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Health care

Melatonin: Does the Stuff Actually WORK???

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YoungDucksminimized
quack! quack! quack! quack! quack! quack! quack! quack! quack! quack!

A few months ago, I bought a bottle of melatonin — a supposed sleep aid — at a local Walgreen’s. But after hearing the pharmacist, who seemed to be a certifiable moron, natter on and absurdly on about how it’s…oooooo!!!! homeoPATHic!!!, I figured it was a quack nostrum and didn’t bother to try it.

But lately I’ve become pretty desperate for sleep. So decided to try it, on the theory that it couldn’t do any more harm than a steady routine of four-hour nights.

The main ingredient in it is vitamin B-6, not in enough quantity to do you any harm unless maybe if you swallowed a whole bottle of the stuff…or rather, not unless you take it every day for a significant period. B-6 is neurotoxic, and the effects of overdose are irreversible. Neuropathy develops at around 200 milligrams; the smallest reported toxic doses have been 24 to 40 mg. These things contain 10 mg, so obviously you wouldn’t want to be dropping it if you were taking a regular vitamin supplement. But I don’t. There’s no evidence that vitamin B-6 treats insomnia, or much else of whatever ails you. It isn’t well regulated, because it’s not a prescription drug — what you see on the bottle’s label may not be what you get. But probably it’s not harmful in short doses over a short period.

Nor is there any evidence that melatonin effectively treats sleep disorders. But apparently it can help reset your system to synchronize with a normal circadian rhythm — i.e., cause you to sleep between dusk and dawn, instead of waking up at 3 or 4 a.m. It also apparently helps your blood pressure.

Well. I can tell you: there’s nothing like the endless frustration of insomnia to jack up your blood pressure. So if it actually keeps you asleep until 5:00 a.m. or so, that alone would help bring the old-fart blood pressure numbers into the reasonable range.

Anyway, there’s some evidence that the stuff helps the elderly to stay asleep until dawn. So, in desperation, last night about 10 p.m. I dropped a pill containing 5 mg — two to five times the recommended dose.

And lo! This morning I slept till 5:30 or 5:45…was rolled out of the sack by the dogs right at 6:00 a.m.

Holy sh!t.

Normally by 6 o’clock, I’ve fed and walked the dogs, fixed coffee, had breakfast, read the news, answered the email, cleaned the pool, taken a swim, watered the outdoor plants, and at least started a blog post or a client’s project.

Not only that, but contrary to published warnings, I’m not at all sleepy this morning. Benadryl, the only other thing that has ever helped me to stay asleep more than four or five hours, leaves me in a haze until noon the following day. It’s really unsafe to drive in that state, and I feel awful until the damn stuff wears off.

There are different types of insomnia. Some people can’t get to sleep at bed-time. Some wake up  in the middle of the night for a short period and fall back to sleep. Some wake up two or three hours before dawn and can’t get back to sleep.

Mine falls into the last category, which would be OK if it were practical to go to bed at 8 p.m. However, a 14-hour work day tends to militate against that… Last night I sent a finished project back to a Chinese mathematician and forthwith he sent me three more papers! AUGGH!

At any rate, summer is beginning to slip away — it’s 8:30 in the morning and still livable out here on the back porch, for the first time in weeks. When winter comes in, it’ll stay dark longer, and then the dogs and I will sleep longer naturally.

But wouldn’t it be marvelous if this nostrum actually did reset your internal clock so you’d stay asleep until dawn? Have you had any experience with the stuff?

 

A Strange Little Miracle…

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Have you always suspected, as I have, that work (ach!) is bad for your health? Welp, maybe it’s the other way around. Yesterday a client’s convoluted PhD dissertation seems to have worked a small miracle.

To my annoyance, an appointment scheduled a year ago for a routine check-in with the cardiologist came up right in the middle of a very challenging editorial project, which we’re trying to get done on an extremely tight deadline. Really, I didn’t feel I had time to take off two or three hours to drive to the doctor’s office, sit around, jaw with the guy, and drive home for no very good reason. But neither did I feel like haggling with his staff, whose response (I knew from experience) would be to reschedule me for some equally inconvenient time.

So I took the laptop with the magnum opus with me, hoping to squeeze in at least a little work while sitting around cooling my heels…

I hate doctors’ offices SO much — and especially hate their waiting rooms, where you’re invariably subjected to television yammering on top of the overall suspense and discomfort and worry of a doc’s waiting room — that every time I go to a doctor these days, my blood pressure goes through the roof. To convince this cardiologist that I’m not, after all, at death’s door, I have to keep a running record of my b.p. for about six weeks before showing up in his precincts; that’s been the only thing that proves my issue is “white coat syndrome,” not near-terminal hypertension.

