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Archive for April, 2009
AUSTRALIAN CLINICS SURVEYED: CONDITIONS TREATED
Author: admin
At the clinics surveyed the main pain-producing pathologies seen were neurological and those of the muscles and skeleton. The least frequent was endocrinological — that is, involving various internal secretions or hormones.
The pain clinics most commonly saw chronic lower back and chronic head and neck pain with all of the clinics reporting that they had treated physically caused chronic head and neck pain.
Jaw-joint pain, or TMJ syndrome, was the most frequent pain syndrome encountered in the area of head and neck. This is the most common chronic pain syndrome with a dental origin.
Post herpetic neuralgia, that is, the pain after shingles (herpes zoster) was seen by 93 per cent of the clinics, 60 per cent seeing it often. Depressive, or abnormal, facial pain was seen by 93 per cent of clinics ‘often or sometimes’.
Other frequently occurring syndromes were trigeminal neuralgia, cervical spondylosis (arthritis of the neck) and referred pain. Migraine and tension headache were less prominent than expected.
The clinics hardly ever see patients with pain from cerebral tumour, diabetic cranial nerve palsy or giant cell arteritis (a blood cell disorder).
All syndromes were seen often — with the exception of postsurgical abdominal pain, phantom limb pain and psychologically caused gynaecological pain, which were encountered only sometimes.
Most clinics used drug therapy with the majority of patients. Non-surgical and anaesthetic procedures tended to be performed where the relevant specialists were heavily involved in the pain clinics.
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read comments (0)CANCER AND PAIN
Author: admin
Not poppy nor mandragora, Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep,
Which thou owedst yesterday.
Shakespeare (Othello)
Much of what has been said earlier in this book relates just as well to the pain associated with cancer. But there are major differences in emphasis in the treatment of cancer pain and the pain associated with non-malignant conditions.
The provision of pain relief for those with terminal disease, and cancer in particular, remains one of the great challenges in medicine today. To be dying from a terminal disease presents great psychosocial difficulties, but, to be in pain as well is often an intolerable burden.
Despite great advances in the understanding of the ways in which opiate or narcotic medication works in the body and the introduction of newer types of powerful pain-killers there are still many who suffer intolerably and perhaps unnecessarily towards the end of their lives.
The 1988 Australian National Health and Medical Research Council devoted much of its report on Management of Severe Pain to the problem of cancer pain. It makes the point that cancer pain is poorly controlled in many cases.
The report states that 40 to 80 per cent of severe cancer pain is unrelieved, when a level of five percent or less of unrelieved pain is attainable. -
It goes on to assert that poor management of cancer pain is often the result of failure to appreciate the degree of suffering which is present, failure to diagnose the cause of the pain, use of weak or inappropriate pain-killers, fear of narcotic addiction both by doctors and patients; and the largely incorrect conviction or belief shared by doctor and patient alike that cancer pain is inevitable and untreatable.
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By focusing your thinking, you can make your fingers feel numb. Put your left hand in your lap with the palm facing up. Keep your eyes closed so you can focus fully on all the sensations in the fingers of your left hand. Now try to imagine, and feel, as if pain-killing Novocaine has just been injected into the side of your left hand next to the little finger. Your little finger will begin to feel like it does when it falls asleep. Now focus your attention on that little finger. Become aware of every sensation and the slight, little changes as you think of the Novocaine slowly beginning to move into your little finger. Very slowly moving. Notice the slight little changes as the little finger is becoming numb as you think of the Novocaine moving ever so slowly. Now think of the Novocaine moving into the second finger, next to the little finger. Tell yourself that the second finger is getting duller and duller. More and more numb as you think of how the Novocaine is beginning to take effect. Tell yourself that these two fingers are beginning to feel kind of rubbery and are losing feeling and sensation. As you think of the Novocaine moving in faster, your fingers feel duller and duller and more and more numb. Dull, numb and insensitive. As you think of the Novocaine taking effect, your two fingers feel duller and duller, more and more numb. Dull, numb and insensitive as you touch those two fingers with your thumb. As you touch your two fingers with the thumb of the same hand notice how they feel duller and duller, more and more numb, more and more insensitive. Dull, numb, rubbery and insensitive. Now tell yourself it’s all in your own mind and that you’re going to get the feeling back. Bring the feeling back into those two fingers!
