Many common household items can be dangerous if they fall into the wrong hands. We recently received this question from a viewer: Dr. Manny, What should a parent do if they think their child has ingested poison? Should I induce vomiting or wait until I see symptoms before taking them to the hospital?
The mayor of Portland, Ore., has conceded defeat in an effort to add fluoride to the city's drinking water. With more than 80 percent of the expected ballots counted late Tuesday night, the Multnomah County election website showed the fluoride proposal failing, 60 percent to 40 percent. Mayor Charlie Hales supported fluoridation and said “the measure lost despite my own `yes' vote. “That's sure disappointing, but I accept the will of the voters,” he said in a statement. Fluoridation foes were delighted. “We're very excited with how the numbers look,” said Kellie Barnes with the anti-fluoride group Clean Water Portland. If the early returns hold up, “then Portlanders spoke out to value our clean water and ask for better solutions for our kids.” Voters in Portland twice rejected fluoridation before approving it in 1978. That plan was overturned two years later, before any fluoride was ever added to the water. The City Council voted last year to add fluoride to the water supply that serves about 900,000 people. But opponents quickly gathered enough signatures to force a vote on the subject. Rejection of the proposal would keep Portland the largest U.S. city without fluoride in the water or with plans to add it. San Jose, Calif., - which is larger than Portland - has been working to add fluoride to its water supply. Voters had weeks to make their choice in the mail-ballot election. By Tuesday it was too late to rely on the postman, so drop boxes were placed across the city to accommodate those who waited until the final day. “We were still getting ballots from drop sites close to 8 p.m.,” said Eric Sample, a Multnomah County elections spokesman. That meant a “pretty darn long night” of vote counting that likely would stretch into Wednesday, he said. Supporters and opponents of fluoridation raised hundreds of thousands of dollars and traded accusations of sign-stealing and shoddy science in an election that has been the city's most contentious of the 21st century. A sampling of voters dropping off ballots earlier Tuesday in rainy Pioneer Courthouse Square found people opposed to fluoridation. “People don't like change. When in doubt, say no,” said Tracy Rauscher, a native Portlander who, like a native Portlander, did not use an umbrella. Portland's drinking water already contains naturally occurring fluoride, though not at levels considered to be effective at fighting cavities. Backers of fluoridation say adding more of it to the water is a safe, effective and affordable way to improve the health of low-income children whose parents don't stress proper nutrition and dental hygiene. Opponents describe fluoride as a chemical that will ruin the city's pristine water supply, and they argue that adding it would violate an individual's right to consent to medication. Although most Americans drink water treated with fluoride, it has long been a contentious topic. In the 1950s, fluoridation was feared as a Communist plot. Today, people worry that its effect on the body has not been sufficiently examined. “I don't want chemicals in my water,” Sarah Lazzaro said after voting Tuesday. “I know that there are really no known health risks with it, but there's a lot of things we find out later in life really do have health risks.” The issue re-appeared on Portland's radar late last summer, when health organizations that had quietly lobbied the City Council for a year persuaded the panel to unanimously approve fluoridation by March 2014. Days before the vote, 227 people - most of them opponents - signed up to testify at a public hearing that lasted 6 1/2 hours. When their objections weren't heeded, they quickly gathered tens of thousands of signatures to force Tuesday's vote.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/22/portland-ore-rejects-adding-fluoride-to-water-supply/
MONTGOMERY, Ala. – & A mysterious respiratory illness has left five people hospitalized and two dead in southeast Alabama, state health officials said Tuesday. Seven people have been admitted to hospitals with a fever, cough and shortness of breath in recent weeks, Alabama Department of Public Health spokeswoman Mary McIntyre said in a statement. Two of the seven have died. The Alabama Department of Public Health and the Centers for Disease Control Respiratory Laboratory are analyzing lab tests from all seven patients. McIntyre says officials hope to have preliminary results on the samples back by Wednesday or Thursday morning. The illness was first reported late last week and the last of the seven patients was hospitalized Monday, McIntyre said. It wasn't immediately clear which municipalities the illnesses were concentrated in. “We're only aware of the Southeast, but we don't know -- we haven't received reports from anywhere else,” McIntyre said. “That's why we're trying to get the information out.” McIntyre said it's unclear what's causing the illness but some of the seven patients also had the flu. Authorities are urging hospital staff to wear masks when caring for patients who appear to be suffering from respiratory illnesses. The Centers for Disease Control referred all questions to Alabama health officials.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/22/mysterious-illness-kills-2-in-southeast-alabama/
