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Is It A Nasty Cold Or The Flu?

By Patti Neighmond

It’s that time of year again. You wake up with a scratchy throat, stuffy nose, a little achy — maybe a fever. Is it a classic head cold, or do you need to be more concerned? Could it be the flu?

“There’s lots of confusion out there, because both are viral respiratory illnesses,” says Dr. Yul Ejnes, an internal medicine specialist in private practice in Rhode Island and spokesperson for the American College of Physicians. “No one likes to get a cold, but people are more fearful of the flu.”

And rightly so.

Last year’s influenza season was particularly severe, resulting in an unusually high number of hospitalizations and deaths from flu complications. Read on

Do Cockroaches Carry Diseases?

By C. Claiborne Ray

Q. It is well known that mosquitoes, fleas, lice and ticks transmit human diseases, but what about cockroaches?

A. Read More…

How Many People Can’t Tolerate Statins?

By Richard Klasco, M.D.

Medical researchers, normally a genteel lot, disagree sharply on the extent to which side effects from statin drugs are a problem.

Q. Are there studies concerning the number of people who cannot tolerate statins?

A. Yes. Studies show that about 5 percent to 10 percent of people are unable to tolerate statins, largely because of muscle aches and related side effects, including potential muscle damage. But… cont

Saunas May Reduce Stroke Risk

After adjusting for other variables, they found that compared with people who took saunas once a week, those who took them two to three times weekly were 12 percent less likely to have a stroke. People who took saunas four to seven times a week reduced their risk for stroke by 62 percent.
By Nicholas Bakalar

Read article

The Best Medicine?

By Mikkael A. Sekeres, M.D. May 3, 2018

What’s Meaningful to Our Patients

At the age of 28, my patient was already a war-weary veteran of leukemia.

When his cancer was diagnosed, we treated him with a multi-drug cocktail of chemotherapy over months, first with more intensive regimens that sidelined him from being able to work, and then with milder medicines.

His leukemia came raging back, though, so we treated him again, this time with one of the new, expensive immunotherapies that has been approved recently by the Food and Drug Administration. These are not curative, but in his case eliminated enough of the leukemia to enable him to receive a bone-marrow transplant, which did have the potential of curing him. cont

Is Alkaline Water Really Better for You?

Ask Well

ALICE CALLAHAN APRIL 27, 2018

Q. Are there benefits of drinking alkaline water, or is what I’m reading just a bunch of hooey?

A. Despite the claims, there’s no evidence that water marketed as alkaline is better for your health than tap water. Continue reading the main story

 

 

Global Health

A column by Donald G. McNeil Jr. about global health news.

Bill and Melinda Gates Grade the World’s Health

Bill and Melinda Gates handed the world a report card last week, assessing its progress on 18 global health indicators: infant mortality, AIDS, vaccine use, smoking rates and so on.

Cont

Lasting Merit Found in a Tuberculosis Vaccine Invented a Century Ago

Tuberculosis kills almost two million people a year. A perfect vaccine could save many of them, but the one now in use — invented in the 1920s and known as BCG, for Bacillus Calmette-Guérin — has so many flaws that some countries, including the United States, have never adopted it.

Cont

The Wrong Way to Keep Kids Safe From Predators

Opinion | The New York Times

They need more than protection; they need the chance to develop survival skills. 

My heart is racing as he kisses my cheek. “Bye, Mom,” he says. Then he grabs his backpack and walks away. I want to snatch him back. I’ll settle for puking instead.

It’s the summer of 2015, and my baby is going off to camp. It’s 3,000 miles away. It’s his first time flying on a plane by himself. 

Read the full story

Major Diseases are in Decline.

Something strange is going on in medicine. Major diseases, like colon cancer, dementia and heart disease, are waning in wealthy countries, and improved diagnosis and treatment cannot fully explain it.Scientists marvel at this good news, a medical mystery of the best sort and one that is often overlooked as advocacy groups emphasize the toll of diseases and the need for more funds. Still, many are puzzled. Cont

Benefits of Affordable Care Act

Researchers say there has been a substantial increase in women under the age of 26 who have received a diagnosis of early-stage cervical cancer since the health law came into effect in 2010. Cont

 

 

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