*131\37\8*
Typical TENS units cost in the area of $400 to $500 each and the best units presently available include the Israeli-made Agar 10K, the American 3M TENZCARE 6880, and the Medtronic Eclipse .
There are many units available on the Australian market and the range is expanding almost monthly. Twin-channel TENS units which stimulate 4 points at a time are likely to be far more effective than single-channel units.
In addition the last year or so has seen the introduction of two completely novel types of TENS devices. The first of these to be introduced was the Likon — a briefcase sized machine which produces electrical pulses which are said to feel subjectively deeper than conventional TENS stimulation.
Patients treated at a major Melbourne pain clinic have found the Likon stimulation produces more intense and longer lasting pain relief than the smaller and more convenient TENS, no matter how sophisticated the latter are. The Likon costs $700 and can be rented on a trial basis for about $80 per month.
The second exciting device recently introduced onto the Australian TENS market is the Araddin. This is a totally self-contained device the size of an Australian 50 cent coin (about 5cm diameter). The Araddin has no wires and can be worn under clothing.
It has a preset sophisticated computer chip which changes the nature of the stimulation so the body and therefore the pain cannot develop tolerance to the stimulation. This small device even has an intensity control to ensure that the wearer obtains the strength of stimulation necessary to block pain.
The current price of the Araddin in Australia is $290. This gives the purchaser, not only the main unit, but also a slave unit and a variety of electrodes which extend the area which can be stimulated.
*106\37\8*
Many other symptoms have been attributed to food intolerance over the years. Those discussed below are ones that are mentioned fairly regularly in connection with food.
Ulcerative colitis
Ulcerative colitis is an inflammatory disease that affects the large intestine (also called the colon – hence colitis, inflammation of the colon). It causes bouts of abdominal pain and diarrhoea, often with blood and mucus in the stools. There were reports in the 1960s and 1970s that ulcerative colitis patients ‘recovered’ on a milk-free diet, and this was attributed to food intolerance. But subsequent experience has not borne this out.
Dr John Hunter, who pioneered the study of food intolerance in Crohn’s disease, has had little success in treating ulcerative colitis by the same methods. When all food is withdrawn, and elemental diets or intravenous feeding used instead, the ulcerative colitis patients do not make a sustained recovery’. Perhaps the milk-free diets in the original studies seemed to be effective because the patients were short of lactase, the enzyme that breaks down milk sugar. Diarrhoea often makes the gut deficient in
One form of ulcerative colitis, known as proctitis, produces inflammation mainly in the lower part of the large intestine, near where it opens at the anus. It is possible that food allergy7 plays a part in this disorder, as a great many IgE antibodies have been found in the vicinity. So far, however, there has been little investigation of this possibility.
There is one type of colitis which is commonly due to food, and that is infant colitis, especially when if affects children under a year old. This rare condition is regarded as a form of ulcerative colitis by some doctors, but not by others. The main symptom is diarrhoea containing blood and mucus. A sample is taken and examined under the microscope (a biopsy) to assess the degree of inflammation in the gut. Dr Peter Milla, of the Institute of Child Health in London, has made a special study of infant colitis, and finds that the symptoms are caused by food in about 75 per cent of cases. There are clear signs of immune-system involvement, so this is in fact food allergy. In some babies, IgE and mast cells are involved, in others it is a different type of immune reaction.
This condition is known as food-allergic colitis or FAC and most of the babies suffering from it are are bottle-fed. However, some are breast-fed infants responding to foods that the modier is eating. For bottle-fed infants, switching to a hydrolysate feed (see p213)is the usual treatment. For those being breast-fed, it is usually enough for the mother to eliminate certain foods from her diet – the most common culprits being milk, egg, soya and wheat. Where this alone does not work, the mother can also be treated with the drug, sodium cromoglycate to reduce absorption of intact food molecules by suppressing her own allergic reactions to them. Some babies are best treated by taking them off the breast and giving a hydrolysate feed instead.
