MEDICAL MATTERS

[chinatyke]

All looking and sounding good Stanley (oh, the pic was a bit of a shock tho, )

Jeepers creepers
Where'd you get those peepers?
Jeepers creepers
Where'd you get those eyes?

Read more: Frank Sinatra - Jeepers Creepers Lyrics | MetroLyrics


Glad everything went well for you.

[Tardis]

Sent this:

This year’s National HIV Testing Week takes place from 22-29 November in the run up to World AIDS Day on 1 December.
During National HIV Testing Week, Renaissance at Drugline-Lancashire across Blackpool and Lancashire will be encouraging people to take an HIV Test. This will include supporting an array of events across the area including:
· Launching dedicated awareness materials
· Holding a HIV awareness conference in Preston
· Community testing in Blackpool
The week aims to:
Increase the numbers of people testing , including communities deemed of particular risk , e.g. gay men and African people taking an HIV test.
Raise awareness in communities of the importance of testing.
Increase the number of opportunities to take a test at clinics and in the community.
Reduce the stigma and increase the knowledge of HIV and HIV Testing
If we can achieve these aims we will reduce the number of people who are diagnosed late with HIV, with an early HIV diagnosis easier to manage and reducing the risk of it being passed on to other people.
If you want to support National HIV Testing Week and find out more about events taking place :
Email: enquiries@druglinelancs.co.uk
Telephone: Preston (01772) 253840 or Blackpool (01253) 311431
Web: www.druglinelancs.co.uk
Facebook: Renaissance at Drugline-Lancashire
Twitter: Renaissance DLL


Kathryn Talboys
Chief Executive
Renaissance at Drugline- Lancashire

[plaques]

Increase the numbers of people testing , including communities deemed of particular risk , e.g. gay men and African people taking an HIV test.

How dare they point the finger a minorities like this. The whole thing is scandalous. They should be treated in the same manor as the general population. This is just discrimination against gays & Africans.

[Stanley]

Thanks to all of you. That ink they use to mark the eye is almost indelible and the last thing you need is scrubbing the area near the eye and risking disturbing the incision. My mate Steve said he liked the slightly bewildered look, like a bloke looking in a mirror and saying who the hell's that!
Things are settling down now, good sleep last night and another slight improvement in clarity. It'll take a week to get settled in and they don't advise getting tested for reading glasses for at least a month so I'll leave it until after Xmas.
Fascinating watching your eye and brain arguing with each other! You could easily convince yourself that it had all gone wrong because of the mismatch between the two eyes. You can watch the brain shifting from one eye to the other. Biggest adjustment is getting used to carrying reading glasses round in your shirt pocket. No near vision at all and it's surprising how often you need them!
On the whole, all is going well and I shall just be patient and keep putting the drops in.
The main thing is that even now, my sight is better than it has been for over 70 years and every chance of it getting better. It's a miracle.... Thank God for the NHS!

[Cathy]

Goodness Stanley, your sight is better than it has been for 70yrs, that really is amazing.

[Moh]

Had a hospital appointment yesterday - they just took the dressing off the wound, the doctor looked at it and said he was happy with it, asked if I had pain in my groin or night sweats (long time since those!!), they dressed it again and gave me another appointment for 18th Dec. Our in 10 mins. ! !

[Tardis]

Increase the numbers of people testing , including communities deemed of particular risk , e.g. gay men and African people taking an HIV test.

How dare they point the finger a minorities like this. The whole thing is scandalous. They should be treated in the same manor as the general population. This is just discrimination against gays & Africans.

Take it up with them. Targeted funding doesn't always address the issue

[PanBiker]

LGI fast tracked little Finlay for his extraction and slotted him in for the first session today at 12.30. This turned out to be 2.00pm and he has to stay until they are happy with him after the anaesthetic. Recent text update from his mum says everything was OK but he was not very happy in recovery, (mind you he's not had anything to eat all day). Should be heading home soon.