The homeless man whose face was nearly chewed off by another man in a gruesome attack in Miami last year is recovering well from his severe facial injuries and has expressed gratitude to those who supported him during his recovery process. In a newly added YouTube video from Jackson Health System in Miami, 66-year-old Ronald Poppo is seen sitting on a hospital bed strumming a few chords on a guitar.  He then pauses, holds up the guitar and jokes, “A good enough action shot?” Towards the end of the video, the infamous Miami cannibal attack victim issues a statement to his supporters. “Thanks for contributing and helping out,” Poppo said in the video.  “People in my predicament need to be helped out, and I’m sure there’s other people who also have the same type of predicaments.  I thank the outpouring of people in the community.  I will always be grateful for them.” On May 26, 2012, Poppo was viciously attacked by 31-year-old Rudy Eugene on the MacArthur Causeway in Miami, Fla. Initial reports suggested that Eugene was high on bath salts at the time of the attack, but later toxicology results only indicated the presences of marijuana in his system. Surveillance video from a nearby building shows Eugene pulling Poppo from the shade, stripping and pummeling him before appearing to hunch over and then lie on top of him. A witness described Eugene ripping at Poppo's face with his mouth and growling at a Miami police officer who ordered him to get off the homeless man. The officer then shot and killed Eugene. After the attack, Poppo was taken to Ryder Trauma Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, where he underwent months of facial reconstruction to rebuild his features.  Poppo lost both his eyes and his nose in the attack. The Associated Press contributed to this report.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/21/miami-face-chewing-victim-thanks-supporters-in-new-video/
After the recent loss of their 16-year-old son from testicular cancer, one family is urging other young men to get checked regularly, Gazette Live reported. Michael Rushby from Grangetown, England waited eight long months before telling his brother John on April 17 that he had found a lump on one of his testicles.   “He said he had a problem and showed me one of his testicles,” John told Gazette Live. “The lump was obvious so I took him straight to (the emergency room). The doctor said just by looking at it there was an 80 percent chance it was cancer.” The next day, Michael – known as Mikey by friends and family – was diagnosed with testicular cancer, and doctors discovered that the cancer had also spread to his abdomen and chest. Despite his late diagnosis, Mikey was given a 75 percent chance of survival.  He underwent a week of chemotherapy at Middlesbrough’s James Cook University Hospital and returned home on Friday, April 26.   The following Monday, he was set to return to the hospital for another round of treatments.  But as he was heading downstairs, he lost his strength and collapsed.  He was taken to James Cook, where he died later that day.  It had only been two weeks since he had told his brother about his lump. Now Mikey’s family is speaking out about their son’s death, urging others to get regular health checkups and to not feel ashamed about their medical issues. “I want to say to anyone who ever thinks they might have a problem, go to your mum, go to your dad, go to someone,” Patricia Rushby, Mike’s mom, told Gazette Live. “Mikey could have come to his mum - I wouldn’t have been embarrassed.” “He was my baby. I loved him to pieces,” Patricia said. “I want other young people to know what we have gone through. I wouldn’t want any family to go through what we have.” Click for more from Gazette Live.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/21/after-16-year-old-son-dies-testicular-cancer-mom-urges-others-to-get-checked/
Too little sleep increases the risk of car crashes for young drivers, a new study confirms. In the study, drivers ages 17 to 24 who reported sleeping six or fewer hours per night were about 20 percent more likely to be involved in a car crash over a two-year period, compared with those who slept more than six hours a night. Car crashes among the sleep-deprived were more likely to occur between 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. than at other hours. The findings held even after the researchers took into account factors that affect people's risk of a car crash, such as age, the number of driving hours per week, risky driving behavior such as speeding and a history of car crashes. Sleep deprivation is known to be a risk factor for car crashes it's estimated that drowsy driving is responsible for 20 percent of all car crashes in the United States, the researchers say. However, most studies to date have not focused on young people. Young drivers should be a focus of education efforts to prevent