Worse than I ever imagined

And we wonder why it takes decades to be properly diagnosed-

The AWAKEN Survey: Knowledge of Narcolepsy Among Physicians and the General Population (Full Text!!)

There was low awareness that narcolepsy is associated with children and young adults in all populations and awareness was lowest among PCPs. An association of narcolepsy with children (aged 5–12 years) and adolescents (aged 13–17 years) was recognized by 14% and 4% of PCPs, respectively. Similarly, low proportions of sleep specialists (12%) and the general population (12%) associated narcolepsy with children, and somewhat higher proportions of sleep specialists (24%) and the general population (20%) acknowledged that narcolepsy can be present in teenagers.

Recognition of individual narcolepsy symptoms was consistently low in the general population and most of the symptoms were not identified by PCPs; however, sleep specialists had a higher rate of symptom recognition (Figure 3). In particular, there was substantially lower awareness of the nocturnal symptoms associated with narcolepsy relative to other symptoms. Of the 5 key symptoms, EDS was most recognized by PCPs (64%) and the general population (46%); sleep specialists had higher recognition of cataplexy (82%), followed by EDS (70%). Less than half of sleep specialists (41%) identified disruptive nocturnal sleep as a narcolepsy symptom. Sixty-three percent of sleep specialists and 39% of PCPs identified both EDS and cataplexy, the two symptoms most commonly associated with narcolepsy, and recognition of both of these symptoms was higher among the non–board-certified sleep specialists (71% vs 49%). More board-certified than non–board-certified sleep specialists recognized all 5 key symptoms of narcolepsy (30% vs 18%, respectively), but the identification of individual symptoms varied for both groups of sleep specialists (Table 2). Identification of the 2 key symptoms was 69% among psychiatrists, compared with 57% of non-psychiatrists, but recognition of all 5 symptoms was low among psychiatrists (17%) and non-psychiatrists (28%).

It's not your imagination-  Narcoleptics do know more about narcolepsy than their doctors.

Fun with Microbes

You Are Mainly Microbe - Meet Your Microbiome (3:51 min. video)

Ever not felt completely like yourself? There's a good reason for that. Because a large part of you . . . isn't you. Our bodies are home to ten times as many microbes as human cells. We are walking ecosystems, each of us home to thousands of different species on and inside of us. Meet your microbiome!

Maniac of the Day

Behold the power of dopamine.

Star Trek Superfan Transforms Basement into Starship Enterprise    pic

Rainville says, "At some points, I took so much time to find out the precise item that it seemed like an obsession… I had put in so much energy seeking what I wanted that to accept failure is difficult, even to this day. Although people say they are impressed with the decor, I know well each inaccuracy, the exact places that I could improve."

LMAO.   "Seemed like an obsession" indeed.
We do not see the lens through which we look...

The Root of the Problem

Oh the things one can find on Medscape...   This is from 2012...

Periodontitis Affects Nearly Half of Americans Over 30

 Nearly half of American adults older than age 30 years have periodontal disease, according to recent findings from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the American Academy of Periodontology. The study, published in the October issue of the Journal of Dental Research, also found that the prevalence of periodontitis rises to 70.1% in adults older than age 65.

Researchers, led by Paul Eke, MPH, PhD, epidemiologist at the CDC, Atlanta, Georgia, evaluated data collected from 3743 adults age 30 years or older as part of the CDC's 2009-2010 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), which assesses the health and nutritional status of adults and children in the United States. In previous years, NHANES included only partial-mouth examinations for periodontitis; the 2009-2010 survey was the first to include a full-mouth periodontal examination.

Dr. Eke and colleagues found that 47.2% of the population (which would account for approximately 64.7 million adults) has periodontal disease, a figure far higher than previous national estimates.
"As periodontal disease is not evenly distributed in the mouth, these prior studies, [on the basis of] how they were designed, may have underestimated prevalence rates in the US population by as much as 50%" said Dr. Robert M. Pick, DDS, a practicing periodontist in Chicago, Illinois, and spokesperson for the American Dental Association, in an interview with Medscape Medical News "[These findings] add an entirely new set of statistics and a whole new set of percentages not known before."
The researchers further classified participants as having mild, moderate, or severe periodontitis, with rates of 8.7%, 30.0%, and 8.5%, respectively. Although the prevalence of mild and severe periodontitis remained stable at less than 15%, moderate periodontitis increased with age among all adults.
In an interview with Medscape Medical News, Pamela McClain, DDS, immediate past president of the American Academy of Periodontology and a practicing periodontist in Aurora, Colorado, said: "With what is known about the health complications related to periodontal disease, namely tooth loss and the increased risk of other systemic diseases, periodontitis is a significant public health issue."
...
The authors note that use of the full-mouth periodontal examination in the 2009-2010 NHANES may have contributed to these figures being higher than previous national estimates. They caution, however, that other factors, such as conservative case definitions, exclusion of inflammation and furcation status, and nonsampling of institutionalized persons in the current study, may still have resulted in underestimation of true prevalence.

