More Experiments on Myself

A couple successful ones, too.

First, Probiotics.  Love them.
I have been having problems ever since I took the antibiotics for my teeth.  Really sensitive guts, temperature control problems etc.  I went to the vitamin store and got some from the refrigerated unit, just to make sure the bacteria were live.  I don't know anything about them, so got the version for Women over 50.  Probiotics for  Seniors, kiss my ass...
Anyhow, I have to say, it worked wonders.   My guts aren't grinding and I no longer feel sick.   My gums and sinuses are much happier.   And my feet are WAY better.   Seriously.  I don't understand it, but my feet don't hurt anymore.   I had a couple warts on them, those went away immediately, but so did my neuroma that started  about 20 years ago.   I was told it required surgery.  It's gone.  Strange but true.  I am actually up to walking 1.5 miles in regular shoes! 


Second, Electric Cigarrettes.
I started using ecigs a while ago, but never could give up the real thing.  Apparently, my bad results were the product of inferior products.  After trying a few- I have learned a few things.
1.  Power matters.   You need a good battery with a manual switch.  Or a wired unit.
2.  Solvent matters.   The nicotine comes dissolved in different liquids.  Ethylene glycol was truly irritating to my mouth.  The cartridges that are half glycerine are not.
 
Get this one, it's better than smoking.
They even have coffee flavored cartridges.   Awesome.

Vaping video
It fits right into my internet obsession lifestyle.
I have now been tobacco free since January 13th.   Never looked back.

Brain Scan

Brain Map Reveals Grid-Like Pattern
I love this pic. It shows how neatly organized the brain really is.
It looks like a network wiring diagram. Each node wired to the central controllers.

How in the World

Did I miss this? I think I was leaving for Mexico...

Scientists shocked to find antibiotics alleviate symptoms of schizophrenia

A cheap antibiotic normally prescribed to teenagers for acne is to be tested as a treatment to alleviate the symptoms of psychosis in patients with schizophrenia, in a trial that could advance scientific understanding of the causes of mental illness.The National Institute for Health Research is funding a £1.9m trial of minocycline, which will begin recruiting patients in the UK next month. The research follows case reports from Japan in which the drug was prescribed to patients with schizophrenia who had infections and led to dramatic improvements in their psychotic symptoms. The chance observation caused researchers to test the drug in patients with schizophrenia around the world. Trials in Israel, Pakistan and Brazil have shown significant improvement in patients treated with the drug.

See what happens when you actually practice medicine and treat the illnesses people exhibit instead of blaming "lifestyle choices" for their symptoms?  Freakin Miracles.

Think about it

Autism in US more common than previously thought

Autism cases are on the rise again, largely due to wider screening and better diagnosis, federal health officials said Thursday. The rate of U.S. cases of autism and related disorders rose to about 1 in 88 children. The previous estimate was 1 in 110.

More than 1 in 100.
And narcolepsy is estimated at 1 in 2000.
Do you really believe there are twenty times more people with autism than narcolepsy?
I don't.   (according to my mechanism, it's not even mathematically possible)

This is a failure of the diagnostic criteria.  They are way too restrictive.  They have sacrificed recall for precision.   Diagnostic Reliability.
Sleep specialists don't recognize any of the mild or preliminary symptoms of narcolepsy.   They wait until the pathology has accumulated to the point it's catastrophic.  (And then they give us drugs that make it worse.)
They're fundamentally incompetent.

Now that's crazy

Coral infected by Herpes Viruses too

As corals continue to decline in abundance around the world, researchers are turning their attention to a possible cause that's almost totally unexplored -- viral disease.
One of the surprises from recent research was the predominance in corals of herpes viruses -- similar but not identical to the herpes virus that can infect humans. Herpes viruses appear to constitute a majority of the viruses found in corals, and one experiment showed that herpes-like viral sequences were produced in coral tissues after acute episodes of stress.

An Offhand Hypothesis

How Mefloquine may induce psychiatric symptoms-

Mefloquine is an antimalarial  drug.  It kills the parasite that lives in the blood cells.
I am guessing it changes the microbe population in the body allowing another parasite to flourish.
Gastrointestinal side effects of mefloquine are well known.

Here is an article linking it to Pneumonia.

Mycoplasma pneumoniae is a pathogen which is known to cause sudden and extreme behavioral changes.

How warped I am

This is what I am reading now:

Rheumatic Fever in America and Britain: A Biological, Epidemiological, and Medical History
and I ordered a few more similar titles.
I'm sure I'll annoy you with all the boring things I learn.

