Dr. Hitaishi Weerakoon appeals Help fight the âmystery disease (MS)
Dr. Hitaishi Weerakoon, President Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Association
of Lanka, in an interview with Health Watch yesterday made an appeal to
the public and private sector institutions organisations, the media, and
the general public for help to fight the âMultiple Sclerosisâ (MS)
disease which is also referred to as the âMystery Diseaseâ the cause of
which is not known yet, and a cure has not yet been found has a social
stigma attached to it in this part of the world owing to the way it
affects the nervous system of the victim.
Therefore most families try to hide it. With the result a disease
which can be kept under control goes out of it, with serious
consequences to the victim, and the family.
This is why she was making this appeal as it is very important to
educate the public on this properly and to
Dr. Hitaishi Weerakoon |
get their cooperation to get this false stigma attached to the
disease removed from society, and get the affected to seek advice and
available controlling treatment from the doctors.
Dr. Hitaishi said, though a doctor, sheâs also a victim of this
âMystery Diseaseâ and with medication she was keeping it under control,
and devoting her whole time to fight it, with hope and determination.
This is why she formed this association (MSAL) which is affiliated to
the International Federation of the MS Association based in UK.
Speaking about the disease in Sri Lanka she said, so far there are 25
diagnosed patients.
They are all in the Association Cooperating in fighting the disease.
She would like the Neurologists and other doctors when they come across
these patients to inform them about this Association, so that they may
decide on their own to join it. She could be contacted on Tel: 2698722.
E-mail: [email protected]
Postal address: 144, Vipulasena Mawatha, Colombo 10.
Support for patients
She said Multiple Sclerosis, could strike suddenly and happen to
anyone. It happens irrespective of age or gender, be it bread-winner or
winsome dependent, causing a breakdown in the family structure and
affecting the offspring psychologically, financially and in every area
of development and education.
MS affects its victims in various ways - a patient could gradually
become incontinent, blind, lame, or paralyzed - or numerous other
symptoms may become evident. Some symptoms, such as walking difficulties
are obvious to other people.
Other symptoms such as pain or fatigue are not, and are often
referred to as hidden, invisible or silent symptoms.
Once diagnosed, MS stays with the person for life, but treatment and
specialist care can help people to manage many symptoms well. Although
its cause is not known and a cure has yet to be identified. Therefore
these patients need support.
If this disease is diagnosed at its very inception the patient has a
chance of escaping its tentacles. The Association has been established
in order to create awareness and also provide support by way of physical
and emotional therapy and medication for patients.
Since its inception in February 2006, the Association had built a
membership including numerous patients, supportive family members and
doctors.
What happens in MS?
MS is an autoimmune condition. This means that the immune system,
which normally helps to fight off infections, mistakes its own tissue
for a foreign body, such as bacteria, and attacks it.
In MS, the immune system attacks the myelin surrounding the nerve
fibres. This damage to myelin disrupts messages travelling along nerve
fibres. The messages can slow down, become distorted, pass from one
nerve fibre to another (short circuiting), or not get through at all. As
the central nervous system links all bodily activities, many different
symptoms can appear in MS, depending on which part of the central
nervous system is affected.
Symptoms MS is unpredictable. It varies from person to person and can
result in a wide variety of symptoms, none of which is unique to MS.
People can have different symptoms at different times and although
some are very common, there is no typical pattern that applies to
everyone. Some of the common symptoms are:
* An overwhelming sense of tiredness.
* Balance problems: walking difficulties, problems with
co-ordination.
* Visual problems: blurred or double vision, temporary loss of sight
in one eye or both.
* Numberness or tingling: commonly in the hands or feet.
* Pain: sometimes mild, sometimes severe.
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Advice to MS Patients on Diet
By A Patient
Upon discovering I have MS, the first changes I made was to my diet.
It wasnât drastic. I try to keep a balanced diet so my body gets all the
nutrients it requires. The key is to eat and drink in moderation.
Eat Least: - Fats, Oils, sugar, salt (use them sparingly)
Eat Most: - Meat and alternatives (Meat, poultry, fish, beans lentils
- 2-3 servings)
Vegetables and fruits (Vegetables 2-4 servings Fruits 2-3 servings)
Rice and alternatives (Rice, bread, cereal, noodles 5-7 servings)
Note: - If you are suffering from specific conditions relating to
depression, osteoporosis, bladder concerns, and bowel management,
discuss with your doctor or dietician on how to develop a suitable
dietary plan to manage your condition.
Former SLMA President Dr. Dennis J. Aloysius On Drug Regulations
The current drug regulations stipulate that all doctorsâ
prescriptions should be generic, and the prescribing doctor may also
write the name of brand, if it is considered desirable.
My view is, doctors have the right to prescribe what they think is
best for their patients. They prescribe certain brands because they
perceive that they are safe, effective of dependable quality and cost
effective.
They also prescribe brands to improve compliance because of
palatability, dosing interval and adverse effects.
