Archive for March, 2008

Causes, Symptoms and Medications : Phobias

Phobia (FO-bee-ah): a persistent irrational fear of an object, situation, or activity that the person feels compelled to avoid. (Wood 689) And that is only the start of it. Phobias can interfere with your ability to work, socialize, and go about a daily routine (American). People who have phobias are often so overwhelmed by their anxiety that they avoid the feared objects or situations (NIMH). For most people, the simple pleasures of life are striped from them.

Symptoms of a phobia include the following:

· Feelings of panic, dread, horror, or terror .

· Recognition that the fear goes beyond normal boundaries and the actual threat of danger.

· Rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, trembling, and an overwhelming desire to flee the situation—all the physical reactions associated with extreme fear

Causes:
There are several different theories about why phobias develop. They do seem to run in families. But how much this is to do with picking up phobias from your parents and how much is inherited through your genes is uncertain.
Young babies seem to be naturally afraid of animals such as snakes and of heights for instance, even though they need to learn to be afraid of man-made objects such as guns. So there is probably a natural fear response that gave our ancestors a survival advantage. It’s possible that when phobias develop this natural fear response has gone wrong.

Psychosocial treatments

Psychological therapies (often referred to as therapy or psychotherapy) involve a trained professional who uses clinically researched techniques, usually talking therapies, to assess and help people make positive changes in their lives.
Behavioral therapy focuses on changing specific actions and uses several techniques to decreases or stop unwanted behavior. For example, one technique trains patients in diaphragmatic breathing, a special breathing exercise involving slow, deep breaths to reduce anxiety. This is necessary because people who are anxious often hyperventilate, taking rapid shallow breaths that can trigger rapid heartbeat, lightheadedness, and other symptoms.

Medication:

Beta blockers. These medications work by blocking the stimulating effect of epinephrine (adrenaline). They block some of the peripheral signs of adrenaline’s stimulation and anxiety, including increased heart rate, elevated blood pressure, pounding of the heart, and shaking voice and limbs. These can be very effective for people who have stage fright, but must give a presentation before other people. However, not all beta blockers are effective for this purpose, and they’re only available by prescription, so check with your doctor.
Benzodiazepines may also help control social phobia. They are used frequently to treat many anxiety disorders, including generalized anxiety disorder.

In addition to the anti-anxiety drugs, medications may include the monamine oxidase (MAO) inhibitor antidepressants Nardil (phenelzine) and Parnate (tranylcypromine), and serotonin specific reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) such as Prozac (fluoxetine), Paxil (paroxetine), Zoloft (sertraline), and Luvox (fluvoxamine) (Hall). Because there are fewer side effects associated with these drugs and a very low addiction potential, practitioners are more comfortable prescribing them (Hall). Plus, the antidepressant action of these drugs is helpful is treating patients who suffer from depression in addition to social phobia (Hall).

About the author: Read about Breast Enlargement. Also read about Makeup Tips and How to give a hickey
Source: http://www.articlesbase.com

Causes, Symptoms and Prevention of Heartburn

Heartburn is a common condition that affects more than 70 million Americans annually. It typically begins with a burning sensation that starts in the upper abdomen and moves up into the chest, often making its way to the back of the throat, and sometimes up into the jaw, arms and back. It usually feels worse when lying down or bending forward.

Symptoms & Signs

Heartburn is an uncomfortable feeling of burning and warmth behind the breastbone (sternum) but sometimes rising as high as the neck. It usually occurs after meals, when lying down, or at night while sleeping.

Heartburn usually is due to gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), the rise of stomach acid back up into the esophagus. Heartburn has nothing whatsoever to do with the heart though the discomfort of heartburn may be confused with heart pain and vice versa. Heartburn is a popular nonmedical term that often is referred to medically as pyrosis.

What Causes Heart Burn?
Heart burn is caused by a faulty muscle in the stomach. There is a “flap” at the top of the stomach that stops food from traveling back up into the esophagus. Sometimes the flap doesn’t work properly and stomach acid escapes from the stomach. When the acid escapes, heart burn occurs.

Factors that contribute to heart burn: pregnancy, smoking, eating large meals, being overweight, and wearing tight clothing around the waist.
Heartburn usually ignites a burning pain that runs from your stomach to your breastbone, and it’s often accompanied by a sour taste in your mouth. Heart attacks, on the other hand, may cause a prolonged heavy feeling or squeezing pain in your chest. (Angina, or heart pain, causes similar pain that lasts just a minute or two.) Although pressure chest pain is more commonly associated with heart disease spasm of the esophagus may cause the same symptoms. It’s best to assume the pain is coming from the heart, get emergency help to rule the heart out as a cause, then focus on the esophagus.

