One step nearer to a diabetes cure
It is more than 80 years since insulin was first used in the treatment of early-onset diabetes, but it was never a 'cure' in the sense that it treated the illness once and for all.
Such a cure, long dreamed of, would not only prevent the long-term complications of diabetes, such as kidney failure and blindness, but relieve sufferers of the need to inject themselves once, twice or three times daily.
One possible cure is to transplant the pancreas, which contains the cells that produce the insulin that early-onset diabetics lack. However, the number of diabetics greatly exceeds the possible number of organs for transplant (unless one day animal organs can be used). Therefore another method must be found.
One step towards a possible cure is the injection of the cells that actually produce insulin into the portal vein, rather than transplantation of the whole pancreas. A trial of this treatment was published in the New England Journal of Medicine last month.
Thirty-six diabetics with unstable diabetes underwent the treatment. Because of its complexity, serious side-effects were common, caused both by the procedure itself and the subsequent immunosuppression necessary to allow the insulin-producing cells to be accepted by their new host.
However, some of the results were encouraging and 16 of the patients were able to do without insulin for at least a year afterwards.
This is not a cure, but perhaps the beginning of one. Considering the experimental nature of the treatment, the subjects who agreed to it should be heroes to their fellow
diabetics.
Health and sex
The world is full of ideas and advice about health and sex. Family and friends, magazines and television ... they all seem to weigh in on the best way to care for our bodies.
Cases in point: At age 15 my mother tried to convince me that if I ate six calcium chews a day I will be immune not only to osteoporosis, but also myasthenia gravis, cancer and the plague ("But honey, they're for women by women").
Commercials tell us that treating your herpes with Acyclovir will not only reduce your number of flare-ups, but will also render you beautiful, in love and in close proximity to the beach.
Glamour magazine has also weighed in our sexual health, promising us the latest classified information on the female orgasm every other
month for the past decade.
We all have a weird relative who, like the character in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," touts Windex as the most appropriate antiseptic for all bodily infections. I had an equally deluded housemate in college who believed that the cure for any illness is to "sweat it out" and would spend hours withering in the gym sauna when he got a cold. Not surprisingly, this friend had chronic athlete's foot.
The moral of the story is that while health and sex advice may be abundant, it's not always what we're after. How to navigate this maze of misinformation? Send your burning questions to me at the Health & Sexuality section of www.cavalierdaily.com -- just click on Sex and Balances Question Submission! As a third-year Medical student, I'm comfortable setting the facts straight on questions ranging from the banal (What causes jock itch?) to the apparently bizarre (Can I get jock itch from using whipped cream during sex?).
Having something go wrong with your body can be incredibly scary, whether it's unexplained itching, headaches that won't go away or a skin lesion you're afraid might be cancer. This is a place where you can get a little objective information about what may be going on from someone with insight into the mysterious world of medicine. So ladies, if you've ever wondered why that annual Pap Smear is helping protect you from cancer, and gentlemen, if you're curious about why the doctor is always making you turn your head and cough, send those questions my way. I'll be here!
קורס הכנה ללידה
מי המדריכה ? מומלץ לברר מה הכשרתה של המדריכה, אילו סוגי לידה היא מלמדת והאם זה תואם את סוג הלידה שבחרתם, מה הניסיון של המדריכה (מיילדת/דולה/רופאה...), האם היא גם יועצת הנקה, מעניין גם לשאול האם המדריכה היא אמא בעצמה. בפגישה עם המדריכה תנסו לבדוק אם נוצר ביניכם קליק או שאינכם מרגישים שאתם תוכלו להסתדר איתה ולתקשר בצורה טובה במהלך הקורס
Sometimes new mothers need professional support
The San Diego Postpartum Health Alliance provides a "Warmline" volunteer phone service and therapeutic referrals to struggling new mothers. PHA provides self-assessment quizzes to help determine whether the exhaustion, sleeplessness, sadness and anxiety are normal or symptoms of such conditions as postpartum depression or panic disorders.
According to Mary Obata, Health Alliance president, "A lot of moms feel shame bringing this up with their health care providers. But they
can get support and can get better with professional care. They need to feel heard."
Welcome Home Baby, a first-time-parent support program of Palomar-Pomerado Health Systems, hopes to fill gaps in new parents' knowledge in military and civilian families. Annamarie Martinez coordinates the free program, funded by grants from the San Diego First-Five Commission.
"We receive moms' birth information from the birth hospital," which will soon include Balboa Naval Hospital, Martinez said. "Then in the first week, we make contact with the parents and provide a home visit from a registered nurse."
Nurses assess the health of mothers and babies and answer questions about breastfeeding, health and newborn care. But the program does not end there.
