Dr. Cranquis' Mumbled Gripes
(Disclaimer: Questions related to medical topics will be answered to the best of Dr. Cranquis' (and Google's) knowledge, but the internet-delivered wisdom on this blog CAN NOT AND SHOULD NOT SUBSTITUTE for your Real-Life Doctor's personal attention + examination, and your own common sense too! If you think you're having a medical emergency, hang up and go email 911. The author of this blog takes no responsibility for any medical, relationship, scholastic, financial, or other decisions you may make based on information found in this blog.)
The Jenny McCarthy Body Count site tracks the number of vaccine-preventable illnesses and deaths in the US since June 2007.
via kottke
I love ranting jovially about self-proclaimed vaccine-danger-expert Jenny McCarthy and similar anti-vaccine nonsense. But this website puts some cold hard numbers on the table in a way which sobers the discussion right up.
In other words, when walking through a crowd of smokers outside of your workplace, you’re better off grabbing a cig and puffing on it. (I kid, I kid).
If you really want to spend a long time at the Urgent Care, while the doctor does a “Fever of Unknown Origin” workup on your child, including urine test, strep test, flu test, and chest xray (which takes about an hour to get all the results)…
Don’t tell the doctor about your other child’s recent illness (even after the doc specifically asks you, “Is anyone else sick around this child lately?”)…
Instead, wait until this child’s influenza test comes back Positive, and the doctor starts to discuss prophylactic Tamiflu prescriptions for the other children in the home, then blurt out, “Oh that’s ok, the other child is already on that medicine after she was positive for influenza at the ER yesterday!”
…The amount of caffeine [the girl] drank in the two Monster energy drinks is about the same as that found in 14 cans of Coca Cola — and is almost five times the recommended caffeine limit from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Apparently, if you happen to have Mitral Valve Prolapse (a usually-harmless condition, found in approximately 10% of the population), as this unlucky teenager did, it may only take 2 cans of Monster (consumed within 24 hour period) to kill you — as opposed to the “normal” prediction of 55+ cans, according to the Death by Caffeine calculator.
There is nothing healthy about energy drinks. Please people, just don’t drink ‘em.
Some online resources for survivors of Traumatic Brain Injury:
- Brain Injury Association of America — 30 years of experience in activism and support for TBI survivors and researchers
- SuperBetter — “an online social game designed to help you build up personal resilience in the face of a serious challenge… or to make a major health change.” (I’d never heard of it before researching this post, and it looks very interesting! If anyone out there is using/has used it, I’d love to hear your feedback.)
- TBI Voices — A fascinating collection of video interviews with TBI survivors, discussing their symptoms, the solutions they’ve tried, and their frustrations (Note: The website is owned by a “brain injury law group”, but appears to do a fairly good job of avoiding a conflict of interest in the video library)
- fuckthedisabled’s list of articles re: “sexual issues after TBI” (Tumblr)
- The Trauma Pro’s Tumblr, which includes many tips on avoiding/preventing/dealing with TBI
And some personal blogs written by TBI survivors:
- Eowyn Rides Again — a Wordpress blog, written by a Cranquistador and professional writer recovering from TBI
- Ferretrunner — a Wordpress blog by a TBI survivor, including life-lessons learned from the writer’s ferrets.
- ALifeInRuin — a personal Tumblr by a university student who struggles with a variety of emotions after his TBI
- Broken Brain — a Wordpress blog, collecting “TBI survival strategies and tactics”
Enjoy, be safe, and wear those helmets, folks!
Jack and Jill went up the hill,
to fetch a pail of water.
Jack fell down, due to dizziness from an inner-ear infection, and suffered a depressed skull fracture with intracranial bleed;
so Jill drank all the water herself, but it turned out to be contaminated with Giardia, resulting in a severe bout of diarrhea.
(These are the kinds of things I think about as I’m singing/patting/whispering Baby Cranquis to sleep.)
A ground-breaking “infographic” by none other than THE Florence Nightingale. This particular one clearly displays the statistics which showed that more soldiers were dying from disease instead of wounds during the Crimean War.
Click the pic for more info about it, including some nifty “interactive” versions of the graphic.
realclearpeople submitted:
Perhaps you have heard of this free text messaging service that aims to help its users quit smoking. I have not evaluated the service—just rolled out—but seems interesting. Some of the Company’s other text services (see their website) have testimonials. Good luck all!
http://www.voxiva.com/solutions/health_engagement/smokingCessation.html
Ooh, looks very interesting and innovative! Thanks for sharing. :)
Thinking about quitting smoking (again?) this new year? Keep it up!
Having a hard time quitting “cold turkey”? That’s because only 7% of people who quit without any help (smoking cessation group, medications, nicotine replacement, counseling, or any mixture of those) will stay smoke-free 1 year later. So maybe you should improve your chances by getting some help!
A couple resources that may help you:
- About.com’s free online Smoking Cessation Forum
- Smokefree.gov’s free Talk to an Expert links (instant messaging, phone number, websites)
- Cranquis’ prior posts about cigarettes, quitting smoking, and related facts.
And good luck to all you future quitters in 2012!
Studies have shown that brief interactions between doctors and smokers can significantly improve the smoker’s future chance of quitting smoking. One presentation I saw in residency really stuck with me — Smoking patients were 35% more likely to quit smoking in the next 3 months if their doctor would just say these two sentences to them during a visit:
- “Have you thought about cutting-back or quitting smoking?”
- “You should quit.”
The whole process takes 15 seconds or less.
I try to work these two sentences into all my Urgent Care visits with patients who smoke. I’ve found that Sentence 1 is easy to ask… but if the patient answers “No”, it takes a LOT of practice to utter Sentence 2 without sounding condescending. I’ve found myself sometimes omitting Sentence 2, out of fears of appearing “insulting” or “offensive”… but if I don’t say it, who will?
My New Year’s resolution: to say BOTH sentences to all my smoking patients.
Creative way of increasing testing in a city with a high rate of HIV infections.
British study finds 16% of phones (and hands) have E. Coli on them, even though 95% of people in the study claim to wash hands after using bathroom. Reactions to the study are (hilariously) mixed:
In Calgary, Kevin Wolf was an eager iPhone enthusiast waiting in line for a new model.
“I bet you a lot of people use their phones in the bathroom,” Wolf said when learning of the British findings. “That’s really gross. Thanks for putting that in my mind.”
Farther down the line, the results didn’t seem to bother Joe Eisenlohr.
“As far as I am concerned, probably everything in the world has fecal matter on it. Just wash your hands and don’t put things in your mouth I guess.”
So… wash your hands, you poo-covered people! October 15 is Global Handwashing Day! :)
thuc:
Infographic : Complete Guide to Tracking Your Health & Fitness Online
Ooh, this is useful! Reblogging so I can find it easily for passing along to my patients.
Keep bumping my left arm while doing yard work today, then wondering why it hurts — then remembering that I got my flu shot on Friday. So it’s a GOOD pain.
Get your flu shot, folks!
True, “only 5 of 100 people who attempt to quit smoking succeed” — for any given attempt. But the more times you try, the greater your chance of finally staying quit. Quitting for even 1 week is still quitting, and teaches you valuable lessons about what does (and doesn’t) work for YOU.
Here’s a simple tip to prepare your brain for quitting smoking:
- Every time your brain sends you the “time to smoke” signal, count 10 extra seconds before actually lighting up.
- Continue this pattern for 1 week.
- The next week, make it 20 seconds.
- The week after that, make it 30 seconds — and so on, gradually weakening the “behavioral conditioning” link between your brain’s nicotine urge and your body’s lighting-up reply.
