Working the Night Shift Causes Cancer?

Does working graveyard lead to an early grave? That's kind of what this study indicates. Although we're still in the early stages here. It is interesting reading for all you noc shift nurses out there.

The higher cancer rates don't prove working overnight can cause
cancer. There may be other factors common among graveyard shift workers
that raise their risk for cancer.
However, scientists suspect
that overnight work is dangerous because it disrupts the circadian
rhythm, the body's biological clock. The hormone melatonin, which can
suppress tumor development, is normally produced at night.
If
the graveyard shift theory eventually proves correct, millions of
people worldwide could be affected. Experts estimate that nearly 20
percent of the working population in developed countries work night
shifts.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Good Q and A on MRSA

An excellent "What you Need to Know" article on MRSA from the Seattle Times. This is well written enough to be handed out as patient teaching materials. There's also a nice explanation as to why shutting down the school when a kid gets MRSA isn't necessary. Here's a sample.

Although most people don't get
serious infections, staph has always been a "bad bug," says Duchin.

MRSA is even badder. Researchers are discovering that MRSA is
surprisingly widespread and becoming tougher. It's a classic lesson in
Darwinian evolution: As the weaker germs are killed by antibiotics, the
strongest, most resistant ones survive and multiply, particularly when
antibiotics are used improperly.

In 2000, a new strain of MRSA "took off like wildfire," according to
Dr. Yuan-Po Tu, a MRSA tracker at the Everett Clinic. Before, most MRSA
infections were caused by a strain mostly contracted in hospitals. This
new, "community acquired" strain can be even more virulent, potentially
causing severe illnesses even in healthy people.Most of the time, community-acquired MRSA
(sometimes shortened to CA-MRSA) causes skin and soft-tissue infections
that can be treated with other readily available antibiotics. But if
not properly treated, the bug can work its way into the body and is
tough to get out.

The vast majority of serious, "invasive" MRSA infections and deaths
occur in hospitalized patients who are suffering from other serious
diseases, have lowered immunity or have recently undergone surgery.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Caring for the Elderly Getting More Costly

Caring for aging loved ones is costing more than anyone has previously estimated. In the past the question on this subject was asked poorly and so the costs of out-of-pocket expenses was underestimated. New survey addresses the financial burden directly -- as much as 10 - 20 percent of earned income.

The out-of-pocket cost of caring for an aging parent or spouse averages
about $5,500 a year, according to the nation’s first in-depth study of
such expenses, a sum that is more than double previous estimates and
more than the average American household spends annually on health care
and entertainment combined.Of the 1,000 respondents, only 2 said they had never laid out any
money. The rest said they spent on average $5,531 a year, or 10 percent
of their salary. The burden was heavier for those who earned less, 20
percent for respondents with incomes of $25,000.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Third World Medicine, First World Country

Well, the Bush adminstration doesn't want to expand children's health care because he's affraid that it would compete with private health insurers. Meanwhile, we're stuck in a country with an increasingly dire future for close to 50 million people. The New York Times Magazine paints at grim picture:

Long before the dentists and the doctors got there, before the nurses, the hygienists and X-ray techs came, before anyone had flicked on the portable mammography unit or sterilized the day’s first set of surgical instruments, the people who needed them showed up to wait. It was 3 a.m. at the Wise County Fairgrounds in Virginia — Friday, July 20, 2007 — the start of a rainy Appalachian morning. Outside the gates, people lay in their trucks or in tents pitched along the grassy parking lot, waiting for their chance to have their medical needs treated at no charge — part of an annual three-day “expedition” led by a volunteer medical relief corps called Remote Area Medical. The group, most often referred to as RAM, has sent health expeditions to countries like Guyana, India, Tanzania and Haiti, but increasingly its work is in the United States, where 47 million people — more than 15 percent of the population — live without health insurance. Residents of remote rural areas are less likely than their urban and suburban counterparts to have health insurance and more likely to be in fair or poor health. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, nearly half of all adults in rural America are living with at least one chronic condition. Other research has found that in these areas, where hospitals and primary-care providers are in short supply, rates of arthritis, hypertension, heart ailments, diabetes and major depression are higher than in urban areas.

My practice is in a rural area with lots of blue collar retirees. It is so rare to see someone come in without at least one or two chronic disease that we all remark on it. Meanwhile, when I triage in the ER -- few of the patients have a regular doctor they see. As more and more Americans either lose their healthcare, or can't afford the treatments they need, preventitive medicine goes out the window. Healthcare then gets more expensive for everyone. The system isn't breaking -- as this article shows -- it is broken.

Powered by ScribeFire.

Miracle Cures that can Kill

The Seattle Times has a good series going this week on modern day snake oil salesmen and their "energy machines" which are supposed to "cure cancer, reduce cholesterol and even eliminate AIDS."

Their claims are a fraud. The Seattle Times has found that thousands of these unproven devices — many of them illegal or dangerous — are used in hundreds of venues nationwide.

These are not the devices in wide use by medical doctors, such as electrical stimulators used for sports injuries. Nor are they the biofeedback devices used at respected alternative-medicine centers such as Seattle's Bastyr University. Rather, these are boxes of wires purported to perform miracles. Their manufacturers and operators capitalize on weak government oversight and the nation's hunger for alternative therapies to reap millions of dollars in profits while exploiting desperate people:

• In Tulsa, Okla., a woman suffering from unexplained joint pain was persuaded to avoid doctors and rely on an energy device for treatment. Seven months later, her son took her to a hospital. She died within hours from undiagnosed leukemia.

• In Los Angeles, a mother pulled her 5-month-old son out of chemotherapy for cancer and took him to a clinic where a 260-pound machine pulsed electromagnetic waves through his tiny body. The baby died within months.

• In Seattle, a retiree with cancer emptied her bank account to buy an energy machine. Shortly before she died, her husband, a retired Microsoft manager, examined its software, finding that it appeared to generate results randomly — "a complete fraud," he said.

Over the past year, The Times investigated these machines and the people behind them.

The investigation took us to where the manufacturers of some of these machines are based, in Hungary and Greece. We found the operators — including a cross-dressing federal fugitive who moonlights as a cabaret singer — making outrageous claims as they peddled their wares. We discovered that the U.S. regulatory system has allowed them to flood this nation with an estimated 40,000 devices.

And we learned that many operators consider our state a safe haven for these "miracle machines."

Check out the picture of the guy with the sparks coming out around his head. The times notes makers of these devices often claim they are FDA "approved" when in reality their manufacturers are simply registered with the FDA -- which does test whether the device actually does any good. This has even fooled the US Military, which the Times caught using these "energy devices" on wounded troops!

Not surprisingly, our state's chiropractic board has been an easy target for lobbing by these hucksters, who use patently false claims to get their devices approved for use by state regulators.

The case highlights how state regulatory board members are increasingly pressured to validate new therapies, but lack the time and scientific expertise to evaluate claims. Washington's chiropractors board has approved about 100 devices and procedures for chiropractors, sometimes after little study. Members are appointed by the governor and serve without pay. The Times found that makers of unproven energy-medicine devices have tried to get licensing boards in more than a dozen states to approve them for use.

Powered by ScribeFire.