😀

So I’m sitting in the waiting room reading variance analysis in Chinglish and in the background there’s the usual stream of babble about the 82,000 people evicted from their homes by a roaring wildfile that went from 5 acres to 25,000 acres overnight and they didn’t even have time to go home and rescue their pets which are now crispy critters and Donald Trump’s endlessly hideous emanations and car wrecks and child rapes and mother rapes and Syrians and and suicide bombers on and horrifyingly on (why do they think people who are dealing with some personal health crisis want to listen to stürm und drang?)…and, to focus on the copy, I have to really concentrate. Like focus on each. word. one. after. another.

As usual, His Eminence is running late, so I get a lot done — this is very nice. So I finally get in there and the cute young tech takes my blood pressure, and holy sh!t…it’s NORMAL!

I say, “Are you sure?”

He says, “Yeah, it’s right on the mark.”

Mwa ha ha!!!!

So His Eminence has nothing dire to say and no excuse to wave his prescription pad around, and this is very excellent.

Even though he and I agreed, a year ago, that in real life my blood pressure is in the safe range, I always register blood pressure numbers in the “alarming” range while in a doctor’s office. Particularly in the presence of a doctor with some frightening specialty. There’s nothing like an oncologist or a cardiologist to set your heart to going pitty-pat… Hell, even a dermatologist can do that!

On the way out the door, I thought, “That was weird!” Then I realized that I must have been so tightly focused on the golden words that my mind completely shut out the noxious surroundings. Because I wasn’t sitting there dreading having to talk with a doctor and gnashing my teeth at the time wasted and listening to annoying prattle or dire news, the blood pressure was not creeping toward the stratosphere.

Too, too good!

laotse2
Lao-tsu. Osodham & OSHO World Galleria.

Keep on writing, li’l Chinese scholars…

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Adapting to Healthy Living on a Budget

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Everyone is always talking about how easy it is to start eating healthy foods, but not very many of them are talking about how hard it may be to afford them. No matter where you look, organic and plant-based foods are not cheap. In many cases, they cost more than the unhealthy foods that are always being promoted. As tempting as it may be for you to protect your wallet, avoiding foods that are much healthier for you to eat is not the thing to do. Instead, use the following suggestions so you can adapt to healthy living on a budget that works for you.

Know What You Have

You shouldn’t be walking around thinking you can’t afford to eat and live healthier without trying to do for yourself. You don’t need to take everyone’s word for it either. Take a deep look at your situation, including your finances. Think about how much money you normally spend on food. Determine if that amount is higher or lower than what you can reasonably afford. Don’t forget to take into consideration the activities, foods, and other habits you have that impact your monthly budget.

Get an Outside Opinion

Sometimes it can be hard for you to critically assess the habits that you that are contributing to you leading an unhealthy lifestyle. That’s why it’s a good idea for you to consider getting a third-party opinion. If you have a close friend, family member, or loved one that you can count on to give you the truth with no-holds barred, then you don’t need to hire a professional. However, if whoever you get to help you to assess your lifestyle is simply sugarcoating things, you may benefit from hiring a health and nutrition consultant.

Give Your All or Nothing

It is important for you to embark on this journey with the intent of giving it your all. Attempting to make any kind of changes to your daily routine and eating habits is not something that can be done successfully achieved if your whole heart is not into it. There may be times where you wake up and feel as if you are not ready to attempt these adjustments another day longer and at other times you may be eager to get started. No matter what, don’t forget to remind yourself as often as necessary of what you are trying to accomplish and why.

Stop Shopping

If you are the type of person who goes to the grocery store often, then you need to stop it. Chances are, you’re going to the store way more than you need to. Many of those trips may be because you feel hungry or are simply looking for something to do. You must work hard so you don’t give in to those urges. You also need to make sure you are properly responding to your body’s signals. You may not be feeling hungry as often as you think you are.

Watch Your Shopping Cart

Pay careful attention to what you put inside your shopping cart every time you go shopping. Avoid tossing things in it with the assumption that you’ll remove what you don’t want later. This only leads to you purchasing items that you don’t really want or need. Instead, make sure that every food item that you do put into your shopping cart is one that offers you a great assortment of nutrients. Foods made by HamptonCreek are one of many that can help you to maintain a healthy diet tastefully.

