Medicine News

According to latest researches recommended daily calorie intakes to maintain a healthy weight, laid down 20 years ago, have been slightly on the low side.



In 1991 the Committee on the Medical Aspects of Food Policy (COMA) set out that the average man should be eating 2,550 calories daily, and the average woman 1,940.

After lengthy consultation, those have now been raised slightly - by a frugal 55 calories for men, but a comparatively generous 139 calories for women.

On a cold day (and we seem to have our fair share of these even in the summer), there is nothing worse than being on a diet and trying to think of something healthy to eat for lunch. We may be craving spaghetti bolognese but pasta isn't exactly the healthiest of lunches! Furthermore, sandwiches using low calorie bread just don’t seem to hit the spot and by early afternoon the stomach is invariably growling. Next time you’re stuck for inspiration why not try some healthy but hearty homemade soup? It’s easy to make a big batch and freeze some for later in the week and the variations are endless. If you prefer your soup smooth rather than chunky, a basic liquidiser or even a sieve is all you need.

You can find loads of recipes online, with the Schwartz website offering plenty of good ideas, but one of my favourites is red pepper and chilli. All you need is some chicken stock (made with stock cubes if you are in a hurry but stick to the low salt variety if you’re trying to be healthy), a couple of chopped red peppers, three or four tomatoes, a red chilli (minus the seeds if you are worried about it being too spicy) and an onion. Fry the vegetables in low fat spray oil, add the stock, cook until everything is soft and then blend. A dash of chilli sauce can be added when you serve the soup to give it an extra kick.

If you’re not keen on peppers, then tomato and basil is another easy and healthy combination. Carrots are another vegetable which lend themselves to soup making. Add the juice of an orange or coriander powder for a change.

For a real winter warmer, lentils go down a treat. There are lots of recipes on the internet for lentil soup but for one with a difference why not go Moroccan and use a little harissa paste?

All these soups, served with a chunk of bread, provide a healthy and filling lunch.

On a cold day (and we seem to have our fair share of these even in the summer), there is nothing worse than being on a diet and trying to think of something healthy to eat for lunch. We may be craving spaghetti bolognese but pasta isn't exactly the healthiest of lunches! Furthermore, sandwiches using low calorie bread just don’t seem to hit the spot and by early afternoon the stomach is invariably growling. Next time you’re stuck for inspiration why not try some healthy but hearty homemade soup? It’s easy to make a big batch and freeze some for later in the week and the variations are endless. If you prefer your soup smooth rather than chunky, a basic liquidiser or even a sieve is all you need.

You can find loads of recipes online, with the Schwartz website offering plenty of good ideas, but one of my favourites is red pepper and chilli. All you need is some chicken stock (made with stock cubes if you are in a hurry but stick to the low salt variety if you’re trying to be healthy), a couple of chopped red peppers, three or four tomatoes, a red chilli (minus the seeds if you are worried about it being too spicy) and an onion. Fry the vegetables in low fat spray oil, add the stock, cook until everything is soft and then blend. A dash of chilli sauce can be added when you serve the soup to give it an extra kick.

If you’re not keen on peppers, then tomato and basil is another easy and healthy combination. Carrots are another vegetable which lend themselves to soup making. Add the juice of an orange or coriander powder for a change.

For a real winter warmer, lentils go down a treat. There are lots of recipes on the internet for lentil soup but for one with a difference why not go Moroccan and use a little harissa paste?

All these soups, served with a chunk of bread, provide a healthy and filling lunch.

Female teenagers who indulge in a spot of binge drinking too often are putting themselves at risk of damaging the part of their brain that controls memory and spatial awareness. The dangers of drinking too much alcohol within a short space of time and at a young age have long been known, but new research from Stanford University in California has found that adolescent girls are the group most at risk of suffering damage to their brains.

The explanation for this seems to rest in the fact that women's brains develop earlier than men's. The study found that female teenage binge drinkers had less brain activity in a number of regions than non-drinking female teens, with MRI scans used to measure brain activation during a specific spatial task. Meanwhile, the male participants in the tests didn't show anything like the same abnormalities.

Although it's easy to ignore health warnings when you're young and carefree, these results should at least provide teenagers with something to think about. After all, damage to such regions of the brain can, in the future, cause problems when driving, taking part in sports, using maps, and remembering routes. Logical thinking and reasoning are two functions that may also be affected.

It's worth remembering, whether you're a female teenager or not, that alcohol is something to be enjoyed in moderation at all times, as responsible brands such as Fosters – who have recently launched a batch of videos featuring comedians reeves and Mortimer – are always keen to point out.

There are many cousec of hair loss - age, diseases, wrong eating etc.

Our hair is made of a type of protein called keratin. A single hair consists of a hair shaft (the part that shows), a root below the skin, and a follicle, from which the hair root grows. At the lower end of the follicle is the hair bulb, where the hair's color pigment, or melanin, is produced.

