Wake Up America!

Pay attention to your business!

Did you vote for your congressman, senators and the president of the United States in order for them to tell you how much you can earn?

Did you vote for them to tell you what doctor you can see and for what ailment he can treat you?

Did you elect them to direct the nation’s banking, car manufacturing, insurance or other industry?

Were they put in office by you to tell you what vaccinations you should have and in what order you can have them (depending on who you are)?  Or, that you must have them?

Did you vote for your “representatives” so that they could tell you what car you can drive, what light bulb you can use, what size your toilet has to be or in what lane you can drive during certain hours?

Ladies and Gentlemen, if you voted for these people for any of these reasons (and hundreds of other areas of your choices which they have usurped) then you did not vote for a “representative”.  You voted for a master.

Who are these people?  What right do they have to direct us in these manners?

WE  are 300 million people.  THEY are – representatives, senators, president and v. president, supreme court – 496 people.

If we don’t want them, they go.

Question:  Do you want them?  If so, for what?

Not that long ago, elected officials concerned themselves with defense, national infrastructure, courts & justice, treaties with other nations and the like.  They budgeted and raised taxes in support of those legitimate government activities.  In short, they created and sustained an environment where the private sector could flourish according to it’s own direction.  The private sector flourished.  The government then was for the people, meaning that it set them up so they could pursue their private interests.  It works.

In the present time, the government has grown itself and expanded to the point where it now wants to command and direct the private sector – that would be you, the private citizen.  It wants us to work for them.  Our constitution permits congress to regulate commerce, not direct it.  Yet, Washington has intruded into nearly every aspect of our lives to the point where nothing of any consequence can be accomplished without a government component.  You can find hundreds of examples simply by looking at the label on most anything you buy!

Our present economic troubles reflect that involvement.  The private sector is not flourishing and the average government worker is paid more money (I decline the word “earns” because government produces nothing.)  than the average non-government worker earns.  Further to that, the “involvement” is that of unqualified people – the politicians – meddling with private sector business affairs in order to create, not a business result, but a political outcome.  This led directly to the so-called real estate bubble and subsequent financial meltdown. (Sometime when you have a few minutes, look at the resumes of our 100 senators and ask yourself, “by what experience shown here, are they qualified to pass law on the details of medicine and healthcare delivery?  Banking and finance?”)

Ladies and Gentlemen, anything government has, anything they are paid, they first take from us.  We are each others’ security and we are government’s security.  Without us, they don’t exist.   Our parents and grandparents fought wars to keep us free from what’s happening here, now.   Here’s a simple question: Do you want them to serve you or rule over you?

We need not tolerate the latter.

Don’t.

And the Hits Just Keep on Comin’

Recently, on an undisclosed date, The Eventual Doc ventured to Boston for his very first interview, at Boston University. If you recall, this was not only his first interview of the application cycle, it was, in fact, his first interview out of three cycles. So this is what you might call a Very Big Deal to him. The drive was fairly pleasant, actually. Driving through Vermont and New Hampshire, the leaves were a fiery, golden blanket across the landscape, and with a few This American Life podcasts saved to his iPod, little in the way of traffic, and nearly ideal driving weather, The Eventual Doc made excellent time.

Just as he reached the outskirts of Boston, however, his Palm Prē buzzed to indicate an incoming email. A glance at the email subject, which was all The Eventual Doc could read (as he is a Very Safe Driver, and doesn’t text or email on the road) indicated that the Dartmouth Medical School admissions office had reached a decision on his application. With the GPS device indicating at least another 10 minutes before he reached the hotel, The Eventual Doc excitedly imagined parking at the hotel, flipping open the phone, and reading the email in which Dartmouth would exclaim that they’d never seen as impressive a student as he, won’t he please come on down at his earliest convenience to interview.

This, of course, was decidedly not what the email said.

The Eventual Doc was assured that his application was considered with care, but that wherever he went to medical school, it wouldn’t be there. One more down.

The interview at Boston University was great. Having been a GMS student, it wasn’t necessary for him to attend a full interview day, sparing him the student-led tour, lunch, etc. Actually, he was pretty bummed about not getting a free lunch. But otherwise, the prospect of a one-and-done interview day was a pleasant surprise, and that would mean he could return home to Snowville, NY much earlier than he’d feared. Then he got the Red Folder.