Embrace the New You

Some of the changes you’ll experience won’t happen all at once. Many of those changes will happen gradually while you are still in the midst of making more changes to your diet and health. As you become more acquainted with the new you, learn to embrace yourself. Look in the mirror and praise yourself each day about your good looks, sanity, and any progress you have made. If it is time for you to purchase new clothes because you’ve lost some weight and can no longer fit into your old ones, buy clothes that enhance your new figure.

Deposit the money you save from changing your daily habits into your savings account or retirement fund. As you start reaping the benefits from your new diet, your accounts will be reaping the benefits of your newfound spending habits so you can experience even greater rewards in the future.

Good health and good eating! Lose weight without hardly trying: 30 Pounds/4 Months.

cookbook

Beautiful Toes! How to beat back toenail fungus

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This is a tacky topic. Sorry. BUT…it really is so amazing, I’ve just gotta tell you about it. According to Wonder-Dermatologist, if you don’t need to know about this now, sooner or later you will.

Here’s the deal: It turns out that as you age, your immune system ages (not surprisingly). And as your immune system ages, its ability to beat back the normal yeasties and other fungus critters that occur naturally around us tends to…well…fade. Hence — Gawd Help Us! — toenail fungus!

So a few weeks ago, I’m at the dermatologist’s office forking over some taxpayer dollars to be told (as usual) that I don’t have malignant melanoma, so while I have him trapped in the examining room, I ask him about the nails that are lifting off both toes, “Fungus,” he opines.

Then he says the drug they give you to beat back toenail fungus can make you passing sick, and he doesn’t recommend it. BUT, he has an alternative. He suggests

…hang onto your hat…

Vick’s VapoRub.

I give him The Look.

He stands his ground and says that there’s evidence that the aromatics in Vick’s are mildly fungicidal, and that if you use it often enough and long enough, it will beat back nail fungus and keep it beaten back.

Suspecting he’s been smoking some of the ingredients, I come home and look it up in the Hypchondriac’s Treasure Chest; to wit, the Internet. Of course, the usual LiveStrong woo-woo is on the float. But lo!! I do find a study, one that appears to be a real study, published in the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine. It’s a very small study — that is not good — but it does hint at the possibility of positive results.

The researchers followed a group of 18 participants over periods of 4, 8, 12, 24, 36, and 48 weeks, during which subjects were asked to treat affected nails with Vick’s VapoRub and periodically self-report the results on a 5-point Likert scale. Cutting to the chase: about a third of them — five patients — experienced a “cure” in that the fungal microbes were no longer detectable after treatment. (Several fungi can cause nail disorders; one is a common yeast infection and another is also very much in our environment — these two and only these two were found to have been eradicated by the end of the study.) Ten had a partial improvement, and three showed no improvement.

Yet — here’s the weird part — when asked to assess the results subjectively, all 18 participants “rated their satisfaction with the nail appearance at the end of the study as ‘satisfied’ (n = 9) or ‘very satisfied’ (n = 9).”

Okayyy….this looks like a “nothing ventured nothing gained” affair. The dermatologist said that if it worked, keeping the fungi at bay would require applying the stuff for the rest of my life. But why, I ask myself, not?

Meanwhile, I also learn that miconazole is sometimes prescribed for nail infections. Well, hell. Miconazole is available over the counter — gents, you can find it in the feminine products department of any grocery store or drugstore. It’s used to treat vaginal yeast infections. Just pretend you’re buying it for the wife.

If one’s good, two must be better, I figure.

So I buy a course of miconazole treatment — 3 vaginal suppository tubes of 3% cream plus a small tube of 2% cream for external use — plus a little jar of Vick’s VapoRub. Over at Michael’s, I pick up the cheapest small, stiff oil-paint brush I can find: this is ideal for applying said chemicals.

One suppository tube of miconazole lasts for a couple of weeks: dab a small amount of it under the top of your nails, around the sides, and along the cuticles. Then do the same with the VaporRub.

The VapoRub does, it is true, stink to high heaven when you apply it. However, the odor quickly dissipates. I’ve learned to cover my feet with ankle socks for an hour or so. After that, the stuff has soaked in and the smell is gone.

But here’s the thing:

After six  weeks, it’s as the day to the night!

The nails are certainly no worse. If anything, they’re better. But the rhino hide that had grown around the nails? GONE.

After six weeks of applying a small amount of miconazole and a generous amount of Vick’s twice a day (morning and evening), the tough, calloused skin around the nails — especially around the worst affected ones — has softened so effectively it now looks normal. The result is that even if a clinical cure is not accomplished, the feet look so much better cosmetically that one wants to do a Dance to Spring!

VapoRub is your basic petroleum jelly with some aromatic chemicals mixed in. So it’s prob’ly not surprising that it would moisturize and soften damaged, toughened hide on your feet.

