Diseases Articles

Article / Updated 06-06-2023

Taking your medications as prescribed is one way to keep your Crohn’s and colitis under control. However, the disease can become active despite taking medications. Certain things are known to trigger Crohn’s and colitis flares or increase your symptoms. But if you know about these triggers ahead of time — and avoid them — you can help yourself stay in remission and avoid flares. Here are the common triggers for Crohn’s and colitis: Smoking: Smoking not only increases your risk of having Crohn’s disease, but also makes the disease worse, causing you to have more flares. Studies have also shown that smoking brings Crohn’s disease back after surgery. Drugs: A variety of drugs can trigger Crohn’s and colitis symptoms, including frequent use of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), such as Motrin, Advil, or Aleve. Certain antibiotics (such as ciprofloxacin and penicillin) increase your risk of having infection of your intestines, which can mimic acute flare. Talk with your doctor if you have any concerns about medications you’ve been prescribed. Don’t stop taking a prescribed antibiotic without consulting with your doctor first. Diet: Certain foods may give you more problems than others, but everyone reacts differently to different foods — so what your sibling with Crohn’s or colitis can tolerate and what you can tolerate may be different. Pay attention to which foods are giving you trouble and avoid them in the future. Here are some common culprits: Artificial sweeteners Fatty foods High-fiber food Gas-producing food (lentils, beans, legumes, broccoli) Caffeine Spicy foods Nuts and seeds Dairy products (if you’re lactose intolerant) Wheat and other products (if you’re sensitive to gluten) Alcohol: Studies have not shown that drinking adversely affects the inflammation in Crohn’s and colitis patients. Alcohol does, however, irritate the intestines and can worsen symptoms of diarrhea in some patients. It can also interact with certain medications you may take for your disease, such as metronidazole and methotrexate. Dehydration: Active disease makes you go to the restroom frequently, causing you to lose water and salt and putting you at risk for dehydration. Dehydration itself can cause stress to your body functions and cause more weakness and inability to cope with illness. And a vicious cycle starts. . . . Bottom line: Stay hydrated by drinking at least eight 8-ounce glasses of clean water a day. The amount of water you need may vary depending on your age, weight, activity level, and body fluid losses (such as water lost during diarrhea). Talk with your doctor and dietitian about your total daily water requirement. Depression: Studies have shown that depression can cause disease flare. You can have more symptoms and an increase in inflammation of the intestines when you’re depressed. Your doctor may prescribe an antidepressant to treat depression and, thus, reduce the symptoms of your Crohn’s or colitis. Be sure to talk with your doctor if you’re feeling depressed. Lack of sleep: Sleep can affect the immune system, and poor sleep or sleep deprivation can activate inflammation. Poor sleepers tend to have more inflammation of their intestines and are at risk for future flares. Getting an uninterrupted seven to eight hours of sleep can keep your symptoms at a bay. Stress: Stress has a negative impact on the immune system. Physical and emotional stress has been shown to cause disease flare and an increase in symptoms. Nobody has a stress-free life, but do what you can to keep your stress at a minimum, even if that means taking a yoga class or dropping the kids off at your health club’s daycare center while you sit in the sauna for 30 minutes. (Just make sure to stay hydrated if you’re sweating out your stress.)

Cheat Sheet / Updated 05-15-2023

To overcome an addiction, first you need to recognize addiction in yourself or a loved one. Then, explore addiction recovery programs and treatment methods and decide how to deal with your addictive behavior, or that of a family member or friend.