A few babies with colitis have a type of autoimmune disease – they are making antibodies to their own cells. These antibodies start to attack various body cells, including those in the large intestine, and this sets off the inflammation that causes the bleeding and diarrhoea. By looking for autoantibodies in the blood, doctors can tell if colitis is being caused in this way. Interestingly enough, Dr Milla has found that changing to a hydrolysate feed or chicken-based feed helps these babies considerably. Some still need im-muno-suppressant drugs to control the inflammation, but others do not. It would seem that immune reactions to foods are aggravating the autoimmune reaction in such cases. Some babies with food-allergic colitis grow out of it, but others are still sensitive to the same foods five or more years later. For other causes of diarrhoea in babies and children.
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If, one day, you find yourself robbed of happiness, just exert yourself by doing something to please others and you will find that it will return. A kind, friendly word, an understanding smile and a comforting look or remark are the things that can do much good in giving pleasure to others. If you have the capacity to comfort someone in his sorrows, you will undoubtedly find comfort for yourself, for it is well known that one derives more pleasure from giving than from receiving.
Is not every day a gift from heaven? Why spoil it with grumbling and discontent? How much more sensible it would be to fill the day with useful thoughts and deeds, for each day comes but once and by nightfall it is gone forever. Even though troubles may arise, happiness and thankfulness can offset them and thus the day never needs to be lost and wasted.
*1254/28/1*
Each and every one of us should remember that the air is free and belongs to all, being a valuable gift we cannot do without. Yet how many people blow foul-smelling cigarette or cigar smoke into the air, completely oblivious to the fact that the atmosphere also belongs to their fellow human beings, who all have a right to inhale pure air. To all those people we could put the same question an American friend of mine once asked a smoker, saying with a tone of surprise: ‘I didn’t know that you couldn’t stand clean air.’ The poisons in our body change our natural sensitivity, yet great apathy has taken over regarding the things that merit special protection and care. Instead of being given greater protection, the air is expected to absorb all kinds of poisonous gases!
*1185/28/1*
MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS – ORGANIC FARMING
Author: admin
The call for organic farming will have to be given more and more attention, and it is good to see the results so far. No longer is organic farming palmed off as eccentric or a dream. Organically grown vegetables, for example carrots, are absolutely essential for children. If you have your own garden, however small, you can be truly happy because you will be able to cultivate it organically and ensure the growth of pure vegetables. Our condensed carrot juice is made from organically grown carrots. However, if you are unable to grow your own vegetables, they are now available at most health food stores, an increasing number of supermarkets and from farmers who have changed over to organic methods.
Poisonous chemical sprays are detrimental and a health hazard not only when used on the land, but also on fruit trees. This practice still demands careful investigation and we should always remember that the consequences can be disastrous when financial profits are put before health and safety in the production of food.
*1116/28/1*
WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT POTATOES – BEWARE!
Author: admin
The green potato leaves contain approximately 0.06 per cent solanin, the flowers 0.6 per cent and the fruits, which look like green berries, about 1 per cent. The white eyes or sprouts on the potatoes themselves are very dangerous, the green ones even worse. As soon as they begin to appear, in winter or spring, cut them out carefully. They are especially bad for the eyes. When the tubers grow a little above the soil and turn green, make sure to cut the green part off since it is poisonous. These rules are simple and can be followed without any difficulty. However, this need for care does not mean that a plant which is considered dangerous cannot also be most useful, even contain food and remedial properties -as the potato clearly proves.
*1046/28/1*
We are naturally grateful to Dr Bircher-Benner for his great achievement in the field of modern nutrition, but we regret that he did not see the importance of keeping the two classes of food, fruit and vegetables, separate. For one thing, even taste-wise they do not necessarily go together. Take strawberries and cabbage or radish salad, for instance; the very thought of having to eat these salads after strawberries is far from tempting. Our sense of taste alone tells us not to mix these foods.
In a personal interview, Dr Bircher-Benner told me once that he could find no scientific reason for separating fruit and vegetables. Nevertheless, many of his patients complained about disturbances, especially fermentation or flatulence, in connection with his diet. Of course, if someone follows the Bircher method and experiences no disturbance at all, there is no reason why he should not continue. On the other hand, if upsets do occur, it would be unwise to stick to a regime that causes trouble. Rather, it is better to follow the lead of nature which, after all, is more important than all our theories. The rule about not eating vegetables and fruit at the same meal applies to the combination of food items in general; in particular, it is important to avoid fried food and sweet things when the liver and pancreas are affected, because they cannot cope well with these.
*976/28/1*