Thefastpharma. Health news blog
Dec 29
How do you start breaking up the logjam of beliefs and habitual ways of responding to stress? The best way we have found with our cancer patients is to ask them to identify the stresses going on in their lives in the six to eighteen months prior to the onset of the disease. Because the [...] [...more]
Posted: under Cancer.
How do you start breaking up the logjam of beliefs and habitual ways of responding to stress? The best way we have found with our cancer patients is to ask them to identify the stresses going on in their lives in the six to eighteen months prior to the onset of the disease.
Because the link between emotional states and disease applies to susceptibility to all illness, not just cancer, the process of identifying the links between stress and illness is valuable for everyone, and so we ask all readers, cancer patients or not, to complete the activity below. (You may wish to refer back to the Holmes-Rahe stress chart in Chapter 4 for an idea of the variety of stresses that can lead to illness.) This exercise can help you translate the general concepts we have been describing into your personal experience.
1. Think of an illness you have now or have had in the past. If you have or have had cancer, use that for this exercise.
2. If you have cancer, take a piece of paper and list five major life changes or stresses that were going on six to eighteen months prior to the onset of your illness.
3. If your disease was something other than cancer, list the five major stresses that were going on in your life in the six months preceding the onset of the disease. (With diseases less severe than cancer, a shorter time span seems appropriate.)
4. If you experienced a recurrence of your disease at any time, make a list of five major stresses going on in your life in the six months prior to the recurrence.
If you do not take the time actually to do this exercise, if you just read through these questions without thinking deeply about the answers and then writing them down, you will not begin to get the benefit that is available to you from this book. This statement applies to all the exercises that will be presented in Part Two of this book.
Most people find when completing this exercise that the period before the onset of the disease held a number of major stresses. If you did not find any major external stresses—such as the death of a spouse, the loss of a job, or the like—be sure also to consider internal stresses. Were you wrestling internally with a psychological problem such as disappointment that youthful dreams were not being realized, major adjustments in a personal relationship, or an identity crisis? These may be every bit as significant in creating feelings of hopelessness or helplessness as very visible external stresses are.
If you did discover significant stresses in your life (whether external or internal) prior to the onset of the disease, examine how you participated in that stress, either by creating the stressful situation or by the manner in which you responded to it. Did you, for example, place yourself in a stressful situation by putting everybody else’s needs first, by failing to say no, by ignoring your own mental, physical, and emotional limits? Or, if the event was something outside of our control, such as the death of a loved one, were there alternative ways of reacting? Did you permit yourself to grieve or did you determine not to show your emotions? Did you permit yourself to seek out and accept support from loving, nurturing friends during the stress?
The object of this kind of self-examination is to identify beliefs or behaviors that you want to change now. Because these beliefs have been threatening your health, they need to be consciously examined with an eye toward altering them.
The purpose of the next exercise—identifying the five major stresses in your life right now and determining alternative ways of responding—is prevention, which means acknowledging and then eliminating tensions that could predispose you to illness.
1. List the five greatest stresses in your life right now.
2. Examine ways you may be participating in maintaining the stresses.
3. Consider ways for removing the stresses from your life.
4. If there is no reasonable way to remove a stress, consider whether you are creating other supportive or nurturing elements in your life. Are you accepting the support of close friends? Are you making a point of giving yourself pleasurable experiences during stressful times? Are you permitting yourself to express your feelings about stressful situations?
5. Consider whether you could remove these stresses or balance them in your life if you put your own needs first more often. Do you permit yourself to consider what your own needs are? Have you attempted to find ways to meet them despite what you feel are the needs of others?
After you have completed this exercise, be sure to note any similarities between the ways you responded to stress prior to your illness and the ways you are responding now. If you find similarities, reexamine your behavior, since you may have habitual ways of responding that do not contribute to health.
*34\347\2*
Dec 15
Of course, you can let the chance slip by. Alison, a cannabis addict and alcoholic, remembers how she missed the chance to get well. ‘At the age of twenty-five I was living with a rock group and we had a very hefty evening – a lot of drinks and a lot of drugs. A lot [...] [...more]
Posted: under Anti-Smoking.
Of course, you can let the chance slip by. Alison, a cannabis addict and alcoholic, remembers how she missed the chance to get well. ‘At the age of twenty-five I was living with a rock group and we had a very hefty evening – a lot of drinks and a lot of drugs. A lot of dope. At 6.30 a.m. I got up dehydrated and did all the washing up, and I finished up some red wine, and then white wine and then cognac.
