KIDNEY DISEASES; SALIENT THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW (I).

Much about the kidney has been said in the HAVE YOUR KIDNEYS BEEN HIDING FROM YOU? article.

The kidneys help to perform several life-sustaining roles: they cleanse your blood by removing waste and excess fluid, maintain the balance of salt and minerals in your blood, and help regulate blood pressure.

           BUT WHY SHOULD YOU KNOW ABOUT KIDNEY DISEASES?

It is paramount that we keep emphasizing this. Why? Five Reasons:

#1: Some kidney diseases are particularly dangerous, because you may not have any symptoms until considerable, often irreparable, damage has occurred.

Breast Cancer Is Not One Disease, Experts Say

Breast cancer isn't the same for every woman, even at the cellular level, according to a new statement from four major medical groups focused on the disease.

The report was issued Monday by the American Cancer Society, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. National Cancer Institute, and the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries. They say that classifying breast cancers according to tumor subtypes could help improve treatment of the disease.

CARDIOMEGALY (Enlarged Heart). . .

This is not the case as when someone is said to have a big heart. This kind of 'generosity' can be dangerous to one's health and also life threatening.

Not to scare you, Cardiomegaly isn't a disease. It is a symptom of underlying problem(s) that is causing the heart to work harder than normal.

The heart is an organ made up of contractile muscles. Coordinated contractions of these muscle helps propel blood out of the atria and ventricles to the blood vessels, and other parts of the body.

Cardiomegaly is one of the most common types of cardiomyopathy (disease of the heart muscle).

New Ebola Vaccine Shows Promise in Human Trials

 

It appeared to provoke good immune response in Chinese study, but larger trials are needed

By Robert Preidt 

 

WEDNESDAY, March 25, 2015 (HealthDay News) -- An experimental Ebola vaccine shows promise in an early clinical trial, but requires much more testing, researchers report.

The trial included 120 healthy adults in China who received either a low or high dose of the vaccine, or a placebo. Twenty-eight days later, 38 of 40 people in the low-dose group and all 40 of those in the high-dose group showed an immune response to the vaccine.

No serious side effects occurred among the participants who received the vaccine.

While the results suggest the vaccine is effective and safe, more long-term testing is needed to determine whether it can actually protect people against Ebola, according to the authors of the study published March 25 in The Lancet.

HYPERTENSION, NOT DEATH SENTENCE. . .

Mr. John came out of the doctor's office, face downcast, really moody, head frequently shaking, acting like someone who had just lost a loved one. After enquiring the reason for his unpleasant gesticulations, I discovered it was all down to what he had heard the doctor tell him. Mr. John was just told he had hypertension.

As the case with Mr. John, so is it with a lot of people; some are at the point of death right about now, just because they've been told they have hypertension.

But I think the problem is actually with the 'big' word, not what the word really is, hypertension.

CAN SMARTWATCH DETECT EPILEPTIC SEIZURES?

It looks like a watch and tells time like a watch, but the creators of Embrace say their new invention is so much more than that. The device comes from Empatica, a computing company focused on human data analytics and that prides itself on its ability to monitor epileptic seizures. Empatica's latest feat was stumbled upon almost completely by accident.

Dr. Rosalind Picard, the company's chief scientist, was studying stress levels in non-verbal autistic children by measuring electrodermal activity (EDA). New York University Langone Medical Center's Dr. Daniel Friedman said EDA is the "flow if ions through the sweat glands," which is innervated by the sympathetic nervous system— the part of the body that regulates breathing, heart rate and other subconscious functions that can indicate stress.

HIV VACCINE THAT TRANSFORMS CELL DNA BRINGS FRESH HOPE

A radical new approach to vaccination seems to completely protect monkeys from HIV, US scientists report. 

Vaccines normally train the immune system to fight an infection. 

Instead, researchers at the Scripps Research Institute in California have altered the DNA of monkeys to give their cells HIV-fighting properties. 

The team describe it as "a big deal" and want to start human trials soon. Independent experts say the idea is worth "strong consideration".

This technique uses gene therapy to introduce a new section of DNA inside healthy muscle cells.

'VALENTINE; THE SEASON OF STDS'. TRUE OR NOT?!

A friend once jokingly said, "valentine is the period when people contract STDs the most". But this particular statement has since seen a lot of criticism. Arguments have gone into it, and it hasn't found favour with a lot of people.

"BUT LET'S JUST FACE IT. . ."

STDs (sexually transmitted diseases) and STIs (sexually transmitted infections), like their names imply don't just jump on you, you invite them to yourself, and that, through ONE mean, SEX.

HEARTBURN 'POSSIBLE CANCER SIGN' WARNING

Persistent heartburn can be a sign of stomach or oesophageal cancer.

According to Public Health England, people should go to their doctor if they have persistent heartburn or difficulty swallowing food for three weeks or more. But it said most people were not aware of the symptoms.
Stomach and oesophageal cancers are the fifth most common cancers in England.

PHE figures show that around 12,900 people in England are diagnosed with these cancers each year and approximately 10,000 people die from the diseases annually.

Top Sierra Leone doctor dies from disease

One of Sierra Leone's top doctors died from Ebola hours after the arrival in the country of an experimental drug that could have been used to save him.

Victor Willoughby, who tested positive for the disease only on Saturday, is the 11th doctor in the country in the current outbreak.

His death has been described as "a big loss to the medical profession".

Ebola has killed more than 7,300 people this year in West Africa, World Health Organization figures show.

Rare Disease Causes California Baby’s Skin To Blister and Tear By Touch

Not being able to hold one’s newborn is a tragic thought for any parent to imagine, but that’s the reality for one California couple whose child has a rare, painful skin disease, KCRA reported.