[Stanley]

I feel for Finlay! Never mind, it will pass and he'll be better for it.
Moh, good news and I'm glad your visit was quick and satisfactory! You must be doing everything right and your diet will be helping!
Cathy, it's getting better every day at the moment as they aye recovers. Only 60 hours since it had a knife stuck in it so I must be patient and keep up with the eye drops. Silly I know but I keep comparing it to the left eye and feeling aggrieved because it's not as good! However, if I take a step back and think sensibly I can see it is improving every day. Yesterday I had to use readers to work the site but today I am managing fine with naked eyes.

[Stanley]

Improvement continues, only three and a half days since the knife went in. Got my appointment to see the surgeon on Tuesday next week so he can assess progress. Susan lined up to take me down there and then she can start packing for her Xmas in Oz in the knowledge she's done her caring job well. I couldn't have hoped for a better outcome in terms of timing. I shall make an appointment for an eye test after Xmas when both eyes are completely settled down.
Fascinating watching the improvement as I am continually comparing the right with the left which is not a good idea but you can't help it. Patience Stanley!! (If it stayed as it is now it would be perfectly acceptable). I think the biggest part of the recovery process is giving your brain time to adjust to the new lens. I never realised how much it governs what you see and how you interpret the information from your eyes. I remember many years ago when I was young, my optician, Mr Cunningham in Stockport, told me that a good exercise was to take my glasses off (I was very short sighted) and try to distinguish detail without them. He said it trained my brain to use my eyes better. I realise now how right he was!

[Stanley]

All going well... Funny how when I go to wash my face I automatically reach up to take my glasses off! Woke up last night with a pain in my eye and immediately went into worry mode. Off with the eye shield and I found it was simply that my eye was crusted up with sleep, washed it out and all was OK. I blame the eye shield but luckily I have now done my five days and can discard it.

[Stanley]

I'm happy to report the surgeon signed me off yesterday with two perfect eyes. I was really surprised when he tested the right eye and I found I could read the sight chart almost as well as the left. The impression I have day to day is that it is not quite as acute as the left but he told me that this was because my brain is using the left eye because it's better and that as the right eye heals it will gradually come into line with the left. This is why I shall wait till January before getting tested for my reading glasses. Pain in the bum but I will have a better result. The eye drops don't help, the steroids irritate it and I have two weeks to go yet. He showed me how to gently test the swelling by feeling the eye through my top eyelid while they are closed. The right eye is noticeably harder and more swollen than the left. Fascinating stuff, I knew my brain was controlling my sight because I can see the lag when it switches eyes but hadn't realised how controlling it was.

[PanBiker]

Result Stanley! glad it all went well.

[Cathy]

Very good news Stanley, keep on enjoying

[Stanley]

Thanks Kids, it's a different world....
By the way, both eyes are Ektachrome now. I used to think I had a cream toilet pedestal but now it has turned white! Weird.....

[Tizer]

A phone call today from the manager of the Extra Care House where my dad has a flat. He's become confused and is wandering in the night, going into other people's rooms - most of the residents leave their doors unlocked because the home is protected by an electronic entry system on the front, main door. He's complained that he couldn't get to the dining room for his lunch because the doors were locked but they're only locked during the night. He confuses day with night. When we visit him in the daytime he doesn't seem much different from before but the staff are finding it difficult now and are afraid he'll wander out during the night - the independence of the Extra Care House system is based on residents being able to come and go as they wish. His GP has been told and we're waiting to here his opinion. So it might be time for him to have yet another move...

[Wendyf]

Sorry to hear that Tiz.

[Stanley]

I want to say something supportive but there is no magic wand.... It must be a constant nagging worry.

On a personal note, I have been a bit congested and had aching limbs for over two weeks but it seems to be getting better now. It feels as though the Flu jab might have done a good job...

[Tizer]

Thanks for your thoughts, Wendy, Stanley. Glad to hear you've had your flu jab S, my dad is still waiting for his - the district nurses are supposed to visit where he lives and give people their jabs but they're still waiting. I complained to the doctor's surgery and they say they've submitted a list of all the old folk in homes needing jabs but they're told the district nurses are `too busy'. The surgery say they're going to have to send out someone from their own staff to do it.