Most people lose about 50 to 100 head hairs a day. These hairs are replaced — they grow back in the same follicle on your head. This amount of hair loss is totally normal and no cause for worry. If you're losing more than that, though, something might be wrong.


If you have hair loss and don't know what's causing it, talk to your doctor. A doctor can determine why the hair is falling out and suggest a treatment that will correct the underlying problem, if necessary.

When I hear talks about 'doctor crisis', wich actually may not apply to everyone, but as you know the doctor shortage in regional WA is now at crisis level and not only there. I guess that the problem is rooted in many aspects including such as the long-drawn medical education (almost 12 years) and slow growth in the number of medical colleges.

But there are many colleges offered different medicine graduate programs which dont need long term study but give perfect profession in madicine sphere, for instance Nurse Anesthesia is absolutely great choise committed to the promotion of excellence in the nurse anesthesia profession through education, research, and patient care.

If you use any hypnotic drugs you shoul know that recent researches show that it can effect on your body balance and standing steadiness.


Background
Disturbed body balance and standing steadiness are problematic for those who wake up at night or in the morning after using hypnotic drugs. As a result, falls and hip fractures are frequently reported in patients using sleep medication.

Methods
A literature search was performed to identify double blind, placebo-controlled clinical trials that examined body balance and standing steadiness. Drugs that were searched were nitrazepam, triazolam, lorazepam, temazepam, loprazolam, flunitrazepam, flurazepam, and the Z-drugs zopiclone, zolpidem and zaleplon.

Results
A total of 57 studies were eligible for inclusion. Results showed that both benzodiazepine hypnotics and the Z-drugs significantly impair body balance and standing steadiness after single dose administration. Impairments correlate significantly with blood plasma levels and are greatest at peak plasma concentrations, but are sometimes still present upon awakening. Balance problems were dose-related and most pronounced in elderly. Co-administration of alcohol aggravated the impairment. After repeated daily use of hypnotic drugs partial tolerance develops to the impairing effects on standing steadiness.

Conclusion
Single dose administration of benzodiazepine hypnotics and Z-drugs significantly impair body balance in a dose-dependent manner. Zolpidem and zopiclone produced similar significant impairment as benzodiazepine hypnotics. Zaleplon significantly impaired balance up to 2 h after intake. Partial tolerance develops after repeated daily use. In conclusion, patients should be warned about the possible risk of imbalance and falls due to the use of sleep medication.

via www.smrv-journal.com/

With more and more Picture Archiving and Communication System or PACS solutions being offered by different providers, it is essentially important for you to understand the regulations governing the use of PACS or diagnostic image storage solutions in medical practices. There are several regulations that need to be met, and we are going to look at them in this article.

Diagnostic image storage solutions are classified as medical devices, so you need to review the USFDA’s regulations regarding medical devices before completing your purchase. The Food and Drug Administration defines specific guidelines that all system providers must follow. Check if the system you are getting meets these regulations before completing the purchase.

Since the use of PACS is also related to patient’s privacy and sensitive patient details, you must also make sure that the system you are getting is properly secured. HIPAA compliance is a must, so check if the system you are getting is advertised as HIPAA compliant. If you don’t see proper description, don’t hesitate to ask questions regarding this particular compliance.

There are several other specific regulations that you need to understand before you can choose the most appropriate PACS solution to use. The Mammography Quality Standards Act, for example, must be met if PACS is used in conjunction with mammography diagnostic tools.

Gardian reports that orphans and babies as young as three months old have been used as guinea pigs in potentially dangerous medical experiments sponsored by pharmaceutical companies, an Observer investigation has revealed.
British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline is embroiled in the scandal. The firm sponsored experiments on the children from Incarnation Children's Centre, a New York care home that specialises in treating HIV sufferers and is run by Catholic charities.

The children had either been infected with HIV or born to HIV-positive mothers. Their parents were dead, untraceable or deemed unfit to look after them.

According to documents obtained by The Observer, Glaxo has sponsored at least four medical trials since 1995 using Hispanic and black children at Incarnation. The documents give details of all clinical trials in the US and reveal the experiments sponsored by Glaxo were designed to test the 'safety and tolerance' of Aids medications, some of which have potentially dangerous side effects. Glaxo manufactures a number of drugs designed to treat HIV, including AZT.



British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline has agreed to pay $750 million to settle criminal and civil complaints as a result of a whistleblower lawsuit that said the company knowingly sold tainted drugs for years, including GlaxoSmithKline mainstay drugs Avandia, Paxil and Tagamet and a contaminated baby ointment.

Altogether, GlaxoSmithKline sold 20 drugs made at a GlaxoSmithKline plant in Cidra, Puerto Rico according to court papers filed in Boston federal court under the U.S. False Claims Act. The whistleblower's lawsuit was originally filed against GlaxoSmithKline in 2004. It alleged the company submitted false claims to government health programs: drugs manufactured at the plant weren't safe and effective, and thus shouldn't have been covered by government programs.