Archive for May, 2008

Cancer of esophagus is a tumor, which actually begins its growth in the inner lining of the esophagus tube.

Esophagus is a 10-inch long tube that connects your throat and stomach.

You can identify this esophageal cancer with a strange sensation of food stuck in your throat or chest, which certainly occurs when the cancer is in advanced stage.

Tobacco, alcohol, infections, health disorders and other types of cancers (if present) in your body eventually aggravates the condition of esophageal cancer.

If you fail to identify the esophageal cancer in its early stages, then it can possibly lead you to many fatal conditions of health.

So, identifying esophageal cancer in early stages is very important to avoid further health complications in your life. It is quite impossible to recognize specific signs and symptoms caught up with this esophageal cancer, particularly in early stages of development of cancer [Treating esophageal cancer].

Risk factors of esophageal cancer in advanced stages:

When esophageal cancer advances, this tumor eventually blocks the esophageal tube and gradually makes your swallowing process much difficult task for you.

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Are you aware of Kawasaki disease? It is the common inflammatory disease in children, which usually affects almost 80% of total kids, who are aged between 2 to 5.

Though the exact cause for this health condition in children is not clear, some of the researchers consider it as an autoimmune disorder, which is mainly stimulated by an infection or any over exposure to environmental toxins.

However, in most of the cases, Kawasaki disease affects children less than 4 years of age, but very rarely it can also affect young infants and also adolescents. It is often believed that children with Asian ethnicity are at increased risk of developing Kawasaki disease.

Do you think Kawasaki disease is contagious and hereditary?

Though many doctors and researchers believe that Kawasaki disease is caused by a viral infection, it is neither contagious nor hereditary.

It is quite uncommon that more than one kid in a family develops this inflammatory disease. It is also believed that very few kids, less than 2%, can have another attack of this disease in their life.

If the illness continues for more than 2 weeks, then you can notice the peeling of skin on the fingers and also toes of the affected individual.

Vasectomy is mainly recommended only when you don’t want to have any children in future.

This is the permanent method of birth control in men and prevents the release of sperm.

Vasectomy can be the safest method and most effective surgical procedure for you in the process of birth control. It is usually done at doctor’s clinic or at any outpatient center.

The operation usually takes 30 minutes to complete and local anesthesia is given while performing the procedure.

Vasectomy to help in permanent birth control

During the process of vasectomy, the vas deferens from each of your testicle is clamped and sealed. This prevents the mixing of sperm with the semen that is usually ejaculated from your penis. As a result, the egg released by women during sexual intercoarse cannot be fertilized.

After undergoing vasectomy surgery, the testicles continue the production of sperm, but the sperms gets absorbed by your body. As the tubes before the seminal vesicles and prostate are blocked, you will be still able to ejaculate the same amounts of fluid.

Have you ever noticed any twisted group of purple or blue veins on your skin? Those veins are known as varicose veins.

Varicose veins are usually considered as abnormal condition of blood vessels, which can mainly result from weakening of vessel wall. Sometimes, these veins are surrounded with thin red capillaries known as spider veins.

Any vein in your body can become varicose, but usually veins present in your legs and feet are affected often.

This twisting of veins is mainly due to increased pressure in the veins present in your lower body, because of standing and walking upright.

Varicose veins and spider veins are very common condition for most of the people and it can take place in its possible mild form. For most of you, these varicose veins that are medically insignificant in variation can be a cause for cosmetic concern while for others it can result in discomfort and also causes aching pain.

Is it necessary to treat varicose veins?

As varicose veins are primarily a cosmetic concern, they are not recommended any kind of treatment. In certain severe cases, especially those which mainly involve skin ulcers, treatment is required. These varicose veins are repeatedly treated by removing the bad veins beneath your skin. This elimination of veins mainly compels the blood to flow through other healthy veins present in your body.

A new calcium scoring method may better predict a person’s risk of heart attack, according to a new multicenter study published in the June issue of the journal Radiology.

Calcium coverage scoring takes into account not only the amount of calcified plaque build-up in the coronary arteries, but also its distribution.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S. Each year, 700,000 Americans die of heart disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The most common form of heart disease in the U.S. is coronary artery disease, which is caused by a build-up of calcific plaque in the coronary arteries leading to the heart.

The current standard of coronary calcium measurement gauges only the amount of calcium present in the arteries, not its spatial distribution.

Diabetes, hypertension and dyslipidemia (abnormal concentrations of lipids [fats] or lipoproteins in the blood) were highly associated with calcium coverage score.

The study also found that the calcium coverage score—which takes into account the location of the calcium—was a better predictor of future cardiac events than currently used measures that gauge only the amount of calcium present.

Source: Medical News Today

Uterine fibroids most commonly appear in your childbearing age and these non cancerous growths in the walls of the uterus are not associated with any increased risk of developing cancer in your body.