Ya think?  People in institutions have the worst dental health of all.
Funny how the experimental methods alter the results...

related post

The Circle of Insanity

Do the Insanity Dance-

US doctors warn Congress cutting food stamps could mean higher medical bills

Doctors are warning that if Congress cuts food stamps, the federal government could be socked with bigger health bills. Maybe not immediately, they say, but over time if the poor wind up in doctors' offices or hospitals as a result.
Among the health risks of hunger are spiked rates of diabetes and developmental problems for young children down the road.

That's one step forward.

The researchers analyzed eight years of California hospital records to find cases of hypoglycemia, when blood sugar plummets, and link them to patients' ZIP codes.
Among patients from low-income neighborhoods, hospitalizations were 27% higher in the last week of the month compared with the first, when most states send out government checks and food stamps, said lead researcher Dr Hilary Seligman of the University of California, San Francisco. But hospitalizations didn't increase among diabetics from higher-income areas, she reported Tuesday in the journal Health Affairs.

Another step forward.

She is working on a project with Feeding America, a network of food banks, to try to improve health by providing extra, diabetes-appropriate foods, including fresh produce and whole-grain cereals and pastas, for diabetics at a few food banks in California, Texas and Ohio.

Two steps back.
And everyone Do-si-do!

Good Morning!

Caffeine Consumption Could Lower Risk For Atrial Fibrillation In Dose Dependent Manner

The meta-analysis, which was conducted by researchers at Fu Wai Hospital in Beijing, found that participants who drank caffeinated beverages decreased their risk of atrial fibrillation in a dose-dependent manner. For every increase of 300 milligrams of caffeine they drank each day, their risk of atrial fibrillation decreased by six percent. The findings were published online in the Canadian Journal of Cardiology. “It is unlikely that caffeine consumption causes or contributes to atrial fibrillation. Habitual caffeine consumption may reduce atrial fibrillation risk,” they concluded.

Myth: Coffee Consumption Leads To Dehydration

A new paper finds no evidence for a link between coffee consumption and dehydration - at least when it comes to normal coffee consumption. Coffee is mostly water so a moderate amount of coffee not only doesn't result in dehydration, it contributes to daily fluid requirements just as other fluids do.

Time for a refill...

Brain Eating Zombies of the Day

Take LSD, stay out of prison? Huge study links psychedelic use to reduced recidivism

From 2002 to 2007, the researchers collected data on 25,622 individuals under community corrections supervision in Treatment Accountability for Safer Communities (TASC), a program for individuals with a history of drug abuse.
Only about 1 percent of those in the program were diagnosed with a hallucinogen use disorder. Cannabis use disorders, cocaine use disorders, and alcohol use disorders were the most common diagnoses in the group.
The researchers found those diagnosed with a hallucinogen use disorder were less likely to fail the TASC program compared to those without a hallucinogen use disorder. That means those with a hallucinogen use disorder were less likely to violate TASC rules or other legal requirements, less likely to fail to appear in court, and less likely to be incarcerated.

No this does not indicate that hallucinogen treatment will make people more compliant.  It's way more likely that those people had a fundamentally different mental disorder in the first place.
Drug use is not indiscriminate, it's self-medication motivated by underlying undiagnosed somatic symptoms.

While we're at it

Their vision of your future:

New device can reduce sleep apnea episodes 

Implantation of a sleep apnea device called Inspire Upper Airway Stimulation (UAS) therapy can lead to significant improvements for patients with obstructive sleep apnea...

Plug into the matrix.
Or use antibacterial mouth rinse and saline nose spray.
You decide.

Bwa ha ha ha ha

Sleep Number’s Solution for Better Snoozing

Does your partner snore?
At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week, Sleep Number introduced a smart bed so smart that one feature allows you to adjust your snoring partner’s elevation, raising them higher in order to decrease their heavy breathing.
The new bed, called the x12, monitors your heart rate, breathing, positioning and the number of times you get out of bed during your sleep. The Sleep IQ technology is all inside the bed, nothing needs to be worn while you sleep.
Silencing a snorer and monitoring your health while you sleep will cost you, though. The bed is currently retailing for $8,000.