There's an interesting article on dementia on the BBC web site. Don't let yourselves be depressed by the pessimistic bits but there are some good things in there, definitely some ideas on how to improve treatment and care.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25263341

[Tardis]

Are the home wanting your father to be sedated Tiz? Have you got full advice from any available local charity?

[Stanley]

Only six days of these bloody eye drops to go. From my experience with the other eye full vision kicks in about three weeks after finishing the course. The steroids are no doubt essential but they do irritate the eye and keep it slightly swollen and this affects the optical properties of the new lens. Patience Stanley, all is well.....

[Tizer]

Are the home wanting your father to be sedated Tiz? Have you got full advice from any available local charity?

Nothing like that at all. It's owned by the council and run by a local business on their behalf. The staff are very good and caring and I wouldn't expect them to even consider such an action. As an immediate fix they say they may put a pressure mat outside his door which will trigger an alarm for the supervisor if he wanders out of his flat at night. He's being visited by a lady from social care today who he's met before and we've met too - she's good and we're confident she'll work to find the best solution.

[Tizer]

The following was the most read science news release during November 2013 on one of the world's leading science reporting web sites. (Note that the study does not imply that milk can prevent cancer - rather that a peptide from milk could be used as a future drug to treat cancer. Making an anti-cancer agent from milk has the great benefit that it would be likely to be very safe to use.)

Peptide Derived from Cow’s Milk Kills Human Stomach Cancer Cells in Culture
New research from a team of researchers in Taiwan indicates that a peptide fragment derived from cow’s milk, known as lactoferricin B25 (LFcinB25), exhibited potent anticancer capability against human stomach cancer cell cultures. The findings, published in the Journal of Dairy Science, provide support for future use of LFcinB25 as a potential therapeutic agent for gastric cancer.

“Gastric cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer-related mortality worldwide, especially in Asian countries,” says Wei-Jung Chen, PhD, of the Department of Biotechnology and Animal Science of National Ilan University, Taiwan Republic of China. “In general, the main curative therapies for gastric cancer are surgery and chemotherapy, which are generally only successful if the cancer is diagnosed at an early stage. Novel treatment strategies to improve prognosis are urgently needed.”

Investigators evaluated the effects of three peptide fragments derived from lactoferricin B, a peptide in milk that has antimicrobial properties. Only one of the fragments, LFcinB25 reduced the survival of human AGS (Gastric Adenocarcinoma) cells in a dose-dependent and time-dependent manner. Under a microscope the investigators could see that after an hour of exposure to the gastric cancer cells, LFcinB25 migrated to the cell membrane of the AGS cells, and within 24 hours the cancer cells had shrunken in size and lost their ability to adhere to surfaces.

“Optimization of LFcinB using various strategies to enhance further selectivity is expected to yield novel anticancer drugs with chemotherapeutic potential for the treatment of gastric cancer,” concludes Dr. Chen.

Full bibliographic information: "Bovine lactoferricin B induces apoptosis of human gastric cancer cell line AGS by inhibition of autophagy at a late stage,” by W.-R. Pan, P.-W. Chen, Y.-L. S. Chen, H.-C. Hsu, C.-C. Lin, and W.-J. Chen. Journal of Dairy Science, Volume 96, Issue 12 (December 2013), http://dx.doi.org/10.3168/jds.2013-7285.

[Stanley]

Of course, a tyro like me can't possibly fully understand that last post but what I do infer from it is that there are so many micro nutrients and trace elements in natural foods that we don't fully understand. I believe that many of these are probably damaged by processing the original food and what it signals to me is that the nearer you can get to a Stone Age diet, the more likely you are to gain the benefit of trace elements such as the one described in the article. Amateurs like me have to rely on common sense augmented by learning as much as we can about nutrition and then boiling it down to an aphorism. So, if your grandmother wouldn't recognise it, don't buy or eat it! I get through a pint of milk a day one way or another. I may be getting enough lactoferricin B25!

[Cathy]

I manage on average 1/2 a litre of milk a day ... is that the same thing ??