Article / Updated 05-03-2023

Gambling involves the betting or wagering of valuables on uncertain outcomes and takes many forms — from games of chance to skill-based activities. People have many motivations for gambling, but all involve the hope of gaining more. Gambling is sometimes a rite of passage by which people discover more about themselves and how to compete with others. It is sometimes a way of life (for people such as casino pros and escape gamblers). It can be, in its healthiest form, a way of socializing and having fun. Pathological gambling is a progressive disorder that involves impulse-control problems. The consequences of pathological gambling are severe and may be devastating to the addicted person's family and career, but the disorder can be treated. As with all addictions, pathological gambling has personal, familial, and neurochemical aspects. Pathological gamblers may even have a genetic vulnerability, although such complex behaviors are unlikely to be traced to one specific gene in the same way some medical conditions, like cystic fibrosis, have been. Problem gambling pioneer Dr. Robert Custer identified three phases to a progressive gambling problem: a winning phase, a losing phase, and a desperation phase. Winning phase In the winning phase, you may experience a "big win" or a series of smaller wins that result in excess optimism. You may feel an unrealistic sense of power and control and you're excited by the prospect of more wins. ("Hey Doc, this is a sure thing. I'm betting the farm.") At the same time, you can't maintain the excitement unless you're continually involved in high-risk bets. Your bets increase, and ultimately, the increased risk puts you in a vulnerable situation where you can't afford to lose . . . and then, sure as the sun rises, you do lose. Losing phase In the losing phase, you may brag about past wins; how you had the casino or track or bookie on the ropes. But in the immediate situation, you're losing more than winning. You're more likely to gamble alone, and when not gambling, you're more likely to spend time thinking about how and when you'll gamble next. Most importantly, you're concerned with how you'll raise more money, legally or illegally. You may have a few wins that fuel the size of your bets. But the dominant pattern is that of losing. Moreover, making the next bet becomes more important than the winning of any previous bet. As the losing continues, you start lying to family and friends and feeling more irritable, restless, and emotionally isolated. You start borrowing money that you're unsure about being able to repay. As your life becomes unmanageable, you may be developing some serious financial problems. Your denial of the huge financial pressures that are building may seem unbelievable to some people: You're also likely to start chasing your losses, trying to win back what you lost. ("Doc, I'll stop, but first I've got to get back to even.") If you don't change your pattern, however, you'll be engaging in more and more self-destructive behavior. Desperation phase The next phase, the desperation phase, involves still another marked change in your gambling behavior. You may now make bets more often than is normal, in more desperate attempts to catch up and "get even." The behavior that's now out of control is associated with deep remorse, with blaming others, and with the alienation of family and friends. You may engage in illegal activities to finance your gambling. You may experience a sense of hopelessness and think about suicide and divorce. Other addictions and emotional problems may also intensify during this phase and drag you down.

Article / Updated 04-27-2023

The American Diabetes Association (ADA) updates its guidelines for standards of medical care annually. These are the 2022 guidelines for screening: People with symptoms of thirst, frequent urination, and weight loss are tested immediately. Starting at age 35, all people without risk factors should be tested for prediabetes and type 2 diabetes every three years if tests are normal. (The ADA changed this from the previously recommended age of 45.) Women planning to become pregnant should be screened with a fasting glucose test, especially if they have risk factors. People should be tested at a younger age and more often if: They are obese. They have a parent or sibling with diabetes. They are from a high-risk group, such as African American, Hispanic, Asian, or Native American. They have delivered a baby more than 9 pounds or had gestational diabetes. They have high blood pressure. They have low HDL cholesterol or high triglycerides.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 04-18-2023

Diabetes, which is excessive glucose in your blood, leads to serious health problems if left untreated. You should follow the American Diabetes Association screening guidelines to get tested for diabetes at the earliest possible time. If you have diabetes, this Cheat Sheet is a handy reference to screening guidelines, rules for living with diabetes, and continuing your diabetes care to better control the disease.