Ah, the Red Folder. Countless times, The Eventual Doc had seen herds of somberly-clad interviewees on the medical campus at BU, clutching their Red Folders nervously. He had never seen the inside of one, but imagined it had to contain untold treasures, and that the mere fact of holding one admitted a person to an elite, secret club, like the Masons, or Scientologists. Turns out, it just contained some facts and figures about the school, some financial aid information, and the like. Nothing too spectacular, and no magic membership to the BUSM Cabal. Still, he found himself unconsciously holding it so that the embossed “Boston University School of Medicine” was conspicuously visible wherever he went.

Secretly, he imagined mothers leaning over their children and whispering, “See? That man there is Going Places. He’s On His Way to doing Great Things.” Old men would look on admiringly as The Eventual Doc passed, nodding in approval. Of course, in reality, he appeared, more than anything, just like those herds of self-conscious interviewees he had jealously despised the year before. But damn it, he finally had his Red Folder.

He learned that his interviewer would be none other than Dr. Wonderful, whom he knew by reputation and occasional interactions to be very nice and easy to speak to. The interview was extremely conversational, not in the least stressful, and left him with a cautious optimism for his chances at gaining acceptance there. That said, Dr. Wonderful candidly warned The Eventual Doc that nothing was certain, and that she could offer no guarantees or even any indication of which direction the decision may go. This will be a long winter.

Before he left, he remembered that he had a logo blanket he’d been awarded by his employer, DrugCorp. He left it beside a pile of blankets in the shape of a sleeping homeless person; it was getting cold, and surely others needed it more than The Eventual Doc. He didn’t want to wake the pile of blankets, so he just left it there. Would it be appreciated? He didn’t know.

Upon arriving in Snowville, The Eventual Doc settled down to his computer to check his email, and then status pages for his medical school applications. UVM had apparently taken advantage of his trip to Boston to update his status; rejected.

So here’s how things stand for The Eventual Doc:

1. Warren Alpert (Brown)
   
2. Tufts
   
3. Boston University [Hooray!!!]
   
4. Yale
   
5. University of Michigan
   
6. Washington University in St. Louis
   
7. Dartmouth
   
8. Medical University of South Carolina
   
9. University of North Carolina
   
10. Mayo
    
11. University of Vermont
    
12. University of Rochester
    
13. Georgetown
    
14. Baylor
    
15. SUNY Stony Brook
    
16. Duke
    

Things are certainly not looking good. Before the cycle began, The Eventual Doc had imagined the doors to highly-ranked medical schools swinging open to welcome him. Now, he’s hoping to get an invite to at least one more.

 

H1N1 Flu Vaccinations for the First Family

Posted by Audiegrl

WhiteHouse.gov/Catherine McCormick-Lelyveld—We’ve been asked about whether the President, Mrs. Obama, and Sasha and Malia have received their H1N1 and seasonal flu vaccines. All four members of the Obama family have received their seasonal flu vaccine. Malia and Sasha were both vaccinated for H1N1 last week, after the vaccine became available to Washington, DC schoolchildren. President and Mrs. Obama have not yet been vaccinated for H1N1, and they will wait until the needs of the priority groups identified by the CDC – including young people under the age of 24, pregnant women, and people with underlying conditions – have been met. The girls’ H1N1 vaccine was administered by a White House physician, who applied for and received the vaccine from the DC Department of Health using the same process as every other vaccination site in the District.
While the initial distribution of vaccine is being administered to priority target groups, there are steps every family can take to help protect against H1N1 and seasonal flu. Remember to check Flu.gov for the latest on vaccine availability near you, steps you can take to protect your family, and what to do if you or a loved one gets the flu.

A Strange System: Food: Too Corny

Too Corny

Corn is a wonderful vegetable.  Admittedly, the stuff we consider corn is actually maize, but I’m not here to argue semantics.  The kernel of maize is a mature ovary of fruit fused with a seed coat.  Corn can be eaten raw, cooked, or ground into flour for bread.  Good stuff this corn.  Perhaps that is why so many Native American cultures used it as the basis for their agricultural system.   However, we decided that there can’t be too much of a good thing.  Too bad that’s not true.