Uterine fibroids are most common; as many as three out of four women can have these uterine fibroids.

The presence of fibroids often does not show any sign or symptom. It can be very difficult for you to judge whether you have an unusual growth in your uterus or not. Your doctor can identify them during your pelvic exam or using prenatal ultrasound.

Fibroids are usually made by muscle cells and other tissues that can grow in and around the walls of your uterus or womb. These fibroids can grow as single tumor or they can also be developed in the form of clusters. It has been estimated that almost 25 % hysterectomy surgeries are usually done due to the presence of these fibroids.

How presence of uterine fibroids affect your pregnancy?

As most of these fibroids appear during childbearing age, most of the women are concerned of their chances to get pregnancy.

Do you know how adversely type 1 diabetes can affect your health? Type 1 diabetes mainly affects the major organs of your body, including heart, eyes, nerves, blood vessels, and also kidneys.

So, it is always important for you to check your blood sugar levels and maintain the blood sugar level at almost normal, which considerably reduces the risk of complications involved in diabetes.

Some times, the complications involved with type 1 diabetes can be long term and develops gradually.

The risk of developing the complications in your regular health conditions depends on how earlier you have developed the diabetes and also on poor control of your blood sugar.

Cardiovascular diseases mainly associated with type 1 diabetes:

Type 1 diabetes can significantly increase the risk of developing several cardiovascular problems, if you do not maintain proper levels of blood sugar. This cardiovascular disease is the most leading cause of death among the people with type 1 diabetes. Some of those include:

1. Atherosclerosis: This condition is mainly associated with narrowing of arteries. Chronic hyperglycemia, which is mainly caused due to higher blood glucose levels narrows your arteries of heart and reduces the elasticity. If you have high cholesterol levels, then this excess fat will also contribute to clog the arteries of heart.

Approximately 36 million American people are suffering from this tinnitus and among them 7 million American people consider this as a significant problem.

The perceived sensation of sound in the ear in the absence of external sounds is tinnitus. It is a common state that briefly afflicts many people at one or another time.

Tinnitus is not a disease, but it is a symptom of some underlying cause of ear problems such as ear infection, injury from loud noises, and foreign object or wax in the ear.

It can vary in pitch from low roar to high squeal or moan. It can come and go or you may hear the sound continuously. It can affect one ear or both the ears. Some people are so badly affected that they cannot even able to lead normal lives.

There are many reasons for affecting with tinnitus. Mostly, the tinnitus can result from damage to the microscopic endings of the inner ear hearing nerve. Injury to these nerve endings results in hearing loss and in most cases tinnitus.

In older people, advancing age results in some impairment of the hearing loss and leads to tinnitus. On the other hand, if you are younger, exposure to the loud sounds is the main cause of damage to hearing, leading to tinnitus.

Though it is very small in size, thyroid gland has great importance in production of hormones, which regulates each and every aspect of your body metabolism.

Any development of nodules in this particular gland, mainly results in thyroid cancer. This gland mainly involves in functioning of all parts of your body from improving heart rate to how rapidly you can burn up calories [Kinds of thyroid gland cancers].

As it is very easy to identify and treat thyroid cancer in early stages, it is the most uncommon type of cancer found in very less number of people.

Once if you are affected with thyroid cancer, after the treatment, there is a possibility for thyroid cancer to reoccur, may be after several months or years of treatment.

Thyroid cancer is still an unsolved puzzle!

The exact cause of thyroid cancer is still unknown. Many doctors and researchers can seldom explain why one affects with thyroid cancer and others don’t. However, it is quite clear that thyroid cancer is not contagious and it can’t be transmitted from one person to another. Certain factors which can increase your risk of developing thyroid cancer include:

Inflammation at any portion of your body joints, especially tendons, leads to tendonitis, which can be identified with mild swelling, tenderness or pain at the affected area of your body.

These tendons become inflamed because of several reasons, which can include your daily physical activities or hobbies like gardening, painting, tennis, skiing, raking, etc.

Anyone over 40 years of age can get tendonitis. As tendons age, they become weak and loses ability to tolerate excessive stress. They also lose their elasticity and become easier to tear.

Any portion of the body, where the tendon normally connects bone to a muscle can become inflamed due to over stress, resulting in tendonitis. Some of the most common areas or parts of the body which can get inflamed due to over use include elbow, base of your thumb, knees, shoulder and Achilles tendon.

Increased levels in regular exercise routines mainly contribute to tendonitis!

Most common cause for tendonitis is mainly due to over use of body joints. Usually many of you, who are in initial stages of regular exercise programs, are more prone to experience tendonitis. Sudden increase or starting with increased levels of regular exercise routine can aggravate the condition of tendonitis.