‘By 11.30 a.m. I was in a suicidal depression, so I rang the office up and said “I’m going to kill myself.” They sent round Susan, my friend. She arrived and I said to her, “I think I’m an alcoholic.”
‘ “No, you’re not,” she said. “You’re a nice girl.”
‘That was the moment when I could see I was suicidal because of the drinks and the drugs. I could make the connection, but because Susan said what she did, the moment passed. I went on drinking and taking dope for a further three and a half years.’
Many addicts and alcoholics have similar moments of truth, which they let slip by. How many times have you told yourself, ‘I’ll really do something about it’? And then you’ve done some more drugs or had a few drinks, and the feeling of urgency has evaporated.
It’s the old excuse: ‘I’ll quit tomorrow.’ But will you? Will you even get the second chance? Have you ever met an old addict? You haven’t? Well, ask yourself why it is there aren’t any old addicts.
Or perhaps you have decided you will act. You’ve told yourself you will stop using drugs or drinking. And you have – for a few days, perhaps even for a few weeks. But then you’ve hit a bad patch and you’ve gone back to drugs or drink. Or perhaps you simply decided you deserved a reward for good behaviour and started again with that excuse. And you’ve probably told yourself: ‘It’ll be different this time.’
If this is the case, we come to what is probably the single most important fact about giving up drugs.
*56\116\2*
Dec 12
The alteration of function or behavior that occurs in a seizure will depend on the magnitude and type of the disruption or disorganization and on the “community” of the brain in which it occurs. Local disruptions of brain function are called “partial” seizures because only part of the brain is involved. Since each area of [...] [...more]
Posted: under Epilepsy.
The alteration of function or behavior that occurs in a seizure will depend on the magnitude and type of the disruption or disorganization and on the “community” of the brain in which it occurs. Local disruptions of brain function are called “partial” seizures because only part of the brain is involved. Since each area of the brain has a different function, the manifestations of an electrical disruption or seizure will differ, depending on which area of the brain is involved. When a partial seizure affects one area of the brain, the manifestations may be twitching of the thumb, hand, or face. If it affects another, there may be a tingling sensation, a peculiar smell, an unusual taste. In other areas, the seizure may lead to changes in behavior—staring or alterations of awareness. All such seizures are caused by local (contained) disruption of normal electrical activity.
But, as in a society, so a seizure or demonstration may not remain confined to a local region. Depending on its intensity and on the threshold of the brain, the disturbance or seizure may become sufficiently severe to involve a large part of the brain or, indeed, the whole brain and become a generalized seizure.
Just as we do not understand exactly why demonstrations begin, spread, and end in a society, we also do not yet completely understand the factors that maintain the seizure focus in the brain or the interactions with the “crowd” of surrounding neurons. How does excitement, lack of sleep, or a fever alter the threshold of the surrounding cells? What genetic and environmental factors influence the “threshold” ? If we understood the multiple factors and interactions that cause disruptions in the brain, and the factors that cause these disruptions to stop, we could probably prevent seizures from occurring altogether. But we do not.
*10\208\8*
Nov 24
When you feel you just can’t go on any longer, you have hit rock bottom. And it feels like the worst place in the world to be. Everybody has a slightly different experience of hitting rock bottom. But most recovering addicts and alcoholics agree that until they have this feeling they are not forced to [...] [...more]
Posted: under Anti-Smoking.
When you feel you just can’t go on any longer, you have hit rock bottom. And it feels like the worst place in the world to be.
Everybody has a slightly different experience of hitting rock bottom. But most recovering addicts and alcoholics agree that until they have this feeling they are not forced to change. When at last they feel they can’t go on any more as they are, then finally they are willing to get help.
Tracey’s rock bottom came after trips to doctors, psychiatrists, casualty departments and even acupuncturists. She had finally been put in yet another treatment centre by her parents, but had been thrown out because of her disruptive and uncooperative behaviour.
‘When my parents discovered what had happened, they told me to get lost,’ she recalls. ‘I was literally out on the streets. I didn’t have a penny. I remember thinking “I’ve got two options. Either I’ve got to do something, or I’d better take a load of barbiturates and finish it now.” A girlfriend took me to Narcotics Anonymous, and I started going to their meetings.’ Her five years of drug-using ended that day. She now has a happy life.
Hitting rock bottom doesn’t have to involve anything very dramatic. Elaine, a woman in her sixties, was dependent on tranquillisers which she topped up with a tumblerful of whisky every night. An almost trivial incident made her realise she had a drink and drugs problem.