A cornfield

If you drive through the Great Plains states, you will be seeing a ton of cornfields.  In fact, that is probably the only type of farming you will see.  We have turned our central Great Plains into a monoculture, where one crop dominates.  This causes a number of problems.  First, this limits the genetic variability of the crops.  If a blight or fungus decided to mosey its way into a corn field and do some damage, you can bet that the whole system is likely to fail, because now, certain plants that are resistant to this infestation are gone.  It is all the same.  Second, it depletes the soil.  When the early white settlers were moving into the Great Plains, the grass had root systems several feet deep.  There was a huge amount of top soil.  But due to constantly farming the same thing and not rotating crops, we have decreased the topsoil levels to a paltry few inches.  Where did this soil go?  Into the streams.  Where do the streams go?  In that area, all roads may lead to Rome, but all streams head to the Mississippi River.  And where does the Mississippi River go?  Unless you flunked seventh grade social studies, you know that it empties into the Gulf of Mexico.  These sediment deposits disrupt the natural ecosystem of the Gulf.  They also carry with them nitrates from fertilizers (more on that in the next segment), which create huge algal blooms.  The algal blooms don’t have all that much oxygen in the rather warm Gulf stream waters (warm liquids don’t hold gases as well as cold ones (why pop is better cold)), so they die relatively quickly, but not before using up all of the oxygen in the water, creating a dead zone.  This is a continuous cycle of nutrient depletion and algal blooms, creating a large dead zone at the mouth of the Mississippi.

And we eat it.  Corn, that is.  Well, perhaps eat is isn’t the best word.  We ingest it in some form.  Corn is convertible into tons of cool food additives, like high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, corn starch, corn oil, and many more of your favorite food label regulars.  We find it everywhere.  Why?  (That one question is so important).  It is common because it is cheap.  Why?  One word: subsidy.  Why?  Because big companies love to use corn.  Why?  Aha, now that is the right question.  The corn kernel is essentially a packet of starch that can be broken down and rearranged as all of those additives, sweeteners, and preservatives listed above.  So to keep their costs down, companies need to keep corn cost down.

Brought to you by the letter c: Corn

Not only is corn convertible to foodstuffs, it can be made into, drum roll please… ethanol!  Ethanol amongst the dumbest ideas I ever heard, and to think that I once believed it had potential.  Right now, whether you like it or not, your gas is 10 percent ethanol.  It’s required by law.  Ethanol is a renewable bio-fuel.  It may burn a bit more cleanly than gas, but, depending on which study you read, some scientists claim that you need to put 1.2 calories of corn into the system to get 1 calorie’s worth of ethanol (this depends on what you consider a cost of farming and producing for corn ethanol.  Some analysts believe tractors fall from the sky so they don’t need to be considered in cost analysis).  It doesn’t take a rocket scientists to do the math.

A factory farm dairy feedlot

Cows are grazing animals.  They are supposed to eat grasses.  So when farmers take cows to pasture, they can have some fun, eat some grass, chew some cud, poop some poop (fertilizing the soil so more grass grows) and everybody goes home happy.  Now, cut to the factory farms.  Cows stand with little to no room to move, knee deep in their own feces.  Factory farms use corn to feed all these cows.  But wait, didn’t I just say that cows are supposed to eat grasses?   Corn is not a natural part of their diet, and it completely messes up their digestive system.  So now what are we going to do with all this fecal matter?  Well, the brilliant solution we have come up with is to create giant cesspools of crap.  These, in turn, seep into the ground water and streams, killing those systems, much like nitrates from fertilizers created a dead zone in the Gulf.  Yum.  Good, clean water.  Also, whenever we divert corn to ethanol, or to livestock feed, we divert it from people who need it for food.  And as the amount of corn being grown for food decreases, the prices increase, causing many people to go hungry.  Seems like a system designed to fail!  It gets better.  We use gas with ethanol in it to ship corn from the Plains to the factory farms in the Carolinas and the Dakotas, and then the cows to the processing plant, and then your local supermarket.  Every calorie of commercial food you eat expends almost 10 fossil fuel calories.  Talk about inefficient.

The Cosmic Perspective

But, you say, how can I make a difference?