Yes, but none of that will alleviate your partner's sinus or throat infection...
Trust me, Sleep Number does not want to improve your sleep.   If you got better, they wouldn't be able to sell those outrageously expensive high-tech bags of air.

Debunking the Talking Points

My heart belongs to Matty.

A New Low in Health Care Rhetoric
He covers the erroneous ER visit statistics, but I like this part-

Specifically, she pointed to data showing that the Oregon group didn't show significant improvement in cholesterol, blood pressure and diabetes rates (although enrollees did show lower rates of depression).

Her take on this tiny initial sample of reform data: Just a few years into having access to primary care doctors, people are not healthier according to a few markers. Therefore, that proves it! Giving poor people health insurance achieves nothing.

He's got a point, it takes a while to improve chronic illness. But- to be clear, nobody shows improvement on cholesterol, blood pressure or diabetes rates whether it's Medicaid or not.  It's a feature of the protocols, not the patients.

Maniac of the Day

Award goes to the cop.  I'm guessing he was a little hypoglycemic.

Police officer fatally shoots mentally ill NC teenager

But the situation appeared to be under control, with two officers restraining the 90-pound Vidal, when the third officer arrived and shot Vidal point-blank, Wilsey contended.
"Then all of a sudden, this Southport cop came, walked in the house [and said]: 'I don't have time for this. Tase him. Let's get him out of here,'" Wilsey said.
An officer used a stun gun on Vidal, "he hit the ground [and] this guy shot him," Wilsey said.
Wilsey said that when he demanded to know why his stepson had been shot, the officer replied, "'Well, I'm protecting my officers.'"

That poor family.  Traumatized forever.
Rest in peace, dear tormented child.

Brain Eating Zombies of the Day

US News and World Report

Best diets: U.S. News ranks DASH first, Paleo last U.S.

The gluten-free “caveman” Paleo Diet (the most-searched plan of 2013) tied the rule-heavy, “idiotic” Dukan Diet for last place.

The popular Mediterranean Diet was found to be the best among the plant-based plans, while the low-fat Ornish Diet was deemed the best for heart-health.

And they wonder why everyone in America is sick and fat.
SSDD.

Spontaneous Brain Explosion

Brief fever common in kids given influenza, pneumococcal vaccines together

The CDC and other medical professional organizations often recommend giving the influenza and pneumococcal vaccines at the same visit, if both are due—both to prevent getting influenza or other infections between visits and to avoid a possible delay in vaccinations due to difficulty returning to the clinic (because of work schedules or other competing priorities).
...
Overall, for every 100 children there were an additional 20-23 cases of temperatures of 100.4 F (38 C) or higher in children with simultaneous influenza and pneumococcal vaccination, compared with those who received only one of the vaccines. There were also 15 additional cases of temperatures of 102.2 F (39 C) or higher in children who received both vaccines, compared with the influenza vaccine alone, but not compared with the pneumococcal vaccine.

Holy Crap!!!  These are "disease experts".  The very people who should know that the influenza virus increases the risk of streptococcal infection.   OMG, I wonder if they are doing the same thing to old people.

Please don't tell me, I really don't want to know...

Yo Europe

DQB1 Locus Alone Explains Most of the Risk and Protection in Narcolepsy with Cataplexy in Europe.

CONCLUSION:
An overwhelming portion of genetic risk for narcolepsy with cataplexy is found at DQB1 locus. Since DQB1*06:02 positive subjects are at 251-fold increase in risk for narcolepsy, and all recent cases of narcolepsy after H1N1 vaccination are positive for this allele, DQB1 genotyping may be relevant to public health policy.

This indicates that all you folks and your kids with post-vaccine onset are gluten intolerant.

Behold the Power of Sugar

Obesity Now A Third World Problem

The number of obese and overweight people in the developing world has nearly quadrupled to almost a billion between 1980 and 2008, Agence France-Presse reported.
According to the Overseas Development Institute, there are now far more obese or overweight adults in the developing world than in richer countries.

The Devil's in the Details

Vitamin-D Deficiency Linked to Fatal Cardiovascular Disease

The current population-based cohort study enrolled 9949 adults aged 50 to 74 years recruited during regular health checkups at primary-care practices in 2000 to 2002. There were more women than men (59% vs 41%); most participants (59%) had inadequate vitamin-D levels ...
Even after adjustment for other potential confounders, including smoking and physical activity, vitamin-D deficiency still conferred a significant 27% increased risk for total CVD and a 62% increased risk for fatal CVD. However, there was no association between vitamin-D deficiency and nonfatal CVD events.
Individuals with low vitamin-D levels also had a significant 36% increased risk of total CHD and a nonsignificant 33% increased risk of total stroke.