"We make phone contact with the mom three or four times throughout the first year of baby's life," Martinez said. "We can also refer moms to social workers, health educators, registered dietitians and lactation consultants as needed."
Help plentiful for struggling new moms
Carlsbad resident Holly Herring was a 12-hour-a-day single career woman when she became pregnant with her now 8-year-old son. A take-charge kind of person, she was sure she would seize her new role with the same energy she had brought to her career.
But after her son's birth, life took a surprisingly dark turn. Her mind was filled with frightening thoughts. Anxiety kept her endlessly awake. She was irritable and worried she could not bond properly with her son. And she was aware that something was very wrong.
Calls to her doctor brought referrals to a psychiatrist and to the Postpartum Health Alliance, an organization providing weekly support groups to women going through postpartum depression and related disorders. For the next 11 months, until symptoms from her illness subsided, PHA was Herring's lifeline.
"Going to a support group, I realized I wasn't alone," Herring said. "As I watched everyone getting better and moving on ---- that was like a light at the end of the tunnel."
The problem of postpartum depression came again to the forefront recently with a letter to national columnist Dear Abby from a young military mother from San Diego. She wrote, "I find no joy, no pleasure and no love being a mother ... I can't stand to wake up much longer ... I am scared of my feelings."
Jeanne Phillips, who writes as Dear Abby, responded, "You may be suffering from postpartum depression," and advised her to get help and a respite from mothering. In September, Abby followed up with a column about the vast numbers of people in San Diego and nationwide who had written to offer help.
Fortunately for that young mom and others like her, North County has plentiful resources to help families survive their first challenging year with a new baby ---- from psychological support to educational, practical or even financial support.
Proposition 85
Once again voters have an opportunity to defeat an initiative that threatens the safety of thousands of California's teens. Proposition 85, the so-called Parental Notification Initiative, will appear on the November General Election ballot. This initiative is almost identical to last year's Proposition 73, which was a failed effort by the same sponsors.
Last year the North County Times wisely rejected the parental notification initiative, calling it "a hurdle, plain and simple, placed before pregnant girls by people who want to roll back abortion rights more broadly."
I could not agree more. While backers of 85 are being careful not to discuss their broader agenda in public, their internal newspapers openly reveal Prop. 85 to be a calculated assault on legal abortion and the Roe vs. Wade decision.
While parental notification laws may sound reasonable, in the real world, they are the wrong answer for California and will put thousands of our most vulnerable teens at risk. Parents rightfully want to be involved in their teens' lives, but no law can mandate family communication.
The good news is that a majority of teens already involve their parents in decisions about an unintended pregnancy. As the North County Times said last year, "California's girls have been doing fine without parental notification. Rates of teen pregnancies and abortions have been falling for years. Studies suggest that most girls tell their parents already."
Interestingly in the year since that was published, teen pregnancy and abortion rates have fallen even further, and more than 70 percent of teens now involve their parents in these decisions. According to an August report by the state Department of Health Services, teen pregnancy rates in California have dropped by 46 percent over the last 10 years. This drop occurred without laws like Prop. 85.
But for the remaining teens who don't involve a parent, there is generally a very good reason why they can't. In the real world the teen may fear being kicked out of her home or face violence should she disclose to her family that she's pregnant. Or worse, a family member may have caused the pregnancy. These teens can't go to their parents. Prop. 85 could force these vulnerable teens to delay medical care or turn to self-induced or illegal back-alley abortions. Some may even consider suicide.
Proponents of Prop. 85 say that teens in abusive situations can just seek a court waiver if they can't talk to their parents. But courts are already backlogged. There is a lot of red tape, and courts are hard to navigate, even for adults. As the North County Times said last year, this judicial bypass option "is a cruel joke; imagine a girl who is pregnant, probably poor, and perhaps suffering under an abusive parent ---- what are the odds she will call a lawyer or otherwise enter the judicial system?"
Ironically Prop. 85's backers have admitted this fact, and are now arguing that Planned Parenthood will escort these teens through the courthouse, and yet it is these same people who regularly attempt to block access to our health centers, intimidate our patients, eliminate our funding, outlaw our services, and recall judges who protect our rights. If they succeed, who then will ensure the safety of these vulnerable teens?
Scared, desperate teens don't need courthouses and judges. They need counseling and medical care without delay.
A recent study released by the New England Journal of Medicine found that after a law like Prop. 85 took effect, some pregnant teens waited months ---- until their 18th birthday ---- to seek care and then faced riskier second trimester abortions.
That's why doctors, nurses and teachers ---- including the California Medical Association, the California Nurses Association, the California Teachers Association, Planned Parenthood and the American Academy of Pediatrics, California ---- all oppose Prop. 85.