drowsy driving “because this group experiences more impairment in alertness, mood and physical performance compared with older age groups with similar sleep deprivation,” the researchers said. The new study involved more than 19,000 young, newly licensed drivers living in New South Wales, Australia, who answered questions about their sleep habits, including how many hours they slept on weeknights and weekends. Researchers then tracked the participants for two years, and obtained police reports to document car crashes. Among drivers who reported getting six or fewer hours of sleep a night, 9.4 percent were involved in a crash, compared with 6.9 percent of those who reported more than six hours of sleep a night. The new findings “may help increase awareness of the impact of reduced sleep hours on crash risk and highlight subgroups of young drivers and times of day for targeted intervention,” the researchers write in the May 20 issue of the journal JAMA Pediatrics. The researchers noted that participants were only asked about their sleep habits once during the study, and the exact number of hours participants slept on the day before they were involved in a crash is not known. Follow Rachael Rettner @RachaelRettner. Follow MyHealthNewsDaily @MyHealth_MHND, Facebook & Google+. Originally published on LiveScience.Copyright 2013 LiveScience, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/21/sleep-deprived-teen-drivers-more-likely-to-crash/
As the legendary front man of The Who, Roger Daltrey has been entertaining fans across the globe for decades – but his latest project goes beyond the music, and into the lives of some very special fans here in America: Cancer patients. “I've been supporting a charity called Teenage Cancer Trust, which was started by my doctor, who recognized, within our system of medical care, that the age group from 13-25 are very, very specific,” Daltrey told FoxNews.com. “They are not children, and they are not adults – and if they are unfortunate enough to get cancer, they tend to suffer some of the most aggressive cancers.” I had the incredible opportunity to sit down and talk with Daltrey about his efforts with Teenage Cancer Trust the UK for more than 15 years, and how he’s bringing that same passion ‘across the pond’ with Teen Cancer America. Here in the U.S., many patients under the age of 18 end up in children’s hospitals when they are diagnosed with cancer. And while we do have some of the best children’s hospitals in the world, for teens and young adults – their treatment regimen may need some tweaking for the best outcome. “When you look at children's hospitals, to be honest, you have fabulous medicine here (in the U.S.), you have fabulous hospitals, and I've looked around quite a few now, and I've found it very difficult to find anything that is actually teenage-friendly,” said Daltrey. “And so it's our ambition and our mission, to, to make Teen Cancer America a gold standard – a stamp of approval.” Teenage Cancer Trust in the UK and Teen Cancer America work with hospitals to provide physical and psychological support to patients going through treatment for various forms of cancer. And since the program started 23 years ago in the UK, doctors have seen the benefits of making treatment programs age-appropriate. As a practicing physician, I believe there are two basic components to successful health and healing. One of them is physical medicine – whether you're talking about surgery, drugs, etc. – and the other part of it is the patient’s mindset. If a patient is not in an environment that puts him or her in a positive mindset, the outcome often suffers drastically. “It's the quality of life that we should be worrying about – not just the cure,” said Daltrey. “And while you're going through it, especially for this age group, um, because they've got educational problems, they're right in the middle of their exams, you know, they're whole future's kind of been taken away from them – it's enormous pressures.” Teen Cancer Trust has already opened up 25 centers throughout the UK and is currently working on nine others. Here in the U.S., with the help his bandmate, Pete Townshend, Daltrey opened the first U.S. facility at UCLA Medical Center.   “It's a very different system than you've got here where um, the ones that we have got, they've given us space in hospitals and we've then provided the services,” Daltrey told FoxNews.com. “So when you look at the kind of finances of this, it's a cheap end, it's a cheap outlay for a very big result.” Daltrey noted that some medical centers like Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and Children’s Hospital of Cleveland are in talks with Teen Cancer America to bring teen facilities to their cancer centers, and Yale Cancer Center has already started an outpatient service for teens. For more information visit TeenCancerAmerica.org.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/20/who-cares-roger-daltrey-helps-teens-with-cancer/
As a doctor, I get a lot of health questions both in my practice and in my email inbox. Today, I found one that I felt was particularly compelling, which I’d like to share with you.Hi, Dr. Manny, can you please tell me some natural remedies for stress?