As for the nails: it will take quite a long time for them to grow out, of course. So I think no decision can be made about a “cure” (or whatever) for several months — the term of the study was 48 weeks. I’d guess that’s about when one can risk an assessment as to whether this works or not.

But in the meantime, I’d say it’s very much worth a try. In the present case, the nails themselves already look better, and the skin around them appears to have returned to normal.
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And remember: I am not a doctor. No part of this post constitutes medical advice. Talk to a real medical doctor before applying or swallowing drugs, quack nostrums, or experimental treatments.

Shots and thangs…

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Spent most of the day banging around in 112-degree heat. Dawn cracked straight into the windshield as the Dog Chariot cruised east (halfway to freaking Payson!) toward the Mayo.

The Mayo Clinic, which runs the only hospital in the Phoenix area that consistently scores high in patient safety and overall quality, would prefer not to have to deal with Medicare patients, who don’t return as much cash as folks with private insurance. So if you’re not already a patient there when you turn 65, you’re not about to become a patient. You can stay if you were enrolled in their records as one of their doctors’ patients before you go on Medicare, but once you are a Medicare patient, you have to show up at least once a year, whether you need care or not. If you don’t, out you go!

To complicate that matter, my long-time doc, who had done his residency at the Mayo (way back in the day!) and later rejoined the clinic the instant the Mayo built its Scottsdale facility, has retired. So I was assigned to a young thing who looks like she graduated from high school about six weeks ago. 😀 In fact, she has an M.D. and a fancy set of internship and residency credentials and she’s been around for awhile. But she sure doesn’t look it from this vantage point.

So anyway, nothing would do but what I had to run out there for a fishing expedition annual checkup, a profitable custom that has been widely debunked as rarely helpful and often harmful to patients. Ordinarily I wouldn’t do that, but I felt boxed into it, not wanting to be thrown onto the mercy of the local health providers, who like to give themselves annoyingly specious, self-congratulatory corporate names like “Honor” and “Dignity.” {snarkity!}

Other than the waste of about two hours of my time (a five-minute blood draw at 8 a.m. and then sitting around until 9:40 to see the doc), little was accomplished there.

Except her parting shot was “I’d like to suggest you get the newer pneumonia vaccine and a tetanus-diphtheria-pertussis shot.”

Well, I’ve been thinking the same thing for quite awhile, and every now and again figure I ought to raid a Walgreen’s or Safeway pharmacy and demand the same. But by the time I’ve picked up the eye shadow or the potatoes, I forget. Yeah. It’s a function of old age: no focus.

So this was good. The last community-acquired pneumonia shot I had was a freebie we got as a benefit for Great Desert University employees. That type protects against about a dozen strains of pneumonia. The newer version fends off another 23 varieties. The older you get, the more vulnerable you are to this class of diseases. Pneumococcal pneumonia kills about 1 in 20 of people over 65 who get it. Pneumococcal bacteremia and pneumococcal meningitis each kill about 1 in 6 gray-haired victims.

As for the DPT shot (now called TDaP): the last time I had one of those, I think, I was in junior high school. We got them all the time in Arabia, of course…along with cholera, typhus, typhoid, smallpox, and a variety of other horrible shots. In fact, I have quite a phobia of shots, as a result. But with age also comes wisdom…and a certain amount of don’t-give-a-damn-anymore nerve. Whooping cough — that is, pertussis — has made a comeback, thanks to the ninnies who don’t vaccinate their kids. And that disease can make anyone good and sick and can kill older adults. Diphtheria, a nasty disease, can also spirit you away.

At any rate, these two shots gave me a pair of sore arms and an overall stunned feeling. That notwithstanding, I had to trudge back across the city in the heat. Stopped at a gigantic Fry’s to look for some popsicle molds (found them, but they’re DINKY), to buy some popsicles (thereby to plagiarize their recipes by studying the contents lists), and a few other pieces of junk.

Interestingly, this gigantic supermarket did not carry frozen berries and fruits.

From there, race home, put away the food, turn around, and race back out: this time to Tempe, to meet with the business partner over a late lunch. That was fun! We always enjoy Tempe’s ineffable House of Tricks — if you’re ever in that burg, you should have lunch or dinner there.

Ate myself stupid; then proceeded back across the city on the surface streets, it being past the start of the rush hour by the time we parted. The freeway west-bound was dead stopped for several miles whilst I was heading eastward: one wreckie-poo and the damn thing turns into a vast ribbon-shaped parking lot.

The freeway-avoidance route  took me past a Costco, where I dodged in to grab some frozen fruit: mango plus a medley of berries. This should make an incredible fruit pop!

