Health Adda

If Shakespeare was alive today, the theme of one of his modern-day dramas could well be the tragic tale of Hepatitis. The tragedy however is not that 40 million Indians harbour the virus, and thosands die of it every year, but the fact that very effective prevention and treatment are available for this illness. If, and only if, people knew and acted on time!! Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C are the names of 2 of the 5 viruses that attack the liver. Why they are usually under the spotlight is because of their propensity to lodge in the liver and nibble away at its cells for years after enetring the body, often finally damaging it completely. This advanced stage is called Liver Cirrhosis. Also both these viruses are notorious in causing Liver Cancer, a deadly disease that usually defies tretament. In contrast Hepatitis A and E, the viruses that spread through contaminated water or food, often cause a transient illness of “Acute Hepatitis” that abates in 4 to 6 weeks, do not require specific...

Emergencies do not give us much time to think but our response at that crucial moment can be fateful.  This incident is an example. On seeing a student getting hit by a car while crossing the road near school, a school teacher reacted by stopping another car, loading the unconscious child into it, and requesting the driver to rush her to a nearby hospital. The well-meaning teacher however did not get into the car herself, and in panic, forgot to take down the details of the obliging driver or the car number. Minutes later, when the girl’s parents got the news and called to know where the child had been taken, the school teacher had no answers!! After rushing form one hospital to another in a beweildered state, the parents finally located their daughter in a nearby hospital. Fortunately this strory had a happy ending: the child recovered, and most important, the Samaritan in retrospect, turned out to be a good one! As major accidents and terror attacks are nowadays no longer confine...

I learnt how the dress of a doctor sometimes affects relationship with his patient, the hard way. Mrs Sinha (name changed), who had been in and out of  hospital several times due to a chronic liver problem, confided that her confidence sapped each time Dr A was on duty. The reason: he dressed shabbily in crumpled loud-cloured audaciously printed T-shirts, jeans and chappals, kept dirty stubble on his face, and had a sweaty odour. “How can I trust and confide in a dcotor who dresses so carelessly, and expect him to be careful with my treatment?”  A person’s nature, attitude and character are often reflected through his attire. A doctor’s dress may help convey a subtle message to his patients and their relatives. In present times when fashion and dress codes change so frequently and radically, doctors are often confused on how to dress appropriately yet smartly. Some stick to the classic “old look” of wearing dull coloured loose pleated trousers, standard white regular collare...

The attitude of medical science towards vegetarianism has changed dramatically in recent years from concern about nutritional adequacy to exploring its health benefits. Recent evidence nails red meat as a major health hazard of modern times, and recognizes the virtue of plant based diets. Although the proportion of vegetarians in Europe and America is still small, constituting 1 -6% of the population, the group seems to enjoy healthier and longer lives than their meat eating counterparts. S tudies have shown that mortality from   ischaemic heart disease   was 30% lower among vegetarians. Vegetarians tend to have lower   body mass index,   lower levels of cholesterol, lower blood pressure, and less incidence of hypertension,   type 2 diabetes,   renal disease,   metabolic syndrome, dementias such as   Alzheimer’s disease   and other disorders.Further, the risk of three common cancers, that of the large intestine, breast and prostate, partly at...