A feedlot

You have buying power.  The purchases you make directly influence companies and our governmental policies.  Buy grass fed beef instead of factory farm meat if you have the money to do so.  It will have less fat and will taste better!  Or, eat less meat.  I am not asking you to become vegetarians.  In fact, I think vegetarianism is unhealthy (The Vegetarian Myth by Lierre Kieth) and often committed to for the wrong reasons.  The clear-cutting of forests to make room for fields for cattle, the environmental impact of slaughterhouses, transportation costs and the sheer amount of methane gas emitted by cattle herds, is damaging to the planet.  Also, eating less meat will positively affect our health in the long run.  The average American obtains 80 percent of their caloric intake from meats, 7 percent from pop and processed foods, and 3 percent from plants.  Is it any surprise that 30 percent of the population is obese, 8 percent have diabetes and 1 in 5 adults have high cholesterol.  400,000 people in the US die from obesity related diseases each year.  Type II diabetes was once thought to be only found in adults.  Now, this generation is set to be the first to have a lower life expectancy than their parents.  We should try to move towards 45-5-50 with regards to our caloric intake.  This will help us lower our cholesterol, blood sugar, and weight.

But it costs so much.

Well, thanks to those nice government subsidies, corn fed beef and corn products can be sold cheaply.  If the actual cost of those corn products was displayed in the supermarket, people would never buy them.  Think of all the water, fertilizers, pesticides, energy, and man hours went into making those foods.  I think that may be worth a bit more that what the supermarkets are saying it is worth.  Not to mention the environmental costs!

Think about it.

Reading Lists

I’m always on the lookout for comprehensive, reliable reading lists in the areas of general European history, history of science, and history of medicine, if for no other reason than to be able to see where the gaps in my knowledge are most stark. And, since my move from a focus on the 19th century to the 18th and 17th centuries (once I began here at Edinburgh), I am acutely aware of how large these gaps can be. So it is in that spirit that I post links to a few helpful reading lists:

[University of California, Los Angeles]

UCLA European and Intellectual History reading list

UCLA History of Science reading list || UCLA History of Science reading list II (perhaps more recent?)

UCLA Renaissance and Reformation reading list

UCLA Early Modern Europe (Reformation to the Revolution) reading list

UCLA Modern History after 1740 reading list

UCLA Social and Economic History reading list

[Harvard University]

Intellectual and Cultural History of Early Modern Europe reading list (Ann Blair – PDF)

History of the Book reading list (Ann Blair – PDF)

[Cambridge University]

A ‘Core’ Reading List for Cambridge HPS students (PDF – modified by me)

Cambridge HPS Research Guide (lots of helpful recommendations here, if slightly dated)

[Oxford University]

Course Programme and Reading List for HSTM Master’s students (2009-10, PDF)

—[History of Medicine]—
And finally the National Library of Medicine in the U.S. has a wonderful website where you can access hundreds of course syllabi on the history of medicine by professor, institution or date. Very helpful. Here are links to a few of the ones I find particularly interesting (note: all of the links point to PDFs):

Katharine Park (Harvard, 2002): Medicine and Society in Medieval and Renaissance Europe

Anne Harrington (Harvard, 2003): In Search of Mind

Thomas Broman (University of Wisconsin – Madison, 2005): The Physician in History

Christopher Lawrence (UCL Wellcome Trust, 2005-6): The Rise of Modern Medicine 1650-1900

Vivian Nutton (UCL Wellcome Trust, 2003-4): Medicine, Disease, and Society from Antiquity to the Renaissance

Penelope Gouk (Manchester Wellcome Unit, 2002-3): Medicine before 1800: Changing Conceptions of the Body, Disease and Health in Early Modern Europe

Clare Pilsworth & Penelope Gouk (Manchester Wellcome Unit, 2004-5): Medicine before 1800: Changing Conceptions of the Body, Disease and Health in Early Modern Europe

Not.So.Good.So.Far.

I feel like a filthy, disgusting rat that has been traipsing endlessly, throughout the sewers of the city all night.  And speaking of filthy, disgusting and night, I awoke from the worst nightmare of my entire life! Absolutely! Without question! Bar none! I will not disclose any of the content, lest I throw the majority of my readers into permanent hospitalization! Except for the odd fact that it came in two versions.  Like film ratings? One for viewers with more hearty stomachs and one for…? Those who wish to have their entire innards obliterated!