This one was pretty fun though:

The Killer of Little Shepherds
Murder in the 19th century. 
A deranged killer.   A brilliant scientist.  A substantial body count.  The birth of forensic science. 
(and a nasty oozing head infection too!)
Plenty of obsession for everyone... even me.

Correlation Games

Chronic Stress Spawns Protein Aggregates Linked to Alzheimer's

Repeated stress triggers the production and accumulation of insoluble tau protein aggregates inside the brain cells of mice, say researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine.

"Acute stress may be useful for brain plasticity and helping to facilitate learning. Chronic stress and continuous activation of stress pathways may lead to pathological changes in stress circuitry. It may be too much of a good thing."

My turn:   Stress activates Herpes Viruses.

Brain Imaging Studies Suggest Alzheimer’s Disease Spreads Through Linked Nerve Cells

Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia may spread within nerve networks in the brain by moving directly between connected neurons, instead of in other ways proposed by scientists, such as by propagating in all directions, according to researchers who report the finding in the March 22 edition of the journal Neuron.

My turn:   Herpes Virus spreads via neuron to neuron transmission

Their vision of your future

Stomach surgery more effective than medicine for diabetes

“With these operations, we could take people with diabetes who are just barely obese ... and put diabetes in full remission,” said surgeon Thomas Magnuson of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, who was not involved in either study.

Low Fat Diet.
Drugs. Drugs and More Useless Drugs.
Surgery.

Everyone Wins!
Especially if you're hyperinsulinemic, in which case you get to go to the Bonus Round!

Zombie Bunnies

The best zombies ever!

This is Why

Military Scrambles To Limit Malaria Drug Just After Afghanistan Massacre

Nine days after a U.S. soldier allegedly massacred 17 civilians in Afghanistan, a top-level Pentagon health official ordered a widespread, emergency review of the military’s use of a notorius anti-malaria drug called mefloquine. Mefloquine, also called Lariam, has severe psychiatric side effects. Problems include psychotic behavior, paranoia and hallucinations. The drug has been implicated in numerous suicides and homicides, including deaths in the U.S. military. For years the military has used the weekly pill to help prevent malaria among deployed troops.

That explains a whole hell of a lot.
Collateral Damage Indeed.

Brain Eating Zombie of the Day

David Eagleman

Great compilation of data.  Same old conclusion.

The Brain on Trial

Advances in brain science are calling into question the volition behind many criminal acts. A leading neuroscientist describes how the foundations of our criminal-justice system are beginning to crumble, and proposes a new way forward for law and order.

It's a remarkable achievement-  he presents all kinds of evidence of involuntary behavior- then concludes criminals just really need to buckle down and train their brains with real-time MRI imaging feedback.
He's outside the box and still can't see it.

See the Pathology

Kid has nap attack on skis

Sweet Sick Baby.  Good thing he had a helmet on.
I hate it when the light is too bright and you have to close your eyes...

He should probably eat more fruits and vegetables.
And take some adderall or something.

As I was saying

Hyperinsulinemic Hypoglycemia After Gastric Bypass

Hypoglycemia after eating a meal is being increasingly recognized in post-gastric bypass patients. While the etiology of this condition is not entirely understood, ongoing research suggests that approaches to treatment should involve a low-carbohydrate diet rather than pancreatectomy.
Dr Spanakis, explains that although there is a growing tendency to treat hyperinsulinemic hypoglycemic patients with pancreatic resection, it is often unsuccessful resulting in total pancreatic removal. “The end result of this approach is to cause iatrogenic diabetes, necessitating lifelong treatment with insulin”

  Tic Tic Tic Tic Tic

Something to Consider

When making alcohol policy...  the problem has been around for a while.
Your idea really isn't very creative.   Or effective.

A snapshot of wet and dry America    (check out Utah)

Which reminds me of this post.

Anyhow, happy friday, friday!

But of Course

You Need Some Extra Austerity!

Brits to raise prices of alcohol to curb consumption

Let me know how that goes...

Zombies of the Day

Rush Limbaugh's Wife Mad at Him Too

Behold the true power of righteous indignation.

The Root of the Problem

Doctors are just now beginning to realize the underlying error of their assumptions-
These traits do not survive in spite of being aberrent.
They survive because they are advantageous.

