August 10th, 2009 by Berci in Better Health Network, News
Tags: Ink Blots, Psychiatry, Psychology, Rorschach Test, Social Media, Wikipedia
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The Rorschach test is used for examining the personality characteristics and emotional functioning of patients as their perceptions of inkblots are recorded and then analyzed.
New York Times had a report about Dr. James Heilman who posted all 10 pictures on the site, along with research about the most popular responses to each. Of course, it led to a heated debate whether this information should be accessed on Wikipedia or not.
The article is protected from editing until 6, August but there are serious debates on the talk page. One example:
All of the pictures of the Inkblot Cards need to be removed. Posting them contaminates this tool, The Rorschach Test. Posting the popular responses further contaminates this test. It is a simple case of scuppering a professional clinical tool and needs to be stopped. – Comment of Edith Meyers who has PhD in Neuroscience and Clinical Psychology.
It has recently been suggested to use the hide template that would hide the word associations, so only those who want to read them would be motivated to click “show”.
As a medical student and Wikipedia administrator, I believe such things happen. It’s impossible to hide that kind of information, but revealing these possible answers can really ruin the test itself. Solution? A hide template with a clear warning for possible patients might be one of them. What do you think?
*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*
August 6th, 2009 by Berci in Better Health Network, News
Tags: Find Journals, Journal Articles, Medline, Publication, Science, Technology
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I just wrote about a new feature at ResearchGATE that helps us determine which journal we should choose for publication. Now Bill Hooker from the Open Reading Frame shared JANE with me.
Have you recently written a paper, but you’re not sure to which journal you should submit it? Or maybe you want to find relevant articles to cite in your paper? Or are you an editor, and do you need to find reviewers for a particular paper? Jane can help!
Just enter the title and/or abstract of the paper in the box, and click on ‘Find journals’, ‘Find authors’ or ‘Find Articles’. Jane will then compare your document to millions of documents in Medline to find the best matching journals, authors or articles.
*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*
August 6th, 2009 by RamonaBatesMD in Better Health Network, News
Tags: Nipple, Obstetrics And Gynecology, Raynaud's Phenomenon, Vasospasm
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This article would have been off my radar had it not been for the interaction on twitter.
jeffreyleow RT @paulinechen: Camera Phones [patients taking pics] helps doctor make rare diagnosis http://3.ly/CXr (via @EllenRichter)
Granted I am not generally asked about nipple pain in pregnant women. Those questions tend to go to folk like TBTAM or ER’s Mom.
The article describes a case report of a 25 yo woman in her 2nd trimester with “frequent episodes of extreme bilateral nipple pain. A typical episode lasted between 5 and 15 minutes and was so painful as to bring her to tears.”
The article discusses Raynaud’s phenomenon of the nipple and share these photos (credit) taken with a camera phone with us. The text with the photo:
Vasospasm of the arterioles manifesting as pallor (left), followed by cyanosis, and then erythema (centre). The right hand image shows the normal, asymptomatic, status.
As with Raynaud’s of the hand (which I am more familiar with), the phenomenon tends to occur when the ambient temperature drops below a certain threshold that is specific to each individual. Exposure to cold should be avoided, as is avoidance of caffeine, nasal vasoconstrictors, and tobacco.
Additional treatment for Raynaud’s of the nipple:
Women with persistent pain require immediate relief to continue breastfeeding successfully. Recommended treatment is 30 mg nifedipine of sustained-release once-daily formulation, and most women respond within two weeks.
REFERENCE
An Underdiagnosed Cause of Nipple Pain Presented on a Camera Phone; BMJ 2009;339:b2553; O L Holmen, B Backe
Vasospasm of the Nipple–a manifestation of Raynaud’s phenomenon: case reports; BMJ 1997 314: 644; Laureen Lawlor-Smith and Carolyn Lawlor-Smith
*This blog post was originally published at Suture for a Living*
August 2nd, 2009 by Medgadget in Better Health Network, News
Tags: ATP, Blue Dye, Rats, Spinal Cord Injury
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Researchers at University of Rochester Medical Center injected mice that had spinal cord injury with a derivative of food coloring Blue Number One. The Brilliant Blue G (BBG) dye, which helps control the activity of ATP by blocking its activation of P2X7 receptors, was shown to help repair the injured spinal cords when treated animals even started moving their previously paralyzed limbs. Interestingly, it was recently discovered that excessive release of ATP, a compound typically known as a biological power source, augments tissue injury by activating these high-affinity P2X7 receptors.