Further, why on earth am even remembering my dreams at all now? I never could before! I suppose the one benefit of it all is if they are pleasant?

I did not take my meds before my MRI (which I suppose is one semi-good thing–the MRI was no problem.)  I did this anticipating it would make me more dopey, so I could just flop there and not think of much.  Well, of course I thought of all sorts of icky things, but I tried to squeeze some good things in there, as well.  So, perhaps some more “semi-good-ness,” in my thinking of those items in the MRI tube.

Nonetheless, onto more “filthy-disgusting-ratness.”  I had to return to my former workplace to do some banking.  In case you want to track PA and she is “Anonymous,” her former workplace was not a bank.  So, screw you if you try and find me.  Therefore…  Yes, I have an account at my former establishment of employment–sounds-weird–don’t ask.  TRIGGER! Also, extremely WRONG music while walking there on my iPod.

Bite.Lip.Don’t.Cry.

Walk.In.Head.Down.Avoid.All.Eye.Contact.

Walk.Out.Head.Down.Avoid.All.Eye.Contact. (…while also trying not to think about your bank balance, or lack thereof…)

I then returned to transit where I got on and “waited” to fall apart.

Head.Down.Start.Bawling.Profusely.

I am now home and have swallowed my handful of “Happy Pills,” and made myself a Pint Cuppa! Maybe that will bring my sorry, filthy, disgusting, sewer rat, ass around! I also have an appt. for my haircut at 1300hrs.  Maybe that will “pretty” PA up, and also make her look and feel like less of a sorry, filthy, disgusting, sewer rat!

True, they day is hardly over.  Perchance, there is some improvement yet to come?

U.S. eases stance on medical marijuana

Though a welcome step, it has to be carefully exercised as the law may be misused by Drug Addicts with the help of crooked Doctors.
As a matter of academic interest, are there no alternative to marijuana in treatiing specific cases?
I am sure there are;Can somebody enlighten me on this?

Story:
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. directed federal prosecutors Monday to back away from pursuing cases against medical marijuana patients, signaling a broad policy shift that drug reform advocates interpret as the first step toward legalization of the drug.

The government’s top lawyer said that in 14 states with some provisions for medical marijuana use, federal prosecutors should focus only on cases involving higher-level drug traffickers, money launderers or people who use the state laws as a cover.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/19/AR2009101903638.html?nav=hcmoduletmv

Read my lips! No health care rationing!

Florida plan advises hospitals to bar some patients in event of severe flu pandemic By Sheri Fink, ProPublica

Florida health officials are drawing up guidelines that recommend barring patients with incurable cancer, end-stage multiple sclerosis and other conditions from being admitted to hospitals if the state is overwhelmed by flu cases.

The plan, which would guide Florida hospitals on how to ration scarce medical care during a severe flu outbreak, also calls for doctors to remove patients with poor prognoses from ventilators to treat those who have better chances of surviving. That decision would be made by the hospital.

The flu causes severe respiratory illnesses in a small percentage of cases, and patients who need ventilators and are deprived of them could die without the breathing assistance the machines provide.

In June, Florida Surgeon General Ana M. Viamonte Ros sent the draft guidelines — which had already undergone a series of internal revisions — to 16 state medical organizations for their feedback.

But the state has not yet publicized the guidelines or solicited input from the general public. The Florida Department of Health released a copy of the draft plan at the request of ProPublica, a nonprofit news organization, which provided it to the Sun Sentinel.

Marc Emery - Prince of Pot

Here’s a piece I found on Marc Emery on U.S TV – it includes an interview with his wife Jodie Emery and is well worth a watch!

Marc is one of the figureheads of the cannabis legalization movement and his treatment by U.S and Canandian prosecutors who circumvented normal procedure to extradite him from Canada is both contradictory and illegal in our eyes.  Further information can be found at drugwarrant.com

FREE MARC!

New York: Get a flu shot, or get fired.

I’m not sure if this kind of mandate has been rolled out across the country, but here in New York, we were told, up front, that the entire hospital staff was required to get a flu shot this year (and the swine flu shot as well when it comes out) OR face termination.  Fired over a flu shot?  I thought Cleveland Clinic’s anti-smoking policy was pushing it…

There have already been talks of protests and law suits here in Albany.  Personally, I’m indifferent, but I guess I can see their point- being forced into doing something they otherwise would not have done, but is it worth a law suit?  Probably not.