The Troublesome Bloom of Autism

Gradually he saw a pattern. At birth, children with autism had normal-size brains. But by the time they were a year old, the brains of most autistic children had grown far beyond average. The average adult human brain weighs 1,375 grams, but Courchesne encountered one 3-year-old autistic boy whose brain weight was estimated at 1,876 grams. The MRI scans further revealed that only certain parts of the brain became larger. The growth was striking in the prefrontal cortex, the region just behind the eyes that is responsible for language, decisions, and other sophisticated thinking. Courchesne also saw an increase in both the gray matter (consisting of dense clusters of neurons) and the white matter linking different regions of the brain. This explosive neural expansion continued in many autistic children until the age of 5, and then it stopped. Past that age, Courchesne found, the rate of brain growth slowed in autistic children, falling behind that of ordinary children. By the teen years, some brain regions actually started to shrink. 

People With Autism Possess Greater Ability to Process Information

People with autism have a greater than normal capacity for processing information even from rapid presentations and are better able to detect information defined as 'critical', according to a study published March 22 in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology. The research may help to explain the apparently higher than average prevalence of people with autism spectrum disorders in the IT industry. The task involved looking at a circle of letters flashed very briefly on the screen and searching for some 'target' letters. At the same time, the participants were also asked to detect a small grey shape that occasionally appeared outside the letter circle. When only one or two letters were flashed on the screen, the researchers found that both groups could successfully find the letter and detect the shape. However, making the search task more challenging by increasing the number of letters significantly impaired the detection performance of the typical adults -- but not of the adults with autism spectrum disorders, who were able to detect the extra shape just as well in the more challenging conditions. When the task became harder, they significantly outperformed the typical adults.

Same as it ever was

My peeps.  Obsessed with liquid insanity.

Beer and Bling in Iron Age Europe

If you wanted to get ahead in Iron-Age Central Europe you would use a strategy that still works today -- dress to impress and throw parties with free alcohol.

Yo Psychs

This is what I know for a fact:

We will teach ourselves Medicine if it helps.
Watch and learn.

I have been wondering

And here is my answer-

New Study Finds That Patients with Gluten Sensitivity Have Tooth Enamel Issues

Thanks Gluten Free Society!

The Circle of Insanity

Lawmaker Targeted By Firebomb Slams Lack Of Funding For Mental Health Care In Texas

To state Sen. Wendy Davis, the firebombing of her Fort Worth district office on Tuesday was a clear sign that something is wrong in Texas. Targeted by a man who authorities said talked of space aliens and had a history of psychiatric problems, the Democrat ripped into her fellow lawmakers on Wednesday for providing so little funding for mental health care throughout the state.

Do you really think psychiatric care is going to help that man?
You're delusional.

Yo Doctors

You like to fry these people's brains too.

Diabetes mellitus and schizophrenia: historical perspective
Diabetes and schizophrenia have been linked since the beginning of the 20th century (Kooy, 1919; Raphael & Parsons, 1921; Lorenz, 1922).

Immune System Activated in Schizophrenia "This suggests that the brain's immune defence system is activated in schizophrenia," says Professor Göran Engberg, who led the study. "It now remains to be seen whether there is an underlying infection or whether the immune system is triggered by some other means."

Very Very Troubling

Someone or some group is starting a push on ECT- Electro Convulsive Therapy for Depression.
It keeps coming up and it really scares me.

-The TV show "Royal Pains" spent a whole season on one character's depression and in the finale they convinced her to try it. (I actually went in the other room and cried during that scene.)
-My local news has done a report on how it's being used again.

Now this: Electroshock: First glimpse of how it works adds clues to depression

That study proves nothing. They have no idea what they're talking about.
Yes ECT calms the brain. Go figure- you fuckin fried the synapses.
If I send some jolts through my computer it will calm down quite a bit too.

There is a whole lot of data indicating depression is caused by immune responses.
How exactly does clamping electrodes on your skull affect that?

My working theory is those people forget to eat after treatment.
And their blood sugar goes down. And their orexin levels go up.
And then they feel better. For a while.

There is absolutely NO evidence that this procedure addresses the cause of depression, or is safe or effective over the long term.
And they are preying on the most vulnerable people.  People who think amnesia would be an improvement.  People who really don't care if they survive.

They know their shit doesn't work.  This just proves how incompetent and desperate they are.
They will literally toast our brains to get us to shut up.

One Google Search Later:
ECT alters brain glucose metabolism.
The hard way.
Fuck You Doctors.  Fuck You and your Low Fat Diets.

Zombie Shopping Spree

One of you crazy people sent me a box of brains-

I got a brain making mold, a coffee cup with brain anatomy, a couple buttons and a brain fart (as if I needed any more of those)!!

Thanks so much-
Brain cells are a girl's best friend...