Water: Can It Be Too Much of a Good Thing?

Dehydration is a familiar foe for endurance athletes, and one that will be on the minds of every participant in Sunday’s New York City Marathon.

But did you know that drinking too much water can be potentially fatal, particularly if not treated properly?

And you don’t have to be an elite athlete like a marathoner to fall victim to what doctors call water intoxication.

Water intoxication occurs when a person has consumed so much water that the salt levels in the blood become diluted, said Dr. Aaron Baggish, co-medical director of the Boston Marathon.

“When sodium [salt] concentrations are low in the blood, it actually allows water to leak out of the blood into the other tissues,” a condition known as hyponatremia, added Baggish, who’s also associate director of the Cardiovascular Performance Program at the Massachusetts General Hospital Heart Center.

The brain appears to be the organ most affected by hyponatremia, and begins to swell as water leaks out of blood and into brain cells, he said.

Usually, the symptoms are mild, such as confusion, headache and nausea. But if left untreated, people might wind up suffering seizures, Baggish said.

In the worst cases, the brain continues to swell uncontrollably, resulting in a potentially fatal condition called brain stem herniation, he said.

“The brain is soft tissue that’s contained in a fixed skull. When the brain swells, there’s only one real way it can go as an exit path, and that’s down to the bottom of the skull where there’s a hole that connects the brain to the spinal cord,” Baggish said.

Death from water intoxication is very rare among athletes like marathon runners, said Dr. William Roberts, a former president of the American College of Sports Medicine.

“We’ve noted maybe a half dozen deaths out of probably 3 or 4 million finishers, so it’s not a very common cause of fatality,” said Roberts, who’s also a professor with the University of Minnesota’s Department of Family Medicine and Community Health. Marathon runners are more likely to die from a heart attack or heat stroke, he said.

Sports medicine doctors are much more likely to see cases of water intoxication or hyponatremia than family practitioners, Baggish said.

“If you’re in a marathon tent or an Ironman tent, you may see a fair bit of it,” he said. “If you’re in a routine office practice, it won’t come across your radar screen. But, anyone who works with athletes in the context of long-distance endurance sports will see it from time to time.”

But endurance athletes aren’t the only ones at risk of water intoxication.

A 17-year-old high school football player in Georgia died in 2014 after consuming too much fluid during practice.

A 47-year-old British woman died from drinking too much water while hiking the Grand Canyon in 2008.

And a 28-year-old California woman died of water intoxication after taking part in a radio station’s water-drinking contest in 2007 to win a video game.

Earlier this year, a 27-year-old man named Andrew Schlater died from hyponatremia while in the midst of a liquid cleanse, or detoxification, without medical supervision, said his father, Frank Schlater of Rowayton, Conn.

For a number of days, Schlater’s parents had noticed him drinking a lot more water than usual. Andrew seemed fine, and shrugged off his parents’ requests to stop drinking so much water.

But, early one morning in July, Frank Schlater found his son in the family’s kitchen, sipping some water. Within minutes, Andrew collapsed on the floor. He was rushed to the hospital but died several hours later, due to brain herniation.

“You just can’t imagine water would hurt you,” Frank Schlater said. “You hear that too much water can be bad for you, but you don’t know how to weigh that.”

Others at risk of hyponatremia: Older people who take diuretics and have reduced kidney function, said Roberts.

Marathoners most at risk of water intoxication tend to be those out on the course for longer periods of time, Roberts noted.

“Slower runners have more time to drink water,” he said. “If you’re out there for six hours, walking through water stops and drinking more than you need, you could end up in this situation.”

Taking in salt or sodium during a race can help reduce the risk of hyponatremia, said Dr. Robert Glatter, an emergency physician with Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. For example, athletes can consume sports drinks containing electrolytes, he said.

Roberts and Baggish offer two pieces of advice for endurance athletes who want to avoid water intoxication:

Drink when you’re thirsty, not before. “You should be drinking if you’re feeling mildly thirsty, but if you’re not thirsty there’s no point to pound water because it’s not going to make you perform better,” Baggish said.

Figure out your water-loss rate before your event. Weigh yourself while naked, go out for an hour’s run, and afterwards weigh yourself again. “That gives you an idea how much fluid you lost,” Roberts said. “Plan on drinking about that much during your event.”

And what about the non-endurance athlete. How much water does the average person need each day?

There’s no one-size-fits-all rule. But, the Institute of Medicine recommends that men consume approximately 13 cups (3 liters) of fluids a day. For women, the recommendation is about 9 cups (2.2 liters).

But, the Mayo Clinic notes that it’s best to think in terms of “fluid” consumption each day, not “water” consumption, because all fluids count toward the daily total, as do fluids found in foods.

