of old vaccine development technology and technical production delays have caused initial estimates of H1N1 vaccine availability to be grossly in error.  Far fewer doses are now available and it appears that it may be a month or more before sufficient doses are available for those who wish to receive vaccine.  Clearly, our medical and pharmacologic science remains no match for the insidious genetic variations that nature and viruses can achieve.  So it appears that basic public health measures will continue to be the best bet for all who have concerns about prevention of spread of the H1N1 virus. . . ben kazie md

The federal government originally promised 120 million doses of swine flu vaccine by now. Only 13 million have come through. As nervous Americans clamor for the vaccine, production is running several weeks behind schedule, and health officials blame the pressure on pharmaceutical companies to crank it out along with the ordinary flu vaccine, and a slow and antiquated process that relies on millions of chicken eggs.

There have been other bottlenecks, too: Factories that put the precious liquid into syringes have become backed up. And the government itself ran into a delay in developing the tests required to assess each batch before it is cleared for use.  What effect the delays will have on the course of the outbreak is unclear, in part because scientists cannot say with any certainty just how dangerous the virus is, how easily it spreads, or whether it will mutate into a more lethal form.

Since April, swine flu has killed more than 800 people in the U.S., including 86 children, 39 of them in the past month and a half, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than half of all hospitalizations since the beginning of September were people 24 and under.

In the meantime, many states have had to postpone mass vaccinations. Clinics around the country that managed to obtain doses of the vaccine have been swamped. And doctors are getting bombarded with calls from worried and angry parents.

Federal officials counsel patience, saying that eventually there should be enough of both vaccines for everyone who wants them.

The delays have led to renewed demands for a quicker, more reliable way of producing vaccines than the chicken-egg method, which is 50-year-old technology and involves injecting the virus into eggs and allowing it to feed on the nutrients in the egg white.

Federal officials initially projected that as many as 120 million doses of the vaccine would be ready to dispense by mid-October. They later reduced their estimate to 45 million. As of Tuesday, only 12.8 million were available. (Health officials say a single dose will protect adults, while children under 10 will need two doses.)

In a sign of how rapidly the virus is spreading, education officials said 198 schools in 15 states were closed Wednesday because of swine flu, with more than 65,000 students affected. That was up from 88 school closings the day before.

Production of swine flu vaccine is way behind – http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hDG1Y2pO9MZlJLNboKJOSSY9xWTwD9BFOG0O4

CDC says flu predictions are often futile – http://www.latimes.com/news/health/la-sci-swine-flu22-2009oct22,0,3172233.story

Swine flu vaccine goal 50 million doses next month – http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ghkYM9EjNWVIMr9ufhUmqQUlcVTQD9BFMQ6O2

www.condron.us

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Thursday, October 22, 2009

The Empathy Deficit

Day Two

Think positive. Heal yourself. “Today is the beginning of my new life”. Shot of butterfly being released from open hands. “Today my faith is restored”. Picture of beautiful sunset. I had to turn the music off, I couldn’t stand it. Now, I do know – because I watched her other videos on YouTube – that this poor girl has been suffering. But now she has seen the light because she was told by a “friend” she should do so and she made a video, so we could share her experience.

But I’m with Barbara Ehrenreich on this one. Positive thinking cannot cure you. It cannot stop pain. In fact, if you’re feeling particularly depressed and frustrated, then it is unbelievably annoying to hear people say that you should stop being so negative. What is there to be positive about? That you are not starving and have a roof over your head? There is always someone worse off than you. If I had that attitude then I could never complain about anything. How can we change the world for the better if we never see its faults? I can’t set about finding a cure for my sickness by denying that my sickness is BAD. It stinks, it hurts, I don’t like it, I want to be rid of it. I want to get better.

And another thing that Barbara Ehrenreich said that is so reasonable it made me shout out loud YES: it shows a huge empathy deficit in our society. If you’re sick, “it must be because you sent out the wrong vibrations to the universe”. Don’t tell me about your problems, I don’t want to hear about them. Watch people’s eyes glaze over when you truthfully answer the question “how are you?”

I love it when my husband sings “armes Häschen bist du krank, dass du nicht mehr hĂ¼pfen kannst?” best of all.

Okay, I hear you say: she’s justifying slumping into a state of depression and doing nothing. Well, I have this to say back again. The predominant emotions involved in chronic sickness are anger and frustration. That is why I am writing this blog. That is why Farrah Fawcett Majors let her death be filmed for all to see. There are some glaring misconceptions about people who are suffering. One is that they should suffer gladly, and if they complain out loud then they are depressed.

I am angry. Really, really angry.  I hate these little monsters living in the corners of my body, that invaded me and then hide when I come at them intravenously with the chemical bludgeon that flattens everything in sight. There is something so horribly clever about them. They have found the places to go that are out of the reach of medical science. They can transform themselves into impenetrable balls, like a hedgehog, when they are discovered and stay like that for up to a year, frozen, until you think you are healthy again and then BAM! They unroll and multiply and the whole odyssey begins again.