Kirsti and Jason Kinkle’s daughter, Kiira, was born Oct. 12 with a recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosis, a genetic skin disease that causes the skin to blister and tear from rubbing, friction, scratching or adhesive tape.

Get Rid of Smelly Feet

If there's one thing that provokes annoyance in people, it's when someone walks into the room, takes off his/her shoe, and this stench oozes out of it. It's so irritating and annoying.

Smelly feet, like snoring, is another real factor that causes dispute in the home, between spouses. You don't want little things like this to ruin your good mood, do you?

Smelly feet, medically called BROMODOSIS, is caused by foot sweat. The feet have more sweat glands than any other part of the body. These glands release sweat regularly throughout the day to keep the skin moist and supple.

Sweat itself is odorless, but it creates a beneficial environment for certain bacteria to grow and produce bad-smelling substances.

Signs, Symptoms and Treatment of Eye Floaters.

Symptoms of eye floaters may include:

* Spots in your vision that may look like dark specks or knobby, transparent strings of floating material

* Spots that move when you move your eyes, so when you try to look at them, they move quickly out of your visual field

* Spots that are most noticeable when you look at a plain bright background, such as a blue sky or a white wall

* Spots that eventually settle down and drift out of the line of vision.

How much do you know about Eye Floaters?

You may have probably seen specks looking like clouds moving in your field of vision, especially when you look towards a bright background direction. As you change the focus of your view they move along with your eyes (not exactly, but in a way). Those things are called floaters. While these objects look like they are in front of your eye, they are actually floating inside it.

                                        EYE FLOATERS, WHAT ARE THEY?

W.H.O finally declares Nigeria Ebola-free.

The World Health Organization declared Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, officially free of Ebola infections yesterday, 20th October, 2014, calling the outcome the triumphal result of “world-class epidemiological detective work.”

The announcement came 42 days after the last reported infection inNigeria’s outbreak, twice the maximum incubation period for the Ebola virus.

The Nigerian response was upheld and praised by the W.H.O. as an example of the measures other countries can take to halt the spread of the epidemic, which is concentrated in three West African countries: Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone. “This is a spectacular success story that shows that Ebola can be contained,” the W.H.O. said in a report on its website. But it also expressed caution that Nigeria cannot
relax its defenses against the deadly virus.

Ebola Patients in Lagos State Quarantine Centre Neglected.

Family members and relatives of the Ebola patients that have been isolated at the Infectious Disease Hospital (IDH), Yaba, have cried out to the Nigerian government to make provision for better health care services for their loved ones.

In a report published by PUNCH, families and associates spoke of the squalor and neglect the admitted patients are undergoing, at a press conference held two days ago in Ikoyi.

Dr. Helen Boyo-Ekwueme, a pathologist, described the utter neglect the quarantined (one a member of her family) are dealing with. “They are just being left on their own. Nobody is counseling them. They are just there as if

Must-Know Facts about The Chikungunya Disease.

The Chikungunya disease, since its discovery has affected millions of lives. It is moving gradually from continent to continent and it keeps affecting more people as the day goes by. Much of this is owed to the fact that very little is known about this mosquito-marketing disease.

* The Chikungunya disease was first discovered in an outbreak that occurred in Tanzania, in the year 1952.

* Chikungunya is a viral disease caused by the chikungunya virus. Chikungunya virus is an RNA virus that belongs to the alphavirus genus of the family Togaviridae.

* Chikungunya disease is mosquito-borne. Its major vectors are two species of mosquito; the Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus. These mosquitoes can carry the virus from an infected person after biting and transfer to a susceptible person during biting, and these mosquitoes operate mostly in day time.

* Symptoms of the Chikungunya disease include fever and severe joint pain, muscle pain, headache, nausea,

Chikungunya Virus Outbreak in the Caribbean.

For a very long time, as far back as 1952 since its discovery, there have been reported cases of the Chikungunya disease in continents like Asia, Africa and Europe. For the first time, sometime in late December 2013, an outbreak of the Chikungunya was reported from the French part of the Island of Saint Martin in the Caribbean region.

According to CDC, as of August 11, 2014, the following Caribbean countries have reported cases of Chikungunya; Anguilla, Antigua, Aruba, Bahamas, Barbados, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Curaçao, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Puerto Rico, Saint Barthelemy, Saint Kitts, Saint Lucia, Saint Martin (French), Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Sint Maarten (Dutch), Trinidad and Tobago, Turks and Caicos Islands, US Virgin Islands

CDC recommends that travelers to the Caribbean protect themselves from mosquito bites. Some travelers may be more likely to

Chikungunya Disease.

Chikungunya is a viral infection caused by the Chikungunya virus, transmitted by the bite of infected mosquitoes such as Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus. It causes an illness which is characterized by acute fever, headache, joint and muscle pains (especially in the hand and leg), which may persist for a very long time in some cases. Chikungunya does not often result in death, but the joint and muscle pain may last for months, or even years, and may lead to chronic pain and disability.

SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS.

After a period of about one to twelve days, which is the incubation period of

Pregnant Woman Diagnosed with Ebola Virus in Lagos, Nigeria.

An unidentified six months old pregnant woman has been diagnosed with the Ebola Virus Disease.

The woman reportedly got infected after being checked by Obi Justina Ejelonu, one of the nurses who had primary contact with the late Liberian Patrick Sawyer, at The First Consultant Hospital in Obalende area of Lagos where she went for antenatal checkup, the same hospital Mr. Sawyer was admitted.

The pregnant woman has been moved to the Isolation centres where suspected people are being quarantined behind Mainland hospital in Yaba Lagos.