Californians know that the real answer to teen pregnancy and abortion is strong, caring families and comprehensive sex education, including abstinence and access to contraception ---- not new laws that would harm our teens. Please join doctors, nurses, teachers and parents and vote no on Prop. 85 this November.
קורס הכנה ללידה
כמה זוגות ישתתפו בקורס הכנה ללידה ?
רצוי לבחור
בקורס הכנה ללידה של חמישה שישה זוגות, שמצד אחד יאפשר לכם לשמוע שאלות ודעות של אנשים אחרים, ומצד שני יעניק לכם יחס אישי עם המדריכה. רצוי להתרחק מקורסים של עשרה זוגות ומעלה, שכן לרוב הם אינם יעילים.
Yes on Prop. 85: Minors need protection, guidance
Sixteen-year-old Rachel Ely's parents had no idea what was wrong with her when they found her in a coma on her bed one morning. She was taken by ambulance to a hospital in Riverside, where doctors determined she was suffering from an overwhelming septic bacterial infection ---- caused by an abortion she obtained without her parents' knowledge. Rachel survived but was left partially paralyzed and in a wheelchair.
Rachel's story illustrates just one of the dangers of secret abortions: young girls trying to hide their abortions from their parents will ignore or not recognize signs of post-abortion complications and delay seeking treatment until it is too late.
Did the doctor who operated on Rachel know her medical history? Not likely.
Was his license under discipline? Likely. California Medical Board records show that many doctors who end up at abortion clinics have disciplinary actions in their history for incompetence, negligence and even sexual abuse of their own patients.
That's the reality for minors seeking secret abortions: a pregnancy test, 15 minutes of filling out forms, and then an abortion performed by a doctor the girl has never seen before and will never see again.
Proposition 85 will put an end to this dangerous situation in California in which girls even younger than 12 can get an abortion without a parent knowing. She can't get a flu shot, have a tooth pulled, or go on a field trip without a parent's consent, but she can be taken to the clinic by anyone: her boyfriend, her boyfriend's mother, an adult male predator.
This is not a scare tactic, as the opposition says. Young girls are impregnated by older men at an alarming rate in California. Secret abortions allow these predators to cover up their crimes and continue the exploitative relationship ---- or move on to other victims. The younger the girl, the more likely she was impregnated by an adult male predator.
Parents spend years protecting the physical, psychological and emotional well-being of their daughters. They care about her future. A young girl ---- pregnant, scared, possibly abandoned or pressured by an older boyfriend or adult predator ---- needs the care and protection of a parent. Ten minutes with an employee of a clinic is not a substitute.
More than 30 states already have parental involvement laws like Prop. 85. Their experience shows that these laws substantially reduce teen abortion and pregnancy rates, as well as rates of sexually transmitted disease, without danger or harm to minors. Despite the opposition's dire predictions of minors turning to illegal abortions, there is no evidence that any girl has suffered harm because of a parental involvement law. There is plenty of evidence that girls have suffered when parents weren't informed about secret abortions that left their vulnerable daughters in the same exploitative relationship in which they got pregnant in the first place.
For those cases where a minor lives in an abusive home, Prop. 85 provides a quick and confidential procedure by which she can obtain a waiver from the juvenile court. This procedure also ensures that an abusive situation is brought to the attention of Child Protective Services so the problem can be addressed, not covered up with a secret abortion. Though the opposition claims the judicial bypass procedure is unworkable and unrealistic, the experience of other states shows that minors are able to use the system, and about 10 percent of them do so.
Fortunately, most parents aren't abusive, and most girls aren't scared of a violent or extreme reaction by their parents. By far, the most common reason given by girls for not telling a parent is that they didn't want to hurt or disappoint them. That's understandable. What's not understandable is why we would let a young girl's wish not to disappoint her parents override what common sense tells us is good medical practice and sound public policy.
Opponents claim that Prop. 85 is an attack on abortion rights, as if abortion was one big package, take it or leave it ---- parents left in the dark, incompetent doctors, sexual predators and all. Prop. 85 on its face specifically prohibits it from being used to restrict abortion in any other way. "Protect choice" is just something the opposition shouts over its shoulder as it's running away from the real issue: protecting our daughters.
Restore the right of California's parents to protect their minor daughters' well-being. Vote yes on Prop. 85.
Once again voters have an opportunity to defeat an initiative that threatens the safety of thousands of California's teens. Proposition 85, the so-called Parental Notification Initiative, will appear on the November General Election ballot. This initiative is almost identical to last year's Proposition 73, which was a failed effort by the same sponsors.