But it is not just the anger and horror at the internal drama being enacted inside my body that takes up emotional space. It is the rage and frustration at the medical community, the so-called health system. Not even able to diagnose a disease that about half a million people are getting each year in Germany alone, until it is perhaps too late to do anything meaningful about it. There is talk of this illness reaching epidemic proportions already and yet there are hardly any doctors treating these patients. Man, I could go on and on and on. You’re bored? So am I.

Sometimes I dream that I am running. I am incredibly agile, I can jump and climb. There are even dreams where I can fly, although they are very seldom. But when I wake up, trapped in this body that goes nowhere much, except to the doctors, I think – at least I can do anything in my dreams that I want. My mind can go anywhere I like. So where will we go today?

Tretinoin for Acne

Vitamin A acid or tretinoin, available in cream, gel or liquid form, can help acne patients but it may be difficult to tolerate because of its irritating effect.

“Like benzoyl peroxide, vitamin A acid is an aggressive irritant the benefits of which are not readily noticeable. In fact, during the first few weeks of therapy, the rapidly drying, peeling, itching pimples may actually appear worse than ever. The skin will be rough, red and flaky and a decidedly unattractive crop of lesions will bloom quite prolifically for a while,” said Dr. Frederic Haberman, a dermatologist at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, in Your Skin; A Dermatologist’s Guide to A Lifetime of Beauty and Health.

While this may be enough reason to discontinue using the drug, Consumer Guide’s Prescription Drugs said you should go on with the treatment since this is a normal Side Effect of Teitinoin.

“The acne may seem worse after several weeks of treatment but this is because the drying and peeling action of the acid has uncovered hidden comedos (blackheads). Two or three months may be required, after which dramatic improvement can be expected,” explained Kurt Butler and Dr. Lynn Rayner of the John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii, in The Best Medicine.

As for side effects, inform your doctor about blistering, crusting, severe redness and burning, swelling, or marked darkening or lightening of the skin. The safe use of this drug in pregnancy has not been established.

To lessen irritation, the use of a sunscreen is advised since tretinoin increases one’s susceptibility to sunburn and possibly skin cancer. Other studies, however, say otherwise.

“The problem with tretinoin is that it often causes irritation and redness. It doesn’t have great patient acceptability because of that. What’s funny is that chronic use of tretinoin is also said to reduce the incidence of skin cancer so it’s like a twin-edged sword. But I would say that the use of tretinoin has decreased dramatically over the last 10 years. The type of acne that seems to respond well to it is the one mainly with blackheads and whiteheads$ not inflammatory acne which is characterized by big red pimples,” said Dr. Peter W. Gould, former president of the New Zealand Dermatological Society.

Tetracycline, an oral antibiotic, which is used to treat a wide variety of bacterial infections, is also prescribed for moderate forms of acne. This prescription drug inhibits the growth of bacteria which are sometimes responsible for the development of acne lesions.

“Tetracycline (one gram) daily is usually required and has to be continued for at least six months for maximum benefit. Up to 70 percent of patients may be expected to respond with useful reduction of inflammation. However, complete clearance of lesions cannot be expected and improvement is delayed for about a month after treatment begins,”explained Dr. John Wishart of the Department of Dermatology, Auckland Hospital in New Zealand.

One drawback is that tetracycline does not work as fast as topical antibiotics and other peeling agents we discussed earlier. Because of this, the patient must continue taking them for extended periods of time and is more likely to experience their side effects.

“In general, we move to topical stuff because a lot of people may have to take oral antibiotics for two years and they should be cautious about their side effects. Some people can’t take them at all. With tetracycline, they might become sensitive to the sun or suffer from gastric irritation or vaginal thrush,” according to Gould. (Next: Side effects of oral antibiotics.)

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Medical Librarian Appreciation Month

According to the National Library of Medicine, October is medical librarian appreciation month.  Yay!  Now, I’m not just pointing this out because I’m a medical librarian myself (*blush*), but I have noticed a dire lack of knowledge even among librarians about just what a medical librarian does all day.

A medical library, contrary to popular belief, is not just a public library inside a hospital.  It’s more akin to an academic library, but even that isn’t a fair comparison.  The medical library exists to serve doctors, researchers, lab technicians, and nurses in keeping on the cutting edge of scientific knowledge.  It also helps them practice evidence-based medicine.  When your doctor tells you that she wants you to take a certain drug because that drug has proven to be beneficial to people like you, in all likelihood your doctor found an article about a study supporting that information in her hospital’s medical library.