Source: https://medlineplus.gov/news/fullstory_161839.html


Ivory Coast re-opens western borders closed during Ebola epidemic

Ivory Coast has re-opened its western borders with Liberia and Guinea two years after they were closed to prevent the spread of an Ebola epidemic that killed thousands across West Africa, an Ivorian government spokesman said on Friday.

Around 29,000 people contracted the hemorrhagic fever during the more than two-year long outbreak, the worst on record. Over 11,000 died before it finally ended in June, nearly all of them in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone.

“We had to take these measures to protect our country. And the fact we didn’t have a single case must be considered a real success,” Bruno Kone said, referring to the border closure measure.

Ivory Coast, French-speaking West Africa’s largest economy, shut its borders in August 2014.

It came under criticism at the time from some health organizations that argued the closure risked aggravating the epidemic and would worsen hardship in countries already struggling with the economic fallout from Ebola.

Several other regional nations, including Mali and Senegal, also shut their borders temporarily as a precaution.

Source: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/09/09/ivory-coast-re-opens-western-borders-closed-during-ebola-epidemic.html


Flesh-eating bug leaves man fighting for life after catching rare disease for second time in 12 months

A flesh-eating bug has left a man critically-ill after attacking him for the second time.

Lee Murphy is today in hospital fighting off the killer condition a year after it first ravaged his body.

Fiancée Gaynor Chambers, 32, said: “I can’t believe this is happening all over again. It’s our worst nightmare come true.

“Lee is really struggling at the minute and has been in the operating theatre as they try to stop it spreading.

“We are engaged and were going to start trying for a family, now our whole world has fallen apart.”

It has been a nightmare 12 months for the 32-year-old former car salesman, from Stanley, who first contracted the flesh eating bug – necrotising fasciitis – this time last year, reports the Newcastle Chronicle.

Gaynor said: “Lee came in from work saying he had pulled a muscle in his leg. When we looked his right leg was starting to turn red, then it looked bruised.”

Realising there was something seriously wrong, the couple went to the University Hospital of North Durham where medics said the bug was stripping the skin off Lee’s leg, from his thigh to his foot.

Lee then spent five days in a coma before doctors were able to begin a series of skin grafts in a desperate effort to repair the damage.

A staggering 16 operations followed during the next few months.

Gaynor, of Consett, said: “He was just starting to recover well although he was struggling to walk a bit and was due another operation on his foot.

But, on Monday Lee’s worst nightmare started to happen all over again.

“The exact same thing happened,” said Gaynor. “I knew we had to get to hospital as soon as possible.

“They told us the bug had returned, this time on the back of his leg. It’s a complete and utter nightmare; they’ve even had to take some of the original skin grafts off.

Source: Mirror uk


10,000 Women Develop Cancer Because of Johnson & Johnson Baby Powder

The baby powder is usually found in every household, even when there is no baby. Most women use the talc-based powder because it makes the skin younger looking and soft. If you are one of them, you need to stop that. Baby powder, like that one from Johnson and Johnson, is increasing the risk by 33% of women of being diagnosed with ovarian cancer. The epidemiologist Dr. Daniel Cramer thinks that minimum 10,000 women get ovarian cancer because they use this baby powder every day.

The shocking facts

The studies provided in 1982 have shown a connection between the baby powder and ovarian cancer. Discoveries have shown that women who use talc-based powders are 300 times more likely to develop ovarian cancer. This study hit general media by the New York Times and forced the company Johnson and Johnson to unveil the truth behind their powder.

Read the labels

If you have a baby powder in your house, get it and read the label and the warnings. Johnson and Johnson warn people to avoid the baby powder coming in contact with the eyes and also to avoid inhalation. There is nothing about talc particle’s aptitude to stay on your skin for years and to go to your ovaries. Nor does it say anywhere on the bottle that talc can cause inflammation and also the perfect place to grow cancer cells.

The big company admitted to being aware of this fact as outlined in the 1982 study. The company decided that they didn’t need to warn their customers of those dangerous side effects of the use of their baby powder. The worst thing that you can do is to use that powder on your baby. The American Academy of Pediatric has advised the parents against using the baby powder, especially with talc. This mineral can very easily become airborne and also can be inhaled by infants, and can cause the mucous membranes to dry up.

This affects the breathing and also can lead to wheezing in babies. Some cases of pneumonia in infants have been linked to the use of baby powder, but we have never seen that on the warning label.

Source: healthyfoodstar


Beware! Antioxidants can cause cancer to spread faster

A new study suggests that people with cancer or an elevated risk of developing the disease should avoid nutritional supplements that contain antioxidants.

Antioxidants double the rate of metastasis, the spread of cancer from one part of the body to another, in malignant melanoma, the most perilous type of skin cancer, warns a new study.