University of Rochester explains:
“While we achieved great results when oxidized ATP was injected directly into the spinal cord, this method would not be practical for use with spinal cord-injured patients,” said lead researcher Maiken Nedergaard, M.D., D.M.Sc., professor of Neurosurgery and director of the Center for Translational Neuromedicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center. “First, no one wants to put a needle into a spinal cord that has just been severely injured, so we knew we needed to find another way to quickly deliver an agent that would stop ATP from killing healthy motor neurons. Second, the compound we initially used, oxidized ATP, cannot be injected into the bloodstream because of its dangerous side effects.”
Neurons in the spinal cord are so susceptible to ATP because of a molecule known as “the death receptor.” Scientists know that the receptor – called P2X7 – plays a role in regulating the deaths of immune cells such as macrophages, but in 2004, Nedergaard’s team discovered that P2X7 also is carried in abundance by neurons in the spinal cord. P2X7 allows ATP to latch onto motor neurons and send them the flood of signals that cause their deaths, worsening the spinal cord injury and resulting paralysis.
So the team set its sights on finding a compound that not only would prevent ATP from attaching to P2X7, but could be delivered intravenously. In a fluke, Nedergaard discovered that BBG, a known P2X7R antagonist, is both structurally and functionally equivalent to the commonly used FD&C blue dye No. 1. Approved by the Food and Drug Administration as a food additive in 1982, more than 1 million pounds of this dye are consumed yearly in the U.S.; each day, the average American ingests 16 mgs. of FD&C blue dye No. 1.
“Because BBG is so similar to this commonly used blue food dye, we felt that if it had the same potency in stopping the secondary injury as oxidized ATP, but with none of its side effects, then it might be great potential treatment for cord injury,” Nedergaard said.
The team was not disappointed. An intravenous injection of BBG proved to significantly reduce secondary injury in spinal cord-injured rats, who improved to the point of being able to walk, though with a limp. Rats that had not received the BBG solution never regained the ability to walk. There was one side effect: Rats who were injected with BBG temporarily had a blue tinge to their skin.
More from National Geographic…
Abstract in PNAS: Systemic administration of an antagonist of the ATP-sensitive receptor P2X7 improves recovery after spinal cord injury
Press release: Common Food Dye May Hold Promise in Treating Spinal Cord Injury
*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*
August 2nd, 2009 by admin in Better Health Network, News
Tags: Diet and Nutrition, organic, Organic Food, pesticides
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I have been bombarded with questions about this new study released yesterday about organic food being no healthier than conventionally grown produce. The study is in the September issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Organics have been growing in the marketplace at a very steady rate of about 20% for years. Are they worth the higher price tag?
This particular study was a review of scientific papers published in the past 50 years on nutritional quality of organic foods. They found that there was no statistically significant difference between organic and conventional produced foods in terms of nutritional value.
Many people were disappointed in this news, but remember that they just studied nutritional value. They did not address in this study the difference between pesticide and fertilizer residue, environmental impact, hormone levels, etc. When you make the decision of organic vs. conventional, there are many issues to consider.
If you want help making this decision, check out this link to the 12 “dirtiest” foods that tend to have the most pesticide residue and the 12 “cleanest” foods that have very little. Spend your organic dollars on the dirtiest and save your money on the cleanest.
The Organic Center has a different take on the study recently released and believes organic food does have higher nutritional quality, especially when talking about antioxidants. Read their response here. You can also link to their study from 2008 that found organic food with higher nutritional quality.
This post, Organic Food Not More Nutritious – But May Have Different Pesticide Exposure, was originally published on
Healthine.com by Brian Westphal.