A medical librarian doesn’t generally deal with typical reference questions.  Although we get the “where’s the bathroom” and “how do I photocopy” just like any other librarian, our reference questions are much more often something like:

  • “I found this citation at the end of this article in the current Archives of General Psychiatry.  Can you help me find the original?”
  • “I’d like to set up a recurring search on PubMed for anorexia in men, how do I do that?”
  • “The hospital is getting a VIP patient soon, and I need all articles in the last 10 years on handling VIP patients.”
  • “I have a patient who I believe is presenting with symptoms of schizophrenia, but that is not my expertise.  Can you help me brush up on it?”
  • “We have a patient presenting with delusions, tremors, and missing hair.  Can you run a search in Ovid on those symptoms and see what comes up?”

As you can see, medical librarians, likes subject area academic librarians, need to have a general knowledge of the type of medicine their hospital deals in.  Medical librarians need to speak scientists’ lingo so their patrons won’t get slowed down explaining what they mean to the librarian.  Medical librarians deal with highly educated patrons who generally think with scientific-oriented minds.  They are intelligent, but busy.  The medical librarian is a part of the hospital team.  She is one of the many cogs that exists to provide quality patient care.  She must stay up to date and trained in utilizing scientific databases, in what research is going on in her hospital, and in current medical knowledge and terminology if she is going to help her patrons efficiently.

You won’t find a medical librarian presenting a story hour, themed reading week, or a summer reading program.  You will find a medical librarian skimming the new medical journals cover to cover.   She may have been assigned specific doctors and researchers.  She knows exactly which area of medicine they specialize in and keeps her eye out for new information to forward to them.  They know her by name and stop her in the hospital halls to ask her to find things for them.  A medical librarian may be called upon to conduct a search on a certain condition in a certain type of patient asap for a patient in critical care.  Unlike a public librarian, a medical librarian’s job isn’t to encourage reading or continuing education for the pure fun of it.  Unlike an academic librarian, a medical librarian’s job isn’t to educate people on how to conduct good research.  A medical librarian’s patrons may or may not enjoy reading for fun, but that’s none of her business.  Most of a medical librarian’s patrons already know how to conduct good research.  A medical librarian’s job is simply to provide exactly the type of information her patrons need when they need it.  Sometimes even before they ask for it.  In this sense, it probably makes a lot more sense to call a medical librarian an information specialist.  Indeed, many hospitals are moving toward calling their librarians “informationists.”

I’m taking the time to write all of this simply because I feel medical librarianship is one of the many misunderstood professions.  I suppose this is fine for the general public, but if you are a librarian or a library student, you should understand what it is your medical librarian colleagues do.  Simply not having to explain over and over again that we are not like public librarians would, frankly, be all the appreciation we need from other librarians.  As for any doctors, researchers, nurses, lab technicians, etc… who might be reading this–I know you’re busy.  You may not have ever even gone into your hospital’s library yourself, but your librarian works hard.  Please take the time to tell her or him thank you.  Even if you just happen to spot her in the cafeteria.  Please tell her thank you for being part of the team.  Medical librarians truly enjoy helping you, but we really appreciate being recognized as part of the team.

The Living Matrix: An Exploration of Energy Medicine

      As an energetic healthcare practitioner, I’ve followed films like What the Bleep Do We Know and The Secret. They have crafted a new way of speaking about the quantum field of energy and taken us down the rabbit hole of exploration and discovery.

    The Living Matrix takes the next evolutionary step to understanding energy as pivotal to health. With important contributions from Bruce Lipton, Rupert Sheldrake, Lynne McTaggart, Edgar Mitchell, Herman Koning, MD, James Oschman,Ph.D, Heartmath Institute, Marilyn Schlitz of the Institute of Noetic Sciences and Franz Popp to name a few, this film delivers rich food for thought from seasoned researchers. It also chronicles case studies of people who have experienced extraordinary healing working with the living matrix.     In statements pivotal to our way of thinking about life and healing, the following summary of content is offered for “traveling even more deeply into the rabbit hole!” Consider the following:
  • Your body is connected to an energetic field of information that surround and include us.
  • Your body field is filled with energetic information. DNA ( biological information library) informs fields that become tissue, organs, muscles, cells, etc.
  • Genes are unlimited potential. Influence of environment, emotion and stress can create 30,000 different variations from the blueprint.
  • The heart imprints information from the energetic field and has neural tissue. Emotions have direct impact on what is relayed. The heart is the body’s control system and delivers information to the cells.
  • Life is patterns of information. Illness is a disturbance in the information energy system.
  • Disease is scrambled, blocked or disrupted information. When the disturbance is stopped, chemistry and physiology self correct.
  • 1/3 of all healing happens due to the placebo effect. Belief in process and positive thought have an impact by enhancing the  healing process.
  • The future of energy medicine empowers facilitating the natural healing capacity of the body as a whole. This process is inclusive of thoughts, beliefs, and nurture.
  • Information follows intention with focus and alignment of frequency. 