Found in many nutritional supplements, antioxidants are widely marketed as a means of preventing cancer.

The results of this study suggest that people with cancer or an elevated risk of developing the disease should avoid nutritional supplements that contain antioxidants.

“We have demonstrated that antioxidants promote the progression of cancer,” said one of the researchers Martin Bergo from Sahlgrenska Academy at University of Gothenburg in Sweden.

Antioxidants protect healthy cells from free radicals that can turn them into malignancies but may also protect a tumour once it has developed, the findings showed.

Researchers at Sahlgrenska Academy demonstrated in January 2014 that antioxidants hastened and aggravated the progression of lung cancer.

Mice that were given antioxidants developed additional and more aggressive tumours.

Experiments on human lung cancer cells confirmed the results. Given well-established evidence that free radicals can cause cancer, the research community had simply assumed that antioxidants, which destroy them, provide protection against the disease.

But because the lung cancer studies called the collective wisdom into question, they attracted a great deal of attention.

The follow-up studies at Sahlgrenska Academy have now found that antioxidants double the rate of metastasis in malignant melanoma in mice. “The antioxidant boosted the ability of the tumour cells to metastasise, an even more serious problem because metastasis is the cause of death in the case of melanoma. The primary tumour is not dangerous per se and is usually removed,” Bergo noted.

Experiments on cell cultures from patients with malignant melanoma confirmed the new results.

Source: India today


Zika virus spreads explosively, four million cases forecast: WHO

The Zika virus, linked to severe birth defects in thousands of babies in Brazil, is “spreading explosively” and could infect as many as 4 million people in the Americas, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday.

Director-General Margaret Chan told members of the U.N. health agency`s executive board the spread of the mosquito-borne disease had gone from a mild threat to one of alarming proportions. The WHO would convene an emergency meeting on Monday to help determine its response, she said.

“The level of alarm is extremely high,” Chan told the Geneva gathering.

“Last year, the virus was detected in the Americas, where it is now spreading explosively. As of today, cases have been reported in 23 countries and territories in the region,” Chan said, promising quick action from the WHO.

The agency was criticised last year for reacting too slowly to West Africa`s Ebola epidemic, which killed more than 10,000 people, and it promised to cut its response time.

“We are not going to wait for the science to tell us there is a link (with birth defects). We need to take actions now,” Chan said, referring to the condition called microcephaly in which babies are born with abnormally small heads and brains that have not developed properly.

There is no vaccine or treatment for Zika, which is like dengue and causes mild fever, rash and red eyes. An estimated 80 percent of people infected have no symptoms. Much of the effort against the illness focuses on protecting people from mosquitoes and reducing mosquito populations.

Developing a safe and effective vaccine could take a year, WHO Assistant Director Bruce Aylward said, and it would take six to nine months just to confirm whether Zika is the actual cause of the birth defects, or if the two are just associated.

“In the area of vaccines, I do know that there has been some work done by some groups looking at the feasibility of a Zika virus vaccine. Now something like that, as people know, is going to be a 12-month-plus time frame,” he said.

U.S. health officials said the United States has two potential candidates for a Zika vaccine and may begin human clinical trials by the end of this year, but there will not be a widely available vaccine for several years.

Marcos Espinal, head of communicable diseases at the Pan American Health Organization, the WHO`s Americas arm, forecast 3 to 4 million Zika cases in the Americas.

As the virus spreads from Brazil, other countries in the Americas are likely to see cases of babies with Zika-linked birth defects, according to Carissa Etienne, regional director for the Pan American Health Organization.

Brazil has reported around 4,000 suspected cases of microcephaly, vastly more than in an average year and equivalent to 1 to 2 percent of all newborns in the state of Pernambuco, one of the worst-hit areas.

The WHO`s Chan said that while a direct causal relationship between Zika virus infection and birth malformations has not yet been established, it is strongly suspected.

“The possible links, only recently suspected, have rapidly changed the risk profile of Zika from a mild threat to one of alarming proportions,” she said.
Health and law expert Lawrence Gostin of Georgetown University in Washington, who had urged the WHO to act, welcomed Chan`s decision to convene an expert meeting, calling it “a critical first step in recognising the seriousness of an emerging epidemic.”

Source: Zee news


Mysterious Syndrome Can Cause People to Become ‘Drunk’ Without Drinking

The baffling case of a woman who was arrested for DWI without drinking has spotlighted a rare condition called “Auto-Brewery” syndrome, where the digestive system becomes its own tiny brewery.