‘I had a horror of water in my flat, and a leak from the flat upstairs (as I thought) upset me. I called the plumbers and they found that the rug on the bathroom floor was completely wet. They told me that the bath must have overflowed and I wouldn’t believe them. After they’d gone, I began to realise they must be right. I had been too knocked out by pills and booze to notice it at the time. I said to myself: “There must be something wrong. I can’t go on like this.” A few days later I went to my first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.’
That incident was the straw that broke the camel’s back. She suddenly realised that she was ill and that she needed help.
*55\116\2*
Nov 17
ПОЛЛИНОЗЫ У ДЕТЕЙ У детей младшего возраста может наблюдаться маскированный поллиноз: заложенность в ушах, вплоть до потери слуха, без других признаков поллиноза. У некоторых бывает только небольшое покраснение конъюнктив, частое почёсывание носа. У других заболевание протекает в виде тяжёлой бронхиальной астмы без ринита. У некоторых детей в период разгара поллиноза развивается пищевая и медикаментозная аллергия, [...] [...more]
Posted: under Allergies.
ПОЛЛИНОЗЫ У ДЕТЕЙ
У детей младшего возраста может наблюдаться маскированный поллиноз: заложенность в ушах, вплоть до потери слуха, без других признаков поллиноза. У некоторых бывает только небольшое покраснение конъюнктив, частое почёсывание носа. У других заболевание протекает в виде тяжёлой бронхиальной астмы без ринита. У некоторых детей в период разгара поллиноза развивается пищевая и медикаментозная аллергия, которая не отмечается вне сезона цветения растений.
Поллинозы у детей могут проявляться тремя клиническими формами бронхитов, типичной бронхиальной астмой. Эти три клинические формы нередко сочетаются или развиваются последовательно.
Начало заболевания обычно совпадает по времени с цветением растений, являющихся аллергенами для ребенка, и симптомы, как правило, повторяются ежегодно в одно и то же время. У детей младшего возраста (до 8 лет) чаще превалируют симптомы заложенности носа с затруднением дыхания и отмечается небольшой зуд глаз. В таких случаях приступообразно наступает нарушение носового дыхания. Дети жалуются на ощущение инородного тела в горле, затрудняющего дыхание, в связи с чем и возникают частое покашливание и першение.
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Sep 14
Originally it was thought that all the symptoms of hyperactivity could be put down to a lack of essential fatty acids.’ Now it seems that only some of them can be laid at the door of an EFA deficiency. We are now sure that evening primrose oil works best for those hyperactive children who are [...] [...more]
Posted: under General health.
Tags: General health
Originally it was thought that all the symptoms of hyperactivity could be put down to a lack of essential fatty acids.’ Now it seems that only some of them can be laid at the door of an EFA deficiency. We are now sure that evening primrose oil works best for those hyperactive children who are also atopic or who come from an atopic family.
There is now a great deal of evidence that people who suffer from an atopic condition, such as eczema, are not utilizing essential fatty acids properly. They may be eating enough in their diet, but it is not getting through. Like other atopic people, hyperactive children might have something wrong with the delta-6-desaturase enzyme, which is needed to convert linoleic acid to the next step in its metabolic pathway. Evening primrose oil avoids the enzyme block because it starts at the next step.
Evening primrose oil should always be taken with its co-factors. These are zinc, Vitamin B6, nicotinamide (Vitamin B3), and Vitamin C. These co-factors are essential if the evening primrose oil is to work properly. The oil will not work so well without these co-factors. A general vitamin and mineral supplement is also sensible so that all the vitamins, minerals and trace elements can work in a proper balance with each other.
When evening primrose oil is taken together with its co-factors, the effects can be startlingly good. The result is calmness, concentration, a change of outlook, and improved general health.
*22/60/5*
buy generic viagra
Sep 14
Beta Blockers The medical assault on high blood pressure took a step forward in the 1970s and 80s as medical practitioners embraced with enthusiasm a new group of drugs called Beta Blockers. Designed as they were to block the effects of adrenalin on the heart muscle these new drugs reduced high blood pressure by slowing [...] [...more]
Posted: under General health.
Tags: General health
Beta Blockers
The medical assault on high blood pressure took a step forward in the 1970s and 80s as medical practitioners embraced with enthusiasm a new group of drugs called Beta Blockers. Designed as they were to block the effects of adrenalin on the heart muscle these new drugs reduced high blood pressure by slowing the heart rate. In retrospect this was a silly way to lower high blood pressure because, ultimately, high blood pressure relates to the tense walls of tight arteries; not the heart’s increasing efforts to pump the blood through them. Such a mode of action leaves people who take Beta Blockers with worse circulation than they had to begin with and they become fatigued with only the slightest of exertion.