   In a time when healthcare issues are increasingly controversial, this film helps to empower the part you play in taking care of your own body. It offers meaningful insights and consideration to what wholeness or health means from the energetic viewpoint. Please comment on this article or the DVD at my blog at http://www.windowstotheheart.wordpress.com I look forward to your comments! Article by Kimberly Rex, MS© Copyright. All Rights Reserved. Kimberly is a Resonance Repatterning practitioner at http://www.windowstotheheart.net where she works with clients by phone or in-person with an energetic healthcare focus.

 Get a session to empower your life here: http://www.windowstotheheart.net Get a FREE article with newsletter sign up here: http://www.windowstotheheart.net/news.php Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Kimberly_Rex

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Refuse To Be A Lab Rat

A lack of scientific information when the practice of medicine started was understandable.  However, even back then the medical community refused to believe scientific proof that did exist.  Dr. Semmelweis was fired in 1848 for demonstrating that hand sterilization stops infection.  It took ten years for hand sterilization to become an accepted practice.

Today, it still seems that ten years or more must pass before scientific truth becomes accepted in medical practice.  There is a tremendous amount of information available and accessible today, and yet the medical field still insists on using us as lab rats.  Have the flu and H1N1 vaccinations been properly tested?  What are the long term health effects?  What will happen to people who are on preventative medications for several decades?  Does anyone know?  What are the environmental effects of having these medications in our waste?  Can we trust what public officials tell us regarding these issues?

Not only are we being used as lab rats, but true scientific information is being supressed or ignored.  We are told that alternative treatments are not the accepted standard of care or they are not accepted by the insurance company as payable treatments.  Never mind that they might actually be safer and more effective than traditional treatments.  Unbelievable!  Why are we letting our health care be dictated by insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and soon the government?   For an example of what I’m talking about, listen to this lecture on statin medications (cholesterol lowering meds) by Brian Peskin.

A large majority of people are taking these statin medications to lower their cholesterol.  You regularly see advertisements on television touting the benefits of them.  The side effects they list scare me.  Yet, I get the feeling that people fear they will die of a heart attack tomorrow if they refuse to take these medications.  The government told us that senior citizens were choosing between these medications and food back when they were developing the Medicare drug plans.  Are we sure these medications are worth the amount we are charged for them?  Why do you think the pharmaceutical companies can afford to advertise medications on television?  I suspect it is because the profit margins are tremendous!  Financial gain and political power are driving the field of medicine, not scientific fact, and I resent it.  As a matter of fact, it angers me.  I would venture a guess that our entire health care system would not need an overhaul if health decisions were based on scientific fact coupled with good common sense.

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Brave new world

Here is a bit of scientific research that has “ethical, moral, social and spiritual disaster” written all over it.

Scientists at the University of Toronto found that by genetically tweaking fruit flies so they failed to produce a particular type of pheromone or odour, it turned them irresistible to their species.

Professor Joel Levine, who led the study, removed the cuticular hydrocarbon pheromone, used by the flies to communicate.   

They discovered that when the pheromone was removed, it created a “sexual tsunami” where the bugs proved attractive to one another, regardless of sex.

The research found that male fruit flies with no history of homosexuality attempted to mate with their pheromone-free males, according to the research published in journal Nature.

Even flies of a different species were interested, according to the research team.

Nope, this advancement in science won’t lead to unforeseen horrors.  Nope.   It’s a brave new world.

Friday, October 16, 2009

Promising new treatment for human cancer - Chrysanthemum indicum extract

A series of studies have demonstrated that Chrysanthemum indicum possesses antimicrobial, antiinflammatory, immunomodulatory, and neuroprotective effects.

Recently, much attention has been devoted to the anticancer activity of Chrysanthemum indicum, especially in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). However, its anticancer mechanism of action is still not clear and needs further investigation.

Read the entire article, here.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

The Winsor Autopsies: Validating Chiropractic

As early as 1921, the medical profession validated chiropractic. Henry Winsor, a medical doctor in Haverford, Pennsylvania, asked the question:

“Chiropractors claim that by adjusting one vertebra, they can relieve stomach troubles and ulcers; by adjusting another, menstrual cramps; and by adjusting others conditions such as kidney diseases, constipation, heart disease, thyroid conditions, and lung disease may resolve – but how?”

Dr. Winsor decided to investigate this new science and art of healing- chiropractic.

Dissection Studies

After graduating from medical school, Dr. Winsor was inspired by chiropractic and osteopathic literature to experiment. He planned to dissect human and animal cadavers to see if there was a relationship between any diseased internal organ discovered on autopsy and the vertebrae associated with the nerves that went to the organ. As he wrote:

“The object of these necropsies (dissections) was to determine whether any connection existed between minor curvatures of the spine, on the one hand, and diseased organs on the other; or whether the two were entirely independent of each other.”