Article / Updated 04-17-2023

Direct from the Age of Aquarius, with a history going back thousands of years, hallucinogens take people on far-ranging trips inside their own minds. Hallucinogens (also called psychedelics) cause your brain to generate experiences that are profound distortions of reality. We have five senses: seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, and smelling. Hallucinogens distort these senses, and particularly change your impressions of time and space. Hallucinogens specifically disrupt the neurotransmitter serotonin and interfere with the way your neural cells interact. Serotonin can be found in many places in the central nervous system (your brain and spinal cord) and assists in the functions controlling mood, hunger, body temperature, sexual behavior, muscle control, and sensory perception. The trips caused by hallucinogens can last for as long as 6 to 12 hours. Some trips are good, some are bad. A good trip is dependent on your mindset when you take the drug. Your reaction may differ from time to time, even though you take the same amount of a drug. A good trip often involves visual hallucinations (seeing things that aren't really there or that are distorted). These images may be seen as funny or inspiring, or just odd. Colors may be especially intense and intriguing patterns may emerge on surfaces, like tables or ceilings. Distortions of objects, faces, and other body parts may be experienced. A heightened sexual drive — an aphrodisiac effect — has also been reported. A bad trip on the other hand, may be set off by similar doses of drug that in the past provided a good trip. A bad trip is a frightening experience with surging anxiety and fears of being out of control and vulnerable. Terrifying images and hallucinations have been reported. At different times, under controlled conditions, hallucinogens have been used in experimental forms of psychotherapy, because they seem to bring underlying conflicts to the surface. The bad trips may be linked to these conflicts surfacing, especially when they take symbolic forms and distort reality (these distorted thoughts and images are like a very bad nightmare). Some hallucinogens come from plants but most are synthesized and manufactured. Mescaline comes from the cactus plant called peyote. Psilocybin comes from certain mushrooms often referred to as magic mushrooms or shrooms (for short). LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide, also known as acid) and a dissociative anaesthetic, PCP, (phencyclidine or angel dust) are widely available synthetic hallucinogens. Taking LSD may make you feel several emotions simultaneously and may merge senses so that you see sounds and hear colors. LSD itself, is a clear or white, odorless, water-soluble material synthesized from lysergic acid, a compound rye fungus. The potential of LSD for abuse is fairly high because the experiences are exciting to some people and they want to re-experience their excitement until, of course, they have a bad trip. If you value self-control, it's unlikely that you'll want to gamble in this way about having a good versus a bad trip. If you use LSD, you may experience flashbacks — a repetition of earlier LSD experiences. A flashback often has an unsettling effect, because it is something that is frequently beyond your control. Flashbacks can occur later in your life and seem to be set off by past associations. People with post-traumatic stress have reported similar experiences as they relive their trauma. In a flashback you have to redirect your attention to the present and get out of your head. Flashbacks are a significant concern if they occur when you're driving or in other situations where distractions can result in elevated risks.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-13-2023

This Cheat Sheet simplifies a few topics that you may encounter in your epidemiology coursework. For example, epidemiologic study design is important for conducting research. Furthermore, when working in public health, you want to help people prevent disease, and educating the populations you serve about making healthy food choices is a great way to do so.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 02-28-2023

Internet addiction involves excessive, and at times compulsive, overuse of Internet screen devices. Typically, some types of content are potentially more addictive, including social media, pornography, video games, binge TV watching, shopping, and gambling. The Internet delivers desirable content unpredictably, and the reward center of the brain loves the unpredictable experience of maybe. Addiction is about maybe finding the pleasure you once experienced, and you thinking that maybe it will be fun again. This is the neurobiological chase for the previous pleasurable dopamine hit.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 01-30-2023

Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis are the two major types of inflammatory bowel disease. They’re part of a group of disorders in which the small and large intestines become inflamed. The exact cause is a mystery, but scientists have discovered some clues as to what may cause Crohn’s and colitis. The symptoms of the diseases can vary in each individual, but some symptoms are more common than others. The good news is, you can take steps to reduce your symptoms and keep them from interfering with your life.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 09-12-2022

Having Parkinson’s disease (PD) makes for a challenging journey. Use the succinct information in this Cheat Sheet to recognize the important PD terms and acronyms, know where to look for related support, manage medications, and prepare emergency contact information.