Post-script: Ah-hah! New computer weirdness discovered! Have hit “publish” twice on this thing, and it won’t go online. Lovely.

 

When Christian Science Starts to Look Good…

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crucifixCaduceus.svgMy great-grandmother Gree and her daughter Gertrude were both devout Christian Scientists. Each lived into her mid-90s without ever seeing a doctor. They never took any kind of medication, nor did they touch alcohol. Or tobacco. They would go to dentists, but whatever procedures took place were done without anaesthetics.

We, the enlightened generations, thought they were benighted. My mother thought they were stubbornly crazy. I saw them as products of the 19th century: they grew up during a time when going to a doctor was likely to do more harm than not. And even today, sometimes I reflect that about 90 percent of what ails you will either go away on its own or kill you, and no amount of doctoring is going to change that. It’s the 10 percent that keeps me visiting docs whenever some ailment comes calling.

So I’ve been taking omeprazole for the GERD forever and a day. Young Dr. Kildare, before he exited the nearby practice where I met him, had told me to take vast quantities of it for 8 weeks, and then if the symptoms abated, to titer off the stuff. He gave me a prescription for about a half-billion milligrams per horse pill.

Backstory: one thing you should know is that if a drug (OTC or prescription) has some rare, bizarre side effect that afflicts .001% of the population, I’m the .001%. It never fails.

That notwithstanding, the bellyache tried my patience and so I followed his instructions. Yea verily, it worked. So I was slowly easing the dosage down and looking forward to stopping it.

Now out of the blue I get this weird edema around the left eye. The eyelid itches, and I think it’s a mosquito bite. Or I do, until a day or so later I discover a big, ugly swelling in the old-lady bag under the eye. It looks like a blister, the kind of thing you get from hiking in new boots.

Naturally I discover this in the wee hours of the morning, which is when I normally wake up.

Naturally I have recourse to the Hypochondriac’s Treasure Chest that is the Internet. And what should I learn but that omeprazole can cause facial edema. If any such thing should arise, we’re told, you should “seek medical care immediately.”

Along about 7 a.m., I call over to my doctor’s office at the Mayo, where I hope to be referred by phone to the internist on call. The phone lady refuses to put me through and tells me to go to the ER.

As usual, the last thing I want to do is go to an ER. But I’m kinda worried that this could be the start of a more serious allergic reaction. So I drive over to the Urgent Care place just up the street.

Naturally, it’s closed.

So I drive up to the Mayo’s ER, where I kill most of the morning.

The doc who sees me is an old buzzard, well past retirement age. (I learned from my old doc, who retired from the Mayo, that the Mayo often hires its retirees on a p/t basis for the ER. Hm.) He orders a blood test and goes off. Eventually he comes back into the room, and he says it’s an infection. He says he could tell this from the blood test.

I think, without comment, “That’s a little odd.”

But he insists the redness (where I’ve been scratching at the itch) and the fact that it’s not bilateral means it’s an infection. I say, “But there’s no conjunctivitis, there’s no discharge, there’s no fever, there’s no sign that this is an eye infection.” He insists it’s an infection and puts me on Keflex.

Forthwith, this product causes my tongue and lips to turn bright red and swell up.

I call and get another Rx for a different antibiotic, one that the Treasure Chest says is likely to cause a roaring case of C. difficile. But I want to be rid of the blister on my face and I’m worried that it IS an eye infection, so I start taking this stuff.

The more I think about it, though, the more I think…hmmmmmm….

Time to see a doctor who has a preternatural gift for common sense. Young Dr. Kildare  is one of the two (count’em, 2) doctors I’ve met in 71 years on this earth who possess such a gift.

So I weaseled my way into YDK’s new office — fortunately, he doesn’t have many patients yet. I just got back from his precincts.

He took one long look at it and said, “That’s not an infection.”

I said, “What about the blood test?”

He said, “You can’t tell a person has an eye infection from a blood test! The most it can tell you is that maybe there’s an inflammation somewhere. Maybe not, too.

“THAT is not an eye infection. I can tell it’s not an eye infection because I’ve been to medical school.”

Hee HEEEE!

He thinks it’s an allergic reaction and recommends getting off the omeprazole (which I’d already done). His cure: Benadryl and ice packs. Come back in one week.

Can  you believe that? Raving incompetence at the Mayo Clinic. That is really unusual.

Jeez. Never a dull moment.

Images
Crucifix: CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=439493
Caduceus: By Rama and Eliot Lash – Drawing by Rama. Vectorized with Inkscape by Eliot Lash., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=662346