The University of Pennsylvania gave Dr. Winsor permission to carry out his experiments. In a series of three studies he dissected a total of seventy-five human and twenty-two cat cadavers. The following are Dr. Winsor’s results:

“221 structures other than the spine were found diseased. Of these, 212 were observed to belong to the same sympathetic (nerve) segments as the vertebrae in curvature. In other words, there was nearly a 100% correlation between minor curvatures of the spine and diseases of the internal organs.”

Heart Disease
All 20 cases with heart and pericardium conditions had the upper five thoracic vertebrae misaligned (T1-T5). Pancreas
All 3 cases with pancreas disease had spinal misalignments in the mid-thoracic area (T5-T9). Lung Disease
All 26 cases of lung disease had spinal misalignments in the upper thoracic area (T1-T5). Spleen
All 11 cases with spleen disease had spinal
misalignments in the mid-thoracic area (T5-T9). Stomach Disease
All 9 cases of stomach disease had spinal misalignments in the mid-thoracic (T5-T9) area. Kidney
All 17 cases with kidney disease were out of
alignment in the lower thoracic area (T10-T12). Liver Disease
All 13 cases of liver disease had misalignments in the mid-thoracic area (T5-T9). Prostate and Bladder Disease
All 8 cases with prostate disease had the lumbar vertebrae misaligned (L1-L5). Gallbladder
All 5 cases of gallstone disease had spinal
misalignments in the mid-thoracic area (T5-T9). Uterus
2 cases with uterine conditions had the second lumbar (L2) misaligned.

Dr. Winsor’s results are published in The Medical Times and are found in any medical library. Winsor was not alone in his findings. Similar studies by other researchers have confirmed Dr. Winsor’s conclusion that degenerated and misaligned spines have a high correlation with disease processes.

Final Thoughts

Despite the continued research and literature correlating the maintenance of health with the maintenance of the spine and the nervous system, chiropractic is the only modern health profession that takes this approach toward health. An unhealthy spine and nerve pressure will cause the body to function at less than 100%. When the body is not functioning properly, it is more susceptible to disease. A chiropractic spinal check-up and adjustment can help in the care and prevention of sickness and disease through a properly functioning nervous system.

Reference:
Winsor H. Sympathetic segmental disturbances – II. The evidences of the association, in dissected cadavers, of visceral disease with vertebral deformities of the same sympathetic segments. The Medical Times, November 1921, pp. 267-271.

Taking the mystery out of medicine

Article one of a package put together in my Newsroom elective. Each week a story had to be produced and filed.

A childbirth booklet currently being distributed in Australia, won the author, Dr Allison Shorten, the annual Trailblazer award last week.

 

Dr Shorten, from the Faculty of Behavioural Sciences at the University of Wollongong (UOW), formed the booklet to aid pregnant women with accurate information about childbirth.

 

A mother of two and a midwife for fifteen years, Dr Shorten led an extensive research team to create the Informed Birth Choices: Pregnancy decision support package.

 

The Trailblazer competition, now in its fourth year, was celebrating one of its largest finalist groups. The nineteen finalists displayed a broad range of products, ideas and research development that spread across many faculties in the university.

 

The annual event inspires innovative ideas and encourages research and development.

 

“I’ve watched the competition over time and I usually think hard science would win those things, the more exciting things,” said Allison.

 

Australia last year had over 250 000 child births. Dr Allison’s work will help to assist a considerable amount of women and their families.

 

“I created distilled information that’s clear for the women. It gives them an opportunity to ask questions. They need good information in order to make rightful choices.”

 

Kate Comac, a practitioner from Sutherland hospital, believes that the birthing package would be appreciated among so many women in society.

 

“It’s an important time for women to make the right decisions that can be based on values, health of the child and so many other elements.”

 

Allison ran a randomised control trial with two hundred women over three local hospitals.  The package has built up popularity and was warmly welcomed across Australia.

 

“I have been translating it into practice. Hospitals all over Australia are starting to use it and I have an agreement with a hospital that will print it under their banner so women are actually getting use out of it,” said Dr Allison.

Dr Shorten’s prizes will include the local community being exposed to the booklet in the near future.

 

UOW will give concrete assistance in the sales and marketing of Dr Allison’s new product and $3000 grant for her to progress.

 

She will have to learn to use a new skill set as she is set to become a leading entrepreneur in the medical field.

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

HUGO Matters: New Blog

It’s good to see that huge organizations like the Human Genome Organisation are starting to use web 2.0 tools in order to reach people in an easier way. As Hsien-Hsien Lei just reported, HUGO now launched an official blog, HUGO Matters, that looks nice and I can’t wait to see the new posts and announcements so added it to my feedreader and the genetics selection of PeRSSonalized Medicine as well immediately.