Generic or brand name prescribing
Should a doctorâs prescription be written using generic names or
brand names or both ? A prescription is an explicit instruction and it
basically means, âdoctors orders. âThe doctors âordersâ should be
precise, embody no ambiguities and unnecessary frills. The views that
are propounded are that
* if 2 drugs contain the same chemical ingredients in identical
amounts they are therapeutically equivalent.
* Since generic drugs are cheaper to produce and are marketed at
lower prices, generic prescribing must be made mandatory. Unfortunately
chemical equivalence and therapeutic equivalence are two very different
things.
If however 2 chemically equivalent drugs are shown to be
bioequivalent then one could presume that they are therapeutically
equivalent.
However generating bioavailability data is expensive and had
pitfalls. For example it uses âheathy average volunteersâ to gather data
on blood levels. There is a world of difference between healthy
individuals and persons who are ill. In addition an âaverage personâ is
statistical fiction and âhealthyâ and âvolunteersâ are pharmacological
misconcepts.
Drugs like T S Eliotâs âcatsâ drugs have 3 different names namely
chemical generic and brand. It is the chemical name and not the generic
name that is unique to a drug.
The medical profession view should be that a doctor should prescribe
the generic variety only if he is convinced that these generics
demonstrate therapeutic equivalence, quality and safety AND they have an
identifiable mark to guide the pharmacist otherwise he should prescribe
brands.
Combination therapy reverses diabetes in mice: study
Louise Daly
An experimental new combination therapy has reversed type I diabetes
in mice, thanks in part to a novel focus on combating insulin resistance
in this form of the disease, US researchers said Monday.
Insulin resistance has long been a recognized feature of type II or
late-onset diabetes, but has only recently been identified as a
component of juvenile or type I diabetes.
With this study, investigators have shown for the first time that
treating inflammation related to insulin resistance as well as the
autoimmune component of the disease can successfully reverse the
disease, if it is caught early enough.
âWe believe this is the first study to show inflammation in insulin
sensitive tissues plays an important role in this disease,â said Terry
Strom, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and co-author
of the paper. Type I diabetes is an autoimmune disorder in which the
bodyâs own immune system attacks the pancreatic cells that produce the
hormone insulin which regulates blood sugar.
The result is that the patient cannot produce enough insulin of their
own, and has to supplement with synthetic versions of the hormone,
typically by injection.
The condition raises an individualâs risk for a host of
complications, including heart disease, blindness and nerve damage.
In this experiment, investigators treated newly diabetic mice with a
cocktail of three substances that prevented the bodyâs own T-cells from
destroying the pancreatic cells that produce insulin and also eliminated
the inflammation that impaired the ability of tissues in the muscles,
fat and liver to metabolize insulin properly.
The mice were treated for a period of 14 or 28 days, and within five
to seven weeks, 95 percent of them had normal blood sugar levels and
were able to control their blood sugar for 300 days.
In contrast, the untreated diabetic mice became hypoglycemic and most
died within seven weeks even with insulin treatment.
The results suggest any therapy that hopes to arrest the development
of diabetes in humans must not only tackle the T-cell disorder, it must
also restore insulin responsiveness in tissues affected by an
inflammatory disorder.
Otherwise, the bodyâs remaining insulin-producing beta cells have to
work twice as hard to regulate blood sugar levels.
âThe remnants of the beta cells have to work overtime to try and
maintain blood sugar levels,â explained Strom.
Strom said that clinical trials of the treatment in humans would
begin within 12 months.
AFP
Sight first project
Lions Club of Borella conducted a free eye camp at the Hathbodiya
Viharaya, Kirulapone recently for those with eyesight defects who cannot
afford the cost of spectacles or any requisite surgery.
A hundred and twenty-seven patients were examined and 117 were
provided with specially calibrated spectacles.
Ten patients needing cataract surgery were donated Intra Ocular Lens
for surgical treatment at the Eye Hospital.
Dr. Manel Pasqual eminent Eye Surgeon volunteered to provide her
specialised services. Dr. Manel is the wife of Lion Mahesh Pasqual,
District Governor of the Lions District 306 B2.
The camp was organised by Lions Chintaka Ranatunga and Siri Jayaratne.
Twenty million women undergo unsafe abortions every year - UNFPA
* Approximately 70,000 women die from complications related to unsafe
abortions.
* Thousands more suffer from infections, haemorrhages, and other
health conditions which can result in death, infertility and chronic
pain.
* Worldwide, unsafe abortions account for 13% of all maternal deaths.
* In some countries, up to 60% of all maternal deaths are due to
unsafe abortions.
The risk of death associated with unsafeabortion in developing
countries is high
Africa 1 in 150
Asia 1 in 250
Latin America 1 in 800
Europe 1 in 2600
Developed countries 1 in 3700
Less developed countries 1 in 250
Availability of legal abortion varies throughout the world
* 40 per cent of the worldâs population live in countries where
induced abortion is permitted on request.
* 23 per cent of the worldâs population lives in countries where
abortion is permitted for social or socio-medical indications.
* 12 per cent of the worldâs population live in countries where
abortion is permitted to avert a threat to a womanâs general health and
sometimes for pregnancies resulting from rape or incest.
