Medical Questions I'd Like Answered...

maglag · Post by **maglag** » Thu Jun 30, 2016 6:57 am

Your diet seems severly lacking in fresh, fruit, have you considered trying that? It's sweet, filling, healthy, energizing, and basically what humans were designed to eat.

Also raw lemon juice (as in cut lemon open, squeeze contents into glass, add water, drink) does wonders.

EDIT: Important to note, fruit (and certain fresh vegetables) have a lot of important vitamins. Most food processing methods ruin the vitamins on it, and your body will feel as lacking energy due to that. Sugar can give you spurts of energy, but fruit will also do so in a much healthier manner.

Only downside is that fresh fruit has a lot more logistics as you usually need to cut/wash it to eat and it'll spoil fast if not consumed so you need to restock every few days.

RobbyPants · Post by **RobbyPants** » Thu Jun 30, 2016 12:18 pm

Every now and then, I'll get some kink in my neck/upper back if I sleep on it wrong. It hurts like hell and restricts my range of motion for about a day, or so.

Physiologically speaking, what is actually happening inside of my body at that point? Is a muscle actually injured, is it a nerve thing, or what?

Are there any ways to speed up recovery? I tend to try to slowly stretch to keep all the adjacent muscles from tightening up. I've made it worse in the past by babying it, and then all of the other muscles got sore as hell from being used unnaturally.

nockermensch · Post by **nockermensch** » Thu Jun 30, 2016 3:27 pm

@Koumei: The first week or so I went without sugar was hell. It gets better later. Stevia works well enough for me to keep my coffee addiction.

erik · Post by **erik** » Thu Jun 30, 2016 5:03 pm

Rob are you sure it is from sleeping wrong and not something done during the day where you did some atypical muscle movement?

Last time I had it as you described it was because i was being lazy laying on a couch and poured a glass of milk from a gallon jug for one of my kids and I did it without moving from my relaxed posture. Next day my neck and shoulder had restricted movement that slowly got better over the next 48 hrs like a sprained muscle. A sprain mostly needs time to heal but you can do things to reduce inflammation. Non medicine would be an ice pack.

For koumei, death by diabetes is often preceded by diabetes drastically lowering quality of life- amputations, peripheral neuropathy, blindness. It isn't a fiery explosion so much as a descent into sewage.
[edit doh i guess we moved on from the query about death from diabetes]
I will say having mostly given up soda, it's crappy. Best thing is to surround yourself with water in easy to drink forms so that you can grab it with minimal effort. If I have to pour something then my heart lingers at the sugar drinks and I wind up drinking oj or Apple juice. I haven't lost a single pound since stopping soda last fall so clearly I need to up my exercise and cut back other sweets beyond soda. I mostly want my BP to improve and lose some fat. I'm not huge but running would be easier if I shed 20 lb.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Jul 01, 2016 6:52 am

nockermensch: five weeks so far. I waited a while before bringing it up here.

erik: mostly I drink tea. No sugar or milk, so it just about is water for the purpose of nutritional content. I tend to have 3-4 cups per day, with a cup that's about twice as big as normal ones. But as awesome as getting HONK sounds, I'll make do with opiates.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Mon Jul 04, 2016 4:44 pm

Caffeine's an interesting drug too. If you're on 5-8 regular cups of tea, that's in the range of it being diuretic, up around 300mg/day.

Which is it makes you pee more, which tends to dehydrate you, promoting headaches, inattention, pain, and foul moods in general. Also promotes anxiety and a few other problems if you're vulnerable to that.

Otherwise you'll likely have near-complete tolerance to the various beneficial effects. Leaving you with a dependency where not drinking the tea will give you nausea and headaches and such for anything up to 10 days. So you think it's making you feel good, but really it's not.

Small doses, you feel good on it, and normal off it.
Large doses, you feel normal on it, and shit off it.

But