Food Additive Regulation started in Congress in 1958. Over 10,000 chemicals are now in use that prevent spoilage, enhance flavor and texture. Safe additives where those that didn’t acutely make you sick, cause birth defects or cancer. Yet safety and testing are in the hands of manufacturers. The Pew Health Group estimates that over 97% […]
What Food Additives Really Mean Read More »
I don’t watch much TV but commercials these days frustrate me. They try to encourage people to walk into their doctor’s office saying they need a certain pill for something they are suffering from. Instead of letting a doctor decide, it is now legal for patients to decide their own diagnosis and demand a specific brand to
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Aluminum salts in antiperspirants combine with skin cells to form plugs that block the sweat ducts, leading to a decrease in perspiration. Research also shows that aluminum can be absorbed through the skin. Other research has also shown that aluminum can damage genes. Aluminum salts in antiperspirants combine with skin cells to form plugs that
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I have done a lot of pelvic exams in my career. Women tend to apologize for legs that aren’t shaved or apologizing to me for having to ‘go down there’. I’m not sure why women feel the need to apologize; I always explain that I am there to help them embrace and keep their genitalia
Seeing Your Lady Parts Read More »
In college, I had a classmate who had traveled to India for a month. She had come home with a parasite that had caused her to lose drastic amounts of weight. She started out a small woman and became emaciated. You could see her eyes sunken in and she did not have the glow of
Weight Loss Isn’t Always a Good Thing Read More »
When I was in first grade, we had to live part of the year in eastern Washington where my stepfather was working. I of course remember not wanting to go, as new seemed a little scary. So I went from a traditional kindergarten classroom to a one room school house. It was first through sixth
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This notion was engrained in us starting in our first year of medical school. I don’t know that we truly understood what that meant. That was true in general our first year of medical school. We learned a lot of philosophy of medicine that as a student didn’t seem applicable to practicing medicine. For me,
In the first year of medical school, you have to get used to not sleeping very much. You also have to get used to taking your clothes off to practice exams, and there is of course the dreaded cadaver lab. Is all you are told is the age and possibly cause of death for a
The Story of Rocco Read More »
Many women spend three weeks out of the month dreading that one week. Your regular doctor tells you to get on the pill. Some women are lucky and have no problems with their periods. These ladies are definitely the exception. The majority of women experience some discomfort around their menstrual cycles. There is good news.
That Time of the Month Read More »
I was thinking today about my first (and thankfully only) encounter with pirates. I don’t mean the Johnny Depp sort, but real pirates. I was in Indonesia on a small, tropical island to study monkeys. There were about 15 students, 10 workers, and 2000 monkeys on this island named Tinjil, southwest of Java.I had left
Meeting Real Pirates Read More »