* 25 per cent live in countries where abortion is permitted only if
the womanâs life is in danger.
Illegal abortions are more likely to be unsafe and more likely to
result in death
* While in developed countries mortality from legal abortion averages
0.6 deaths per 100,000 procedures, in less developed countries unsafe
abortion results in as many as 1,000 deaths per 100,000 procedures.
If all women who said they wanted no more children had access to
safe, effective contraception
* Maternal deaths would drastically decrease.
* The number of abortions and deaths from unsafe abortions would
decrease.
(Sent to Health Watch by Doctorsâ Wives Association, Sri Lanka)
High-intensity walking beneficial for elderly
High-intensity walking helps elderly adults keep their blood pressure
in check, maintain thigh muscle strength, and increase their exercise
capacity, according to results of a study published in the Mayo Clinic
Proceedings.
âThe rapid growth in the elderly population in many countries has
highlighted the importance of exercise training to decrease the
likelihood of disability and age-associated disease, promote
independence, and enhance quality of life,â Dr. Hiroshi Nose and
colleagues from Shinshu University Graduate School of Medicine,
Matsumoto, Japan, write.
Moderately paced walking (about 6 kilometers or 3.7 miles per hour)
is thought to protect against disability and is recommended for
middle-aged and older people.
However, such walking may not be intense enough to improve aerobic
exercise capacity.
To address this issue, the researchers randomly assigned 60 older men
and 186 older women to one of three groups: no walking training,
moderate-intensity walking training, and high-intensity walking
training. The groups were studied for 5 months.
Patients who engaged in high-intensity walking, which included
several short intervals of high-intensity walking interspersed with
intervals of low-intensity walking, showed greater improvements in blood
pressure, thigh muscle strength, and exercise capacity than did patients
in the other groups.
The results provide further support for the adoption of an active
lifestyle, Dr. James Levine, of the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota,
comments in an accompanying editorial. âThe longer a person is active,
the better, regardless of what form the activity takes.â
âWe are designed to walk all day long, and (this) article suggests
that we should,â Levine concludes.
SOURCE: Mayo Clinic
Proceedings, July 2007.
REUTERS
Low cholesterol diet improves blood flow in fetus
Consuming a low-cholesterol, low-fat diet during pregnancy seems to
have a beneficial effect on blood flow in the fetus, Norwegian
researchers report.
Dr. Tore Henriksen, of the University of Oslo, and colleagues used a
special ultrasound test to examine how the type of diet consumed during
pregnancy affects circulation in the fetus.
The study included 290 nonsmoking, pregnant women, between 21 and 38
years of age.
As dietary cholesterol consumption dropped, the blood in the fetus
appeared to flow more smoothly, according to the report in the American
Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Exactly how this occurs is unclear and requires further study, but
the authors suggest that it may involve certain anti-inflammatory
effects associated with a drop in LDL cholesterol, the âbadâ
cholesterol, in the mother.
SOURCE: American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, June 2007.
REUTERS
Help them to ease the burden
Daily on my way to work I see schoolchildren with arched backs
carrying heavily loaded schoolbags. itâs a sour sight for eyes in early
hours of the morning, but how could we avoid this mishap?
A year six child has an average of eight to nine subjects to study
with almost the same number of recommended text books. If six subjects
are taught daily, students are expected to carry around five textbooks
and five notebooks-a total of ten in all!
One does not need logic to realise that this heavily laid schoolbag
itself might be the key reason for children to dislike schooling. Here
are several suggestions on how to help these unfortunate children.
Use a single partitioned book to take down notes of all the subjects
taught. Introduce a low cost locker or use the classroom cupboard for
safekeeping of textbooks that need not be carried home daily.
If boiled, filtered water is provided at schools, the heavy drinking
bottle could be replaced by an empty cup. The schoolbag should be a twin
compartment, one with an inbuilt rigid panel resting over the back of
the child.
The upper compartment should be packed with the heaviest items and
the lower compartment with lighter ones. Then when the shoulder straps
are well tightened, the centre of gravity will act straight down the
spine, the concept used in bags meant for mountaineering! This will put
a stop to all sorts of back problems.
If arrangements can be made with the teachers, the number of subjects
taught per day can be limited, and specified dates can be given for
textbooks usage.
The educational authorities can revise the textbooks layout so that
books can be partitioned and be given in separate terms.
So parents, do some thinking and help your loved ones ease that
schoolbag burden.
Dr. Himantha Atukorale
Radawana Government Hospital
Health Watch
Medical crossword
No. 26, consolation prizes
At the above crossword draw held on July 25 at Apollo Hospital
Auditorium the following won Rs. 1000.00 consolation prizes each offered
by Parkway Health Care Services (Singapore)
Entry No. 77 Lakshmi Samaranayake (73 years), 146/4 Havelock Road,
Colombo 5
Entry No. 75, R.P.P. De Zoysa (67 years) 171, Dolosbage Road, Gampola.
Entry No. 84:- Doreen de Silva (77 years) No. 5, Dharamaratne Avenue,
Rawathawatte, Moratuwa |