November 2nd, 2010 by Dr. Val Jones in Health Tips, Video
Tags: ABC, ABC News, David Hale, ePatient, ePatients, Featured, MedHelp, NIH, NLM, PillBox
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The Internet has revolutionized how we receive information – and it’s also changing how we learn about and manage our health. A new “ePatient” movement promises to empower patients with online and mobile tools – making it easier than ever to contact a physician, track health variables, and join a support group.
Four minutes isn’t much time to summarize an entire movement, and I think I got a little off topic while suggesting a new use case for David Hale’s NIH PillBox (a pill identifier tool). I said it could be used to identify pills even after your pet licked part of the label off them!
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVcm-Xzc0Sc
For more information about ePatients, check out my earlier blog post.
November 1st, 2010 by Dr. Val Jones in Health Tips, News
Tags: Autism, CDC, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, Diphtheria, Efficacy, Engerix-B, Flu Vaccine, Gardasil, Hepatitis, HPV, Immunization, Immunized, Infectious Disease, Jab, Lock Jaw, Mayo Clinic, Meningococcal Vaccine, MMR, Pertussis, Pneumovax, Polio, Primary Care, Reasons To Get Vaccinated, Safety, Science Based Medicine, Shots, Tetanus, Top 10, Vaccine, Vaccines, Whooping Cough, Zostavax
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Vaccines have saved more lives than any other medical intervention in history. They are incredibly safe and effective and are well-tolerated by most people. In the US, the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) carefully reviews all reports of adverse reactions that could be associated with vaccines. Over decades of review, they have found that the rate of potential severe reactions is so low that they cannot even calculate a risk.
There are many vaccines available for babies, children, and adults. Please check these vaccine schedules to make sure that you and your family are fully protected from vaccine-preventable diseases. (Or you can ask your doctor/nurse to review your vaccine needs with you in person.)
Vaccines for ages 0-6 click here.
Vaccines for ages 7-18 click here.
Vaccines for adults click here.
In case you have any doubts about the value of protecting yourself from disease, here are my top 10 reasons to get vaccinated: Read more »
October 31st, 2010 by Berci in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News
Tags: CDC, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Bertalan Mesko, General Medicine, Health Communicators, Health Messages, Healthcare Communication, Healthcare Social Media, Medicine and Social Media, Science Roll, Social Media and Health Communication
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The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has published the newest “Health Communicator’s Social Media Toolkit.” From the CDC:
A guide to using social media to improve reach of health messages, increase access to your content, further participation with audiences, and advance transparency to improve health communication efforts.
The guide is truly fantastic, detailed, and comprehensive.
*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*
October 31st, 2010 by RyanDuBosar in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Health Tips, News, Research
Tags: ACP Internist, American College Of Physicians, Blood Sugar Control, Candy, Community Health, Diabetic Medicine, Food and Nutrition, Glycemic Control, Halloween, HDL Cholesterol, Health Commissioner, High Polyphenol Chocolate, High-Fat Foods, Insulin Resistance, Media Message, Medical Advertising, New York City, Nutritional Issues, Obesity, Overweight, Public Awareness, Public Health, Ryan DuBosar, Sugar Consumption, Sugary Soft Drinks, Type 2 Diabetes, Weight Gain, Weight Management
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New York City’s war on sugary soft drinks had to balance evidence-based medicine with a short, simple message that would go viral in the community. Going viral won, according to e-mails of internal discussions between the city’s health commissioner, his staff, and the ad agency that crafted the campaign. The statement that soda would cause a person to gain 10 pounds a year is contingent upon many factors, argued the staff, but the desire to produce a media message with impact overruled the details. One nutritionist called the campaign “deliciously disgusting.”
Chocolate may moderate HDL cholesterol in type 2 diabetics, according to the November issue of Diabetic Medicine. High polyphenol chocolate increased HDL cholesterol in diabetics without affecting weight, insulin resistance or glycemic control. Researchers enrolled 12 type 2 diabetics in a randomized, placebo-controlled double-blind crossover study to 45 g chocolate with or without a high polyphenol content for eight weeks and then crossed over after a four-week washout period. HDL cholesterol increased with high polyphenol chocolate (1.16+/-0.08 vs. 1.26+/-0.08 mmol/l, P=0.05) with a decrease in the total cholesterol: HDL ratio (4.4+/-0.4 vs. 4.1+/-0.4 mmol/l, P=0.04). No changes were seen with the low polyphenol chocolate.
With Halloween, sugar will be on everyone’s mind (and in everyone’s stomachs). To find out how many calories and how much fat that pile of Halloween candy totals, try this interactive module. (New York Times, Diabetic Medicine, ABC Chanel 7 News-Denver)
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
October 30th, 2010 by Lucy Hornstein, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, Opinion, Research, True Stories
Tags: Biological Aging, Dr. Lucy Hornstein, Getting Older, Good Sleep Habits, Healthy Aging, Medical Residency, Medical Residents, Medical School, Musings of a Dinosaur, puberty, Signs of Aging, Teen Health, Young Adults
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I heard a 23-year-old woman complain: “I must be getting old when 11:00 at night is late.” It got me thinking.
It turns out that the explanation for why teens are natural night owls has recently been elucidated. They can’t help it — they just don’t get tired until way later in the evening. Then, of course, their bodies want to stay asleep well into the next morning in order to feel sufficiently rested. Since most of them are stuck with the artificial structure of school hours, they’re screwed — and condemned to suffer constant fatigue from cumulative sleep deprivation. Old news.
Then I started wondering about the back end of this phenomenon. Even though our American “youth culture” attributes great coolness to late-night happenings, since this pubertal sleep shift is biological, there must come a point at which their pineal glands go back to releasing melatonin at a more reasonable hour. Does 10 years sound about right? I remember not being nearly as enamored of the “all-nighter” by the time medical school rolled around, as opposed to college, where staying up all night was a regular occurrence. Certainly by residency (ages 26 to 30), it was a killer. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Musings of a Dinosaur*