I’ve heard a few different explanations for dissent.  Perhaps the most interesting reasoning I’ve heard is this- because the flu shot is offered for free or reduced cost by the drug companies, the companies are protected from litigation if a patient is injured as a direct result of the vaccination.  Another question to be asked would be, “Does the punishment fit the crime?”  Is termination the proper penalty for not receiving a shot?  They require house staff to be up to date on their vaccinations, after all.  So is that any different?  I suppose.  Can you fire an employee for poor hygiene?  Either of my examples could perceivably place patients at risk, but it’s not clear to me that either of these would be enforced.  Finally, do ALL employees really need the shot, even those with no patient contact?  As a pathologist, I did ask myself that question.  Sure we have some patient contact, and we surely have contact with other employees that do have contact with patients, so I suppose the idea is to cover all your bases and just vaccinate everyone.

In the end, it seems clear to me that the New York State government has gotten swept up in the media craze surrounding the H1N1 virus, which, as a concept is sad, but in practice is probably better for everyone in the long run.  I do wonder, however, if we will be required to get our flu shots next year too…

Gahhhhhh....

I took Mom down to The Heart Institute and got her fitted with the  ambulatory blood pressure monitor this afternoon about 2:30. We went from there to the chiropractor’s and then I drove her home. I went out to Sears and bought 2 pairs of shoes for myself and then got some shopping done. I arrived home, just before 6, and went to put the groceries away and Mom started complaining about the blood pressure monitor as soon as I got in the door. “We need to take this back.”

I asked if it was uncomfortable or something and then walked into the living room to find that she had taken it off. I asked why she’d taken it off. “Because I’m done with it!”

“We have to take it back.”

I said “You aren’t supposed to take it off. It’s supposed to be left on!” We paid $100 for this test that isn’t covered by OHIP and I’m worried that we’ll have to pay another $100 to have it put on again. I am still trying to understand why she took it off. And then she says “Aren’t we supposed to take it back, today?”

I said that we are supposed to take it back Thursday that she’s supposed to wear it for two days!

“But I’ve been WEARING it for two days!”

I kept trying to tell her that she’s had it on for less than 4 hours, at this point. She’s looking at me like I’m crazy…

I told her what we did today and she’s convinced that that was 2 days ago…

I managed to get the thing put back on properly, though. Hopefully, it will STAY on for the next two days.

And every time the thing beeps before the cuff inflates, she’s asking “Is this going to go on all night?”. I explain that it only beeps for the first few hours and then before bedtime, it stops beeping and won’t beep at all before we take it off. It will take her blood pressure every half hour but it won’t beep…. It beeps again and she gets irritated and asks if it is going to go off all night long, again.

“It seems to be beeping every 2 minutes!”. It is 1/2 an hour by my count…..

Jesus and all the Saints preserve me….

scar tissue

i hold the hands of the people i never touch.

i provide comfort to people i never embrace.

i watch people walk into brick walls, the same ones over and over again, and coax them to turn around and try to walk in a different direction.

people rarely see me gladly. as a rule, i catch the residue of the despair. i see people who are broken, and people who only think they are broken. i see people who have had their faces rubbed in their failures. i see weak people wanting anesthesia and strong people who wonder what they have done to make such an enemy of fate. i am often the final pit stop people take before they crawl across the finish line that is marked: i give up.

some people beg me to help.

some people dare me to help.

sometimes the beggars and dare-ers look the same. absolutely the same. i’m supposed to know how to tell them apart.

some people who visit me need scar tissue to cover their wounds. some people who visit me need their wounds opened further, explored for for signs of infection and contamination. i make those calls, too.

some days i’m invigorated by it all. some days i’m numbed.

always, i’m humbled by the role of helper.

and, occassionally, i’m ambushed.