I have been looking at this study again-   (abstract)
The one that claims vitamin D supplementation doesn't help for heart disease-

Well  men got 50 μg per day and women got 20 μg per day.  The most up to date recommendations are 5000 IU per day for people who are deficient.   That's equivalent to 125 μg.

The Institute of Medicine recommends 600 international units of vitamin D for adults, and 800 international units for people over 70. 
No wonder it hasn't been helping.

See the Pathology

Ke$ha In Rehab For Eating Disorder

Yeah, I'm guessing the anorexia has morphed to binge eating.   Or vice versa.

A hyper vegetarian with piercings, and tattoos.  Go figure.
Including one inside her lip.
What she needs is treatment for a streptococcal autoimmune disorder.

Just a Thought

After asking people if they believe in evolution-
Researchers should ask them if they believe antibiotic resistant bacteria are a health concern.

That data might be interesting.

Told Ya So

Shingles Before 40 Hikes Risk for Vascular Events

Rates of stroke, transient ischemic attack (TIA), and heart attack were significantly increased among patients experiencing shingles episodes in young adulthood or early middle age, a British epidemiological study found.
Among more than 100,000 individuals in Great Britain whose records indicated a shingles attack, the risk of stroke was nearly doubled after episodes occurring prior to age 40 relative to age-, sex-, and location-matched controls, according to Judith Breuer, MD, of University College London, and colleagues.

They recommend getting the shingles vaccine.   I am not sure how it works, and am personally now afraid of vaccines, so I will do some more research on that.  I already take valtrex every day.

The Circle of Insanity

College Students' Thesis Topics Are Hilarious, Depressing

Documenting the obvious.   Excellent use of millions of years of evolution and thousands of years of technological achievement.  But I guess it keeps the unemployment rates down.

Correlation Games

Autophagy is reduced in the brains of schizophrenic patients.

Vitamin D induces autophagy.

Low vitamin D associated with psychosis and schizophrenia.

Well How About That

The brain also produces the sex hormone oestrogen

The research, recently published in the Journal of Neuroscience, shows that the hypothalamus – a part of the brain involved with regulating the menstrual cycle and reproduction – can actively release the hormone in rhesus monkeys. The findings have implications for humans because the reproductive neuroendocrine system (which makes and releases hormones) of rhesus monkeys is identical to humans.
The researchers discovered that estradiol – one of three major naturally occurring oestrogen hormones and the predominant one involved in female reproduction – can be rapidly produced in the brain. Estradiol influences other functions in the body including our weight and memory.

That's because it increases insulin production....
Been there, done that.  Can't remember it though.  Ha.

Why I came back

Because I remember a different world.

When morbid obesity was the exception, not taken for granted.
When children drank milk and ate eggs and went outside to play.
When infection was a cause of disease.
When doctors had patients instead of protocols.
When psychology was greeted with skepticism and dismissal.
When antidepressants and meth and oxycodone didn't exist.
When medical research alleviated human suffering instead of making corporations rich.
When big business didn't own the food and drug companies and the government agencies that regulate them.
When TV wasn't all pathology all the time.
When politicians and the people who vote for them had some sense of the common good.

Because I remember a world where crazy didn't rule.
And insanity truly is the root of the problem.  Nothing will change until we address that.

So, even if I can't do much, and I am constantly frustrated, and I just want to ignore it all- I will keep screaming into the void.

Happier New Year?

Nutrition Trends For 2014

Announced December 26, U.S. nutrition trade magazine Today's Dietitian released a survey of more than 500 dietitians on their predictions for rising nutrition trends, citing next year's biggest trend as gluten-free. 

They call it Hypomania Now

Sherlock Holmes is the archetypal scientist – brilliant but slightly scary

Fun stuff in there.   But this is wrong-

The world he was originally created for was one obsessed with science. The Victorian era saw the birth of Charles Babbage's own "calculating machine", a forerunner of modern computers. Many early fictional detectives – Edgar Allan Poe's Dupin, Jacques Futrelle's "Thinking Machine" – were characters who prided themselves on their systematic, unemotional approach to solving mysteries.
Holmes, too, boasts of his lack of emotions – "I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix" – and his ability to separate fact from theory. "I make a point of never having any prejudices," he tells Inspector Forrester in The Adventure of the Reigate Squires, "and of following docilely wherever fact may lead me." Like Babbage's Difference Engine, there is no personality involved, only the application of a method. "He was," says Watson, "the most perfect reasoning and observing machine that the world has seen."

Mania involves all kinds of cognitive biases.   Especially the one where you believe you are thinking especially clearly.  The illusion of competence.  Heh.