Prokinetic medications are those that increase activity or peristalsis of the stomach to help push contents into the intestine more quickly. The medications metoclopramide and domperidone are both prokinetic medications. This medication may be beneficial in those people whose reflux symptoms are caused by delayed stomach emptying.

Try Tea

Green tea has been used for centuries in Japan as an after dinner drink. Green teas aid the body in the digestion process, and help soothe the stomach’s sensitive tissue.

PREVENTION

Heartburn and its symptoms can often be prevented or at least minimized by following a few, standard guidelines.

1. Never smoke before or while eating. Smoking often causes one to swallow small amounts of air, which form air pockets in the digestive tract with the added pressure of food. Smoking also slows the body’s ability to digest food.
2. Monitor which foods cause you to suffer heartburn. Often times, eliminating certain gas forming foods (such as beans, cabbage, cucumbers and onions) from the diet, brings an end to suffering.
3. Eat at a dinner table in an upright, sitting position.

About the author: Read about Breast Enlargement. Also read about Makeup Tips and How to give a hickey
Source: http://www.articlesbase.com

Causes, Symptoms, Diagnosis and Treatment : Mycosis Fungoides

Mycosis Fungoides, is a rare form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma characterized by patches, plaques, and tumors. It is also known as cutaneous T cell lymphoma (CTLC), which affects the skin. Lymphomas are blood tumors. In mycosis fungoides the blood lymphoma stays mostly in the skin. This results in a rash. Most people who have mycosis fungoides will have the rash over many years. It is very difficult to determine if someone has mycosis fungoides, usually several biopsies are required over a number of years before the diagnosis can be made. This infection is confined to the skin and it rarely affects other parts of the body. These changes develop slowly over the years.

Who Can Get Them?

African American individuals are more likely to get mycosis fungoides than Caucasian individuals. The rashes will appear very light or very dark on those with a darker skin tone. Males are affect more so by this ailment than women. Individuals over the age of fifty are more likely to get the condition. The most common age is forty-five to fifty-five years for those who develop the rash and plaque. The tumors and lesions will start to develop after an individual turns sixty.

Causes and Symptoms of Mycosis Fungoides

1. Mycosis Fungoides has outward visible symptoms.
2. They appear as rash like patches, plaques or lesions.
3. The duration of the aliment from its onset to diagnosis can be up to six years.

Tumors: tumors can originate from plaques, red skin, or normal skin. They are usually reddish brown or purple. The itching can diminish, but the tumors may develop painful open sores or become infected. Some tumors can become very large. Patches, plaques, and tumors can co-exist.

Erythrodermic form: in the erythrodermic form, the skin becomes red, thickened, and sometimes peels and flakes. The palms and soles thicken and may crack. Itching is usually intense. More than 90% of the time, the erythrodermic form is associated with Sézary syndrome.
Other, more rare symptoms are also seen, including itching alone.

Diagnosis

Typically there is about 6 years from the time symptoms begin to the diagnosis of mycosis fungoides. Confusion with other conditions is common. A sample of the skin can be taken (skin biopsy) and examined for the disease. Other laboratory tests can be done to determine the progression of the cancer.

Treatment

Chemotherapy is employed primarily for patients with advanced MF; systemic treatment with chemotherapeutic agents (cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, doxorubicin, bleomycin, etoposide, and steroids) and interferon-alfa produces transient regression.

Common treatments include simple sunlight, ultraviolet light, topical steroids, topical and systemic chemotherapies, local superficial radiotherapy, total skin electron beam radiation, and biological therapies (e.g. interferons, retinoids, rexinoids).Vorinostat (Zolinza®) is a second-line drug for CTCL. Application of organic (Manuka) honey to skin affected by erythorderma (red skin) has also proved to be effective in reducing inflammation. Treatments are often used in combination.

PUVA is a combination treatment. You will take psoralen (P) pills two hours before exposing your skin to long wave ultra violet light (UVA). Usually PUVA treatment will be given twice a week until your skin is clear, and then less often. Some patients respond well to single weekly treatments. A bath solution of psoralen can be used instead of the tablets, but this is mainly used for psoriasis - your treatment may therefore seem to be different from that of the other patients having PUVA for other skin conditions.

About the author: Read about Breast Enlargement. Also read about Makeup Tips and How to give a hickey
Source: http://www.articlesbase.com

« Previous PageNext Page »