HUGO Matters is the central hub for HUGO’s social networking efforts. The blog will serve as a platform for discussions on genome technology, genomics and ethical, legal, and social issues, intellectual property, education, latest research techniques, and other topics relevant to genomics in the 21st century. Contributors will include myself, editor Dr. Hsien-Hsien Lei, HUGO Council and Committee members, fellow HUGO members, and genetic and genomic scientists/researchers from around the world. We will also use the blog to communicate HUGO’s latest events and happenings, including exclusive behind-the-scenes look into how an international scientific organisation is run. Over the next few months, HUGO has plans to facilitate greater interaction and activity on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, hopefully creating a virtual scientific community that spans the globe.

Painful Subject

Oh my aching back!  People who talk about health complaints without coming up for air are a real pain in the . . . well, you know.  Also avoid taking medications in front of people in your place of business.  In any medical emergency, suspend the rules.

If nosy people ask personal questions or offer unsolicited advice about your health, simply say, “There are some things that are personal that I will not discuss.”  You may add, “But thank you for your concern.”

From  the Culture and Manners Institute at http://www.cultureandmanners.com

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Physiological Evidence of NDE's?

This is one of the most controversial scientific issues:

Brain Waves Surge Moments Before Death
‘A study of seven terminally ill patients found identical surges in brain activity moments before death, providing what may be physiological evidence of “out of body” experiences reported by people who survive near-death ordeals.

‘Doctors at George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates recorded brain activity of people dying from critical illnesses, such as cancer or heart attacks.

‘Moments before death, the patients experienced a burst in brain wave activity, with the spikes occurring at the same time before death and at comparable intensity and duration.

‘Writing in the October issue of the Journal of Palliative Medicine, the doctors theorize that the brain surges may be tied to widely reported near-death experiences which typically involve spiritual or religious attributes…’
–see full article -Irene Klotz, Discovery News

Saturday, October 10, 2009

[Open] Science Sunday - 11.10.09

This week’s science reading list brought to you through the magic of the internet, bloggers and Open Access.

There’s been a lot going on this week, starting with the Nobel Prizes, and of course, NASA’s quest for a watering hole. That of course, does not mean that other interesting things did not pop up on my reading list.

The Nobel Prize in Physics was jointly awarded to Charles K Kao for his work on the use of fibre optics for communication and to Willard Boyle and George Smith for the invention of the CCD sensor (charge-coupled device) , which can convert light signals into electronic signals. The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A Steitz and Ada E Yonath  for their work on the ribosomes. And the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Elizabeth H Blackburn, Carol W Greider and Jack W Szostak for their work in chromosomes, and the enzyme telomerase. I particularly liked the emphasis placed by Carol Greider on the importance of ‘curiosity-driven” research (read about it here).

There were another few fun things this week. There was the 3D description of the human genome (great post by Brandon Keim on Wired Science), the image gallery from the Nikon Small World competition are absolutely amazing, and lastly a nice article got published in PLoS One about the growth of Archaeopteryx, which is nicely discussed by Michael Ryan on his blog.

And this tweet just really made me laugh!

Friday, October 9, 2009

Baloney Detection 101: Double-Blind Testing

One of the most important advancements in scientific methodology, dating from it’s development in the mid-19th century, is the double-blind protocol, a method of testing in which neither the experimenter nor the subjects are aware of certain key variables in the study, like the identity of the control group and the test group.

First proposed by one Claude Bernard, a physiologist, it was a bit of an extreme departure from the earlier Enlightenment attitude that only trained scientists were qualified to conduct experiments. Double-blinding has the advantage of side-stepping the problems of experimenter biases and expectation, and is a superior method overall to single-blinded studies, and not just in medical research either.

It is highly useful in the physical sciences as well, such as the incident in the early 1900s with the alleged discovery of N-Rays by René Blondlot at the University of Nancy in France: Just previously, X-Rays had been discovered, and Blondlot believed he had uncovered yet another form of radiation, N-Rays.

It turned out that when a double-blind test of the procedures to produce N-Rays was covertly conducted by a visiting American physicist, that detection of them was simply the result of subjective misperception, that they did not actually exist, caused by the prior belief and expectation to see them by Blondlot and his associates.

During the double-blinding procedure, key components of the instruments thought to produce the rays were secretly altered. Blondlot saw the rays when they should not have been there (an aluminum prism, thought to refract the rays, was surreptitiously removed) by his own belief in how they should behave, and were not seen when they should have been (a lead screen was removed from one such test, unknown to him) had they been real.

This protocol was a revolutionary idea when first proposed, and is occasionally even done in paranormal research, though the studies have a distressing tendency when so done to produce negative results, often well within the boundaries of chance when independently conducted.

Even those with pro-paranormal sympathies at the time, when they are both honest and competent, produce such results in experiments, which sometimes leads a wee few of them to adopt a more skeptical stance, even if they continue to truly believe in psychic phenomena shortly after the original failed study.