Jabbing Myself

At 6:55 p.m. last night, the UPS truck pulled up and the driver dropped a box on my doorstep, knocked on the door, and sped off into the night. What timing since overnight deliveries are to arrive by 7:00 p.m. This moment was filled with anticipation since being prescribed Cimzia a week earlier after Enbrel was no longer doing its thing for my RA. The box was carefully opened and the styrofoam cooler inside gave off a mist of cool air as the lid was lifted. Inside was a brightly colored, ergonomically designed box full of a magic potion in ergonomically designed syringes. But anticipation quickly gave way to fear as the thought of jabbing myself with two needles crept into my mind. This was never an issue with the autoinjector Enbrel Sureclick pens. My heart raced as I opened the box and read all of the safety material (I didn’t really read it all as I had spent much time reading websites already). The reading seemed to calm me down a little as I joked with my children about the side effects of the clear, viscous liquid.

Band aides were arranged, sterile conditions were ensured, hands washed, and alcohol was swabbed on my stomach. The moment had arrived. I removed the protective cap, tapped the syringe to get the air to the top, pushed the plunger up until the air was removed (see pic that my son took), and then quickly pushed the needle into my stomach. To my surprise, I didn’t feel anything which was quite unlike Enbrel whose large needles hurt when they go in. Confidence was raised. But then I started slowly plunging the Cimzia into my flesh. Much like Enbrel, the sting of the medicine was quite noticeable and lingering. But, I wasn’t finished. I repeated the steps with the second syringe. It was all over in 10 minutes but I emotionally felt much better. I could actually jab myself! I still am amazed about how quickly my life became wrapped up in high level, biological medical treatments.

Now the wait begins. How long until I notice an impact? Will I get my energy back? Will joint pain diminish? Will I be back here in 5 months looking at another medicine.  Stay tuned for results.

What pill did I just take?

My friend carries around one pill bottle with several medications. Once, she took a pill that turned out to be a piece of candy. Funny, yes, but it goes to show that pills can be confusing.

For that reason, the NIH is developing a handy database of images and information on FDA-approved pills. As you input details like color, size and shape, the image of the pill in question is updated. Once the pill on screen matches the one in your hand, you can obtain more information such as ingredients and dosing.

The system is still in beta form but according to the Pillbox Web site it will eventually be available for use by “healthcare providers and concerned citizens”.

-Amber

Dad’s Life or Yours? You Choose by Nicholas D. Kristof

Posted by betham37

Op-Ed by Nicholas D. Kristof

Nicholas D. Kristof

New York Times/Nicholas D. Kristof—So what would you do if your mom or dad, or perhaps your sister or brother, needed a kidney donation and you were the one best positioned to donate?
Most of us would worry a little and then step forward. But not so fast. Because of our dysfunctional health insurance system, a disgrace that nearly half of all members of Congress seem determined to cling to, stepping up to save a loved one can ruin your own chance of ever getting health insurance.
That wrenching trade-off is another reminder of the moral bankruptcy of our existing insurance system. It’s one more reason to pass robust reform this year.
Over the last week I’ve been speaking to David Waddington, a 58-year-old wine retailer in Dallas, along with his wife and two sons. I’d love to know what the opponents of health reform think families like this should do.
Mr. Waddington has polycystic kidney disease, or PKD, a genetic disorder that leads to kidney failure. First he lost one kidney, and then the other. A year ago, he was on dialysis and desperately needed a new kidney. Doctors explained that the best match — the one least likely to be rejected — would perhaps come from Travis or Michael, his two sons, then ages 29 and 27.
Travis and Michael each had a 50 percent chance of inheriting PKD. And if pre-donation testing revealed that one of them had the disorder, that brother might never be able to get health insurance. As a result, their doctors had advised not getting tested. After all, new research suggests that lack of insurance increases a working-age person’s risk of dying in any given year by 40 percent.

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Real Canadian doctors...

…who know what it means to be doctors:

Pereira, chief of palliative medicine at the long-term-care hospital Bruyère Continuing Care in Ottawa, specializes in caring for and improving the quality of life for patients who are terminally ill or require long-term care.

He said he is concerned about a private member’s bill to legalize euthanasia after his experience in Switzerland, which already allows the practice.

While working at a hospital in Geneva, Pereira said, he noticed that a few months after the hospital began offering assisted suicide, community-based palliative care services were shut down and the number of palliative-care physicians at the hospital was reduced.

Pereira, who is also a University of Ottawa professor who heads the university’s palliative-care program, said he is concerned that a similar “social slippery slope” could appear in Canada if Bill C-384 is passed.