A host of other undesirable side effects and the rises of vaso dilating anti blood pressure tablets have led to a decline in the use of Beta Blockers. Obsolescence is not yet complete as Beta Blockers have found an enduring place in the management of angina. It is difficult to suffer from the pain of angina if the heart can’t beat fast enough to run out of oxygen in the first place. One further use of Beta Blockers relates to their action in and around heart attacks. Whilst not preventing a heart attack; evidence supports the conclusion that people taking Beta Blockers have their risk of dying from a heart attack reduced by up to 50 per cent.
Betnovate
Betamethasone is a very potent steroid hormone. Doctors prescribe Betnovate prolifically in the treatment all forms of dermatitis and psoriasis. As a rule, the larger and the more frequent the application of steroid creams like Betnovate the sooner allergic skin conditions go away and the longer they stay away. Betnovate is not for the face or infants. It can cause skin wasting and stretch marks. Used in high doses over large areas for a long time Betnovate penetrates the skin and causes “cortisone” like side effects. Doctors should not use Betnovate in the presence of infection, unless they treat the infection at the same time. Sometimes creams like Betnovate encourage or aggravate viral infections such as herpes.
*21/131/5*
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Jun 01
The medical term for senility is dementia. Dementia refers to a set of symptoms, not a single illness – a generally progressive, irreversible decline in memory, reasoning, thinking. A number of diseases produce this inexorable intellectual deterioration. Though it has now become the popular catchword for everything, Alzheimer’s disease is only the most common of [...] [...more]
Posted: under General health.
Tags: General health
The medical term for senility is dementia. Dementia refers to a set of symptoms, not a single illness – a generally progressive, irreversible decline in memory, reasoning, thinking. A number of diseases produce this inexorable intellectual deterioration. Though it has now become the popular catchword for everything, Alzheimer’s disease is only the most common of them.
When people have dementia (caused either by Alzheimer’s disease or by another illness) an early sign is trouble in remembering the ongoing events of daily life. A woman may forget she just made a phone call and call her daughter back. She may not remember driving to the store an hour earlier and may make a second trip.
Sometimes the first symptom is a change in personality. The person withdraws, becoming apathetic, abstracted. Or a life that had been tightly ordered seems to unravel. A fastidious housekeeper begins leaving the dinner dishes in the sink; her immaculate house is now in disarray. A dapper, punctual man regularly shows up at work hours late, disheveled, with a stained tie.
Changes like these are almost always either isolated incidents (How many of us have never blanked out on a phone call we made two seconds ago?) or signs that something is wrong with the emotional side of life. Personal problems may be preoccupying us, affecting our memory, our mood and our ability to handle life competently. It is very difficult to be sure a person is suffering from a dementing illness when the condition is in its earliest stages.
Strange or unusual behavior is often seen in retrospect as the first sign of the disease when, as the months pass, the victim’s mental processes deteriorate. For instance, when University of Michigan researchers interviewed family members of dementia victims, many said they had interpreted early symptoms in their loved ones, later diagnosed as Alzheimer’s disease, as emotional problems. When their mother became forgetful, children decided she was depressed or deliberately tuning them out. When a husband started behaving strangely, his wife might worry about their marriage. Some women even went for counseling or considered divorce.
Even if a family sensed what was really happening early on, they were often unable to articulate exactly what was peculiar or amiss and so had trouble convincing the doctor to take their worries seriously. Months might go by before the true condition was diagnosed.
If the problem is a dementing illness, things do get worse; eventually it becomes obvious that something is very wrong. As the illness reaches its middle stages, a person’s reasoning becomes strangely concrete. A man may be unable to follow simple instructions such as “turn right to Main Street” or “twist the cap to open the jar.” The advice to “just dive in” may be greeted by the puzzled comment, “I’m not near a swimming pool!”
Simple calculations become difficult. A woman may first have trouble making change, then forget that four quarters make a dollar, then not understand the word dollar. She may be unable to name objects correctly or remember their function – calling forks spoons, spearing steak with her knife, cutting food with her spoon. Judgment becomes increasingly unreliable, alarming family members. Children, worried at first that Mom might cross Main Street against a red light and be hit by a car, months later may find that their anxiety multiplies: “Will she run out on Main Street undressed?”
In the final stages there is profound disorientation, an inability to locate oneself in time or space. People are often unable to dress or feed themselves, control their bowels, remember their names, or recognize their families.