In any case, double-blinding is one of the many methods of science used to ferret out the secrets of Nature, and human test-subjects in a manner that allows a more objective examination of whether something actually works, on what, in what way, and how well. It’s a development that was truly remarkable when it was conceived and even now one of the best of many scientific methods. It will likely be around much longer until a better system is discovered in that evolving social enterprise we call science. Fnord.

Thursday, October 8, 2009

"Her parents said at their trials that they believed healing came from God, and that they never expected Kara to die."

Kara Neumann, 11, died in March 2008 surrounded by a prayer group at her family’s home in rural Weston in central Wisconsin. It was later determined she had an undiagnosed, but treatable, form of diabetes. Her parents said at their trials that they believed healing came from God, and that they never expected Kara to die.

But prosecutors countered that the Neumanns recklessly killed their youngest of four children by ignoring obvious symptoms of severe illness as she became too weak to speak, eat, drink or walk. They said the couple had a legal duty to take their daughter to a doctor but relied totally on prayer for healing.

In handing down the sentence, Marathon county circuit court Judge Vincent Howard told the Neumanns they were “very good people, raising their family, who made a bad decision, a reckless decision. God probably works through other people,” he told the parents, “some of them doctors.”

Read the full article here.

Previously: Wis. jury: Father guilty in prayer death case (August 1, 2009)

Do you ayurveda?

In recent years, Ayurveda has emerged in France. We hear more and more about ayurvedic massage, ayurvedic medicine. Yet, this philosophy of life and medicine that have existed for over 5000 years in India.

Ayurveda is composed of two words, Ayur means life and veda meaning knowledge or science. This philosophy was primarily to help you rebalance your energies to live in perfect harmony with yourself and the world around you.

Ayurveda is both a way of life and a medicine known as Ayurveda.

Regarding lifestyle, Ayurveda is practiced every day. You need to work on you daily. You must be very careful about ecology, but not one that we, the West, we know. You should be aware of the nature that surrounds you in the preserving, but also your inner nature. Thus, you should avoid your being polluted by harmful elements such as negative thoughts. For this you need to adopt a positive attitude. Similarly, you must learn to control your emotions and impulses like jealousy, anger, uncertainty, fanaticism.
Work is therefore on you so that you reach the well-being and inner peace, while trying to be in perfect harmony with nature around you. So you must change your diet according to different seasons. All acts of your daily life are resolved accurately and every moment of the day should be devoted to a specific activity. In the morning you need, for example, getting up early, you massage, do exercise, take a shower, you purify, meditate, eat before going to work. At night, you must be creative, you walk, meet people, meditate, relax and sleep.
Food is of great importance in ayurveda. You should consume no excess and healthy way. For example, you should eat only when hungry.
The world is a whole and each of its elements (space, air, earth, fire, water) interact with each other. They act on man and influence. Similarly, human impact nature. And the goal is to find the perfect harmony so that the balance is carried.

Ayurveda is a kind of preventive treatment of disease. But, if they occur, treatment “medical” exist.
Ayurveda has given birth to ayurvedic medicine, alternative medicine, taught in universities in India.
According to ayurveda, each person has a Prakruti, a constitution and metabolism of its own. From there, have been defined three humors or doshas, that is to say, the vital energies that regulate the body. These three humors are Vata, Pitta and Kapha. Each of us is more or less Vata, that is to say impulsive, imaginative and restless insomniac, Pitta, that is to say, very tough, angry and passionate and Kapha, ie say up solid but slow and prone to obesity and cholesterol.
To be healthy, we need your three humors are balanced.

If you are sick, so that your mood is in excess in your body. If it hurts, is the Vita which is in excess if you have a fever, is the Pitta, and if you scratch, it is the Kapha. Each mood is separate treatment, which consists of massage with enema in diet, physical exercise in mental and spiritual exercises and more surprisingly, fasting, singing, affection, gatherings, etc..

The principle of Ayurveda is to treat the person (children to seniors) and not the disease. Each person is different constitution, being composed of different moods, treatment will not be the same.
Thus, by examining your eyes, your language, your wrist or your urine, your doctor may ask Ayurvedic diagnosis and determine which treatment is best for you.
These treatments may seem incongruous to Western minds, are to treat your entire body. For example, if you suffer from liver, we will not only give you a treatment for the liver. All of your body and your mind will be treated.

This treatment is done in stages:

- Cleaning your organization (Shodan), which consists of massage with oils and herbs to remove toxins and in enemas, in vomiting, nasal douches in for you free of excess; ingestion of yogurt in special restore your intestinal flora
- The spiritual treatment (Shaman) which consists of meditation, yoga, chanting, breathing in order to reconcile the doshas
- Physical exercises and breathing with absorption of herbs and minerals to improve your vitality and your physical performance (the Rasayana)
- The practice of mantras (sound therapy), the yantras (helps concentration) and Tantra (direction of energy through the body) to fight against stress and increase your psychological balance in order You raise spiritually and mentally.

In disease prevention, the proposed schemes are intended to help you strengthen your weakest organs and balancing your body and your mind.
In France, ayurvedic medicine pure and simple, does not yet seem to many followers. It must certainly be born in India to achieve fully understand the very principles of Ayurveda. By cons, are emerging for some time ayurvedic massages, treatments, diets inspired Ayurveda, Yoga without forgetting.

The ayruveda seems complicated at first sight and it is certainly very difficult to know all the ins and outs. However, with changing attitudes toward the West from a desire to live more in harmony with nature, to a better physical and mental, is that we do not approach a little more each day ayurveda ?

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

High doses of paracetamol may help patients with stroke

High doses of paracetamol may help patients with stroke
According to a new study conducted by researchers from the Netherlands, large doses of paracetamol improves prognosis in patients with stroke and elevated body temperature. Due to its accessibility, is a popular febrifuge may be one of the methods of treatment of stroke.

It is known that increasing the temperature above 37 degrees immediately after stroke worsens prognosis, and the probability of a bad outcome is doubled when the temperature is increased for each additional degree. Temperatures above 37.5 degrees is found in every third patient with stroke. Paracetamol at a dose of 6 g per day lowers the temperature by about 0.3 degrees.

Heleen den Hertog and colleagues at the Erasmus University (Rotterdam, The Netherlands) conducted a study, which involved 1 400 patients with stroke. Patients were treated with paracetamol or placebo.

It was found that 40% of patients with a temperature of 37-39 degrees, treated with paracetamol, recovering from a stroke better than one might expect.
The authors say that to confirm these results, larger studies are needed, but in all probability, paracetamol can be an inexpensive and safe method of treatment of stroke.

Source material Reuters.

Sunday, October 4, 2009

PeRSSonalized Genetics: Follow Quality News and Resources

I launched PeRSSonalized Medicine to help patients and doctors keep themselves up-to-date more easily, without any kind of IT knowledge. It is an easy-to-use, free aggregator of quality medical information that lets you select your favourite resources and read the latest news and articles about a medical specialty or a medical condition in one personalized place.

Now here is the newest category, PeRSSonalized Genetics with all the quality news sites, blogs, peer-reviewed journals and web 2.0 tools focusing on genetics and genomics.


Some reasons why it is unique:

  • You can search in the database. It means you will find medical information only from a quality selected portion of the world wide web.
  • You can personalize any of the sections.
  • You can also receive the newest Pubmed articles focusing on your search term. Just insert your field of interest, a therapy, a condition, etc. and click Search. Then you can add the newly created box to your personalized medical “journal”.
  • It is a community-based project. Please let us know which quality resources should be added to the database.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

A Secret Chord to Please the Lord

i had a dream last night that i started working at this burlesque house. when i went to apply for the job, i was completely naked and i had to pass through this room that sold lingerie and the saleslady asked me what size i was, and i said “i’m not shopping” and i kept going to the burlesque part and the mistress lady who ran it was like “hello beautiful” and i knew i’d get the job cuz there was only one other girl there and she was pretty ugly. the rest of the people were all guys, but they weren’t working there, they were just hanging out. they looked like the type of guys you’d find in a tattoo parlor.  the first guy i had to entertain was scrawny and balding and way pass 40. i started off by sitting on his lap and…..that’s all i can remember.

i’ve been sleeping a lot. my medicine is making me drowsy and heavy feeling. i’ve been spending a lot of time in my memories lately. i have some really good ones, but i really should be working on making more.

In health debate, Obama's stories of hardship don't always hold up to scrutiny

WASHINGTON – One of President Barack Obama’s health care “horror stories” is about a woman who, he says, lost her health insurance on the verge of breast cancer surgery because she didn’t disclose a case of acne to the insurer. That’s not what happened.

Robin Lynn Beaton, 59, of Waxahachie, Texas, indeed had her insurance suspended and then terminated when she needed it the most. Hers is a cautionary tale about how an insurance company can act in a seemingly arbitrary manner to revoke coverage for lifesaving treatment.

But not for the reasons Obama cites.

Star Tribune

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Copeland: Success of Personalized Health Care Requires Impactful and Sustainable Benefits

Dr. Ronald Copeland, president and executive director of Ohio Kaiser Permanente Medical Group, spoke on the importance of emphasizing health awareness on a community level. He touched on key benefits in developing personalized medicine including the ability to make more informed medical decisions, decreased probability of negative side effects and early disease intervention.

Copeland continued to say that we must proceed with caution and realize these benefits in a way that allows them to be both impactful and sustainable. It seems likely that the genetic influences and impacts on disease are great and additional research is going to be a key factor. We need to improve quality and patient satisfaction while reducing health care costs. Copeland ended his presentation by noting that there is definitely a case for practicing and researching personalized medicine and that he and his team are pleased to be part of the journey and look forward to collaborating on future discoveries.