The woman was able to get the charges dismissed after her lawyer presented evidence by a doctor that she had the rare syndrome, according to the AP. The syndrome causes substances in the gut to ferment food into ethanol, thereby causing a person’s blood-alcohol level to spike. While the story of food-turning-to-alcohol in the body may seem like a convenient tale for the police, doctors have found the rare condition in multiple patients.

As a person’s blood-alcohol level rises, he or she can exhibit all the same symptoms as someone who drank too much liquor, including slurred words and confusion. In one case, the patient said that alcohol could be smelled on their breath.

Dr. Richard Peek, a professor of medicine and cancer biology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said the cause of the symptoms is not fully understood although there is one likely culprit.

“Yeast are normally in the GI tract and the commonality of all these case reports is they have an increased number of candida,” Peek told ABC News. “When [yeast] ingest a meal that has a high amount of carbohydrates, they metabolize the carbohydrates into ethanol.”

Peek said the alteration of the gut’s bacteria, called the microbiome, has far-reaching effects with auto-brewery syndrome being one of the most drastic results.

“These observations show the importance of gastric microbiota or microbiome in altering functions,” Peek said. “It really can regulate or cause disease such as irresistible bowel syndrome and it’s been linked to metabolic syndrome, diabetes, fatty liver.”

Peek said more study was needed to pinpoint the exact cause and find a cure that works for all patients.

“You could recommend a low carbohydrate diet and in some cases that has worked to reverse the symptoms,” Peek said, stressing that these treatments have not been proven for every patient. “You can treat the patients with antifungal medications to reduce the load of candida in microbiota.”

While most people will not end up with a tiny “brewery” in their gut, Peek said anyone can face an alteration of their micrombiome, due to illness, antibiotics or other conditions.

He recommended a good diet, exercise and occasional probiotics to achieve a healthy microbiome.

Source: abcnews


Man sues doctors for mocking him while he was unconscious

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So what do doctors chat about after you’ve gone under anesthesia? You may not want to know, according to a lawsuit picked up by Courthouse News Service. A colonoscopy patient in Virginia says he used his cellphone to record instructions given to him prior to his April 18, 2013, procedure, and accidentally left it on and recording. “DB” says doctors mocked him relentlessly. A sampling:

Dr. Tiffany Ingham is heard saying to the unconscious patient: “And really, after five minutes of talking to you in pre-op I wanted to punch you in the face and man you up a little bit.”

Ingham also allegedly called him a “big wimp” and a “retard,” joked about firing a gun up his rectum, made fun of his alma mater (Mary Washington College), and threatened to falsely note on his chart that he had hemorrhoids.

The medical team joked about a rash on the patient’s penis, speculating it might be syphilis. Then Ingham allegedly said, “It’s probably tuberculosis in the penis, so you’ll be all right.”

Doctors also strategized about how to avoid him after surgery.
The Fairfax County patient is suing for $1.35 million in damages. (More odd medical news: A Pennsylvania woman has been busted dealing heroin—from her hospital bed.)

Source: newser


Doctors remove large cockroach from man’s ear

A man in Australia had to be rushed to hospital in terrible pain after a large cockroach crawled into his ear as he slept, and an attempt to suck it out with a vacuum cleaner failed.

Medical treatment initially only caused the inch-long insect to burrow further into the head of Hendrik Helmer.

The unwelcome invader was eventually extracted by a doctor with forceps, but only after Helmer had endured the unpleasant sensation of it being in the “throes of death-twitching.”

His ordeal began in the early hours of Wednesday morning when he was woken by a sharp pain in his right ear, according to Australian TV.

He said: “I was hoping it was not a poisonous spider … I was hoping it didn’t bite me.”

Source: Fox news


Japan’s population declines by record 244,000 in 2013

The number of Japanese births hit a record low in 2013 while the death rate was the highest since the end of World War II, according to health ministry estimates.

Ministry officials determined the nation’s population fell by a record 244,000 for the year by deducting the number of births from the number of deaths.

“The trend of population decline will likely continue for a substantially long period of time,” a ministry official said.

It is the seventh consecutive year Japan has experienced a decrease in its population.

According to the estimates released on Dec. 31, the number of babies born in 2013 fell by 6,000 from the previous year to 1,031,000, the lowest number since such statistics became available in 1899. The ministry cited the decline in the number of women still in their childbearing years.

Meanwhile, 1,275,000 people–up 19,000 from the previous year–died in 2013, reflecting the aging of Japanese society.

The Japanese population declined for the first time in 2005. In 2006, the country saw a short-lived increase, but it has been falling steadily since 2007.

The fertility rate–the number of children a woman is expected to give birth to in her lifetime–was 1.41 in 2012. The ministry estimated that figure remains unchanged for 2013.

The statistics also showed that 663,000 couples married and 231,000 divorced in 2013.

Source: Asia and Japan watch