*119/159/5*
GENERAL HEALTH
Jun 01
The person whose mind I have always envied most, my brilliant childhood friend who became a historian, has Alzheimer’s disease. Several years ago she began noticing changes in her teaching. She had trouble finding the right word for what she wanted to say. Sometimes she would pause in the middle of a sentence and begin [...] [...more]
Posted: under General health.
Tags: General health
The person whose mind I have always envied most, my brilliant childhood friend who became a historian, has Alzheimer’s disease. Several years ago she began noticing changes in her teaching. She had trouble finding the right word for what she wanted to say. Sometimes she would pause in the middle of a sentence and begin a thought again. We all thought her complaints were psychological. She was too upset about her daughter’s divorce. We understood there was something seriously wrong only on our trip to Europe in the summer of 1984.
Janet had to ask the tour guide for the schedule several times a day. She could not keep the time the bus would leave in her head. She would ask questions about sights that had been discussed only a few minutes before. She seemed apathetic, not thrilled, when we visited the historical places I knew she loved. Restaurants were a problem. She had trouble finding her way back to our table after trips to the ladies’ room. Once we caught her about to walk out the door. Afterward I made excuses so I could take her there and back.
Over the next year or so she was able to handle life fairly well once back in the familiar surroundings of our town. She took a sabbatical from teaching but went to her office to “work” on papers several days a week. Everyone felt it would be good for her keep up the pretense, even though she could no longer really produce. Jack let her to do everything – shop, cook and take care of the house. He never stopped her from going out alone. But he was always upset. Would this be the time she took the car and wound up lost or dead? Would this dinner he the one where the stove was left on? By then she had been seen by specialists. Everyone knew what she probably had.
This year things have gotten much worse. My cool, rational friend now has outbursts of anger that come from left field. She sometimes is unable to sit still for more than a second at a time. When she is home she wants to go out. Once out, she wants to go back. She is like a person possessed – a firecracker of emotions without purpose or will.
Last week I invited Jack and her to dinner. When I would go into the kitchen, Janet would get up to go to the door. Jack would have to jump up, bring her back, and explain we were about to eat, only to have her pop up again. When I finally got dinner on the table, he had to cut her food and serve her. I was near tears by the time they left. What’s going on? Can’t anything be done to ease her suffering? What about me? What is my chance of getting this terrible disease?
Senility is everyone’s worst terror about old age. The flood of publicity about Alzheimer’s disease has multiplied this concern. We hear there is an epidemic; there is nothing medical science can do. But we know little else about this sword hanging over our later years: “Is my forgetting names more often a sign of beginning Alzheimer’s disease?” “Is becoming senile the inevitable price if we live to a ripe old age?” “What is senility?”
*118/159/5*
GENERAL HEALTH
May 21
There is a great deal of individual variation in the way that children interact with others. Some seem to have boundless curiosity and confidence, while others are hesitant and literally cling to mother’s skirts. Shyness has been the subject of a great deal of study by researchers in recent times. Many have been concerned with [...] [...more]
Posted: under General health.
Tags: General health
There is a great deal of individual variation in the way that children interact with others. Some seem to have boundless curiosity and confidence, while others are hesitant and literally cling to mother’s skirts. Shyness has been the subject of a great deal of study by researchers in recent times. Many have been concerned with the age-old argument of nature versus nurture. Are children the way they are because they were born that way, or as a result of their upbringing?
It is true that shy parents are more likely to have shy children. What is not clear is whether this is because of an inherited predisposition to shyness, or because there is something about the parenting style that makes a particular child shy. In addition, role modelling is very important. A child learns from the way his parents interact with other people, and is likely to emulate this style. Shyness as a particular style is more common in certain cultural groups, though again it is uncertain whether this is genetic or due to a particular style of parenting.
Shyness can be very painful for children who may find it very difficult to interact with others in a social setting, or take a long time to warm up. The worst thing that parents or teachers can do is to push these children into a strange situation, or else ridicule them in front of others. This only diminishes their self-confidence and makes things worse.
It is very important to respect individual differences in temperament and personality of children, to accept them as they are, and to support them in their efforts to negotiate the many transitions of their childhood successfully. A child’s shyness may so affect his confidence and interaction with peers that parents will be concerned about his social isolation. In such cases, it may be appropriate to consult a psychologist or other health professional. A number of professionals specialise in working with shy children, either individually or in groups. Your doctor will be able to refer you to an appropriate person.
*136\90\8*