One in five handbags contain higher levels of bacteria than the average toilet, Medical News Today reported. The study, conducted by British company Initial Washroom Hygiene, suggested that the bacteria found on handbags are significant enough to pose a threat to human health. “Handbags come into regular contact with our hands and a variety of surfaces, so the risk of transferring different germs onto them is very high – especially as bags are rarely cleaned,” said Peter Barratt, technical manager at Initial Hygiene. Leather handbags contain the highest levels of bacteria, Medical News Today reported, because the soft material acts as a breeding ground for germs. The insides of handbags are contaminated with high levels of bacteria too, and bottles of hand cream emerged as the dirtiest item inside women’s purses, the study revealed. To minimize germs, women should try to clean their handbags regularly with antibacterial wipes or handbag cleaners. The study also suggested women wash or sanitize their hands after touching the inside or outside of their purses. “Once these germs get on the bags, they can easily be transferred via hands onto other surfaces. Regular hand sanitization is essential to prevent the presence of bacteria in the first place and thorough cleaning of bags is recommended to prevent the build-up of contamination,” Barratt said. Click for more from Medical News Today. source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/20/20-percent-handbags-carry-more-bacteria-than-toilet/
Scientists have long known that Crohn’s patients – even when they are in remission – suffer from fatigue and low quality of life. So when Tara Raftery, a research dietitian at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, who works specifically on Crohn's disease, saw emerging evidence suggesting a lack of vitamin D may alter muscle function and strength she decided to set up a study investigating the possible effects of vitamin D on fatigue and quality of life in Crohn’s patients. Crohn’s disease is an inflammatory condition  with no known cure and often causes diarrhea, abdominal pain, mouth sores and joint pain. Patients often feel extremely fatigued – either from the extensive medicines they have to take or from the disease itself. “Some research has suggested that vitamin D supplementation might influence muscle strength and quality of life,” Raftery told FoxNews.com. “But this was yet to be shown in Crohn’s disease.” Raftery said she and her doctorate supervisor, Maria O’Sullivan, performed a three-month study, where half of the participants – all Crohn’s patients who were in remission –  were given vitamin D supplements and the other half were given a placebo. “So at the start of the study, we measured their baseline vitamin D levels,” Raftery said. “We also measured fatigue and quality of life by using validated questionnaires, and we measured hand-grip strength – this gave us a proxy measure of their muscle strength.” At the end of three months, the researchers repeated those measures. “What we found, was in the participants who received the vitamin D supplements (of 2,000 International Units per day), their hand-grip strength was significantly stronger than those who took the placebo,” Raftery said. “We measured both the dominant and non-dominant hand grip strength at baseline. After three months, those who had received the vitamin D supplement had significantly stronger hand grip, in both hands, compared to those who were randomized to the placebo pill.” Raftery said they also found the patients who had vitamin D levels of above 30 ng/ml had a significantly higher quality of life compared to those patients who had less than that and those patients taking the placebo. “In terms of fatigue, what we found was that when the levels were 30ng/ml  or more, the patients reported significantly less physical fatigue, as well as mental and general fatigue,” Raftery said. Raftery said these findings are the first to suggest the potential benefits of vitamin D supplementation in Crohn’s patients to improve muscle function, fatigue and quality of life. While more studies need to be done, researchers are hopeful. Raftery is currently conducting a larger study – containing more participants studied over a one-year period - to confirm her initial findings. “What I would recommend, is that patients with Crohn's disease discuss supplementation with their doctor and also have their levels rechecked about three months after supplementation begins,” Raftery said. “Vitamin D supplementation is safe for most people, but not everyone . . . mega-doses should be avoided and many countries have set upper limits of 2,000-4,000 International Units a day for adults.” Raftery will present her findings at Digestive Disease Week in Orlando during the week of May 20.source : http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/05/20/vitamin-d-supplements-could-help-crohns-patients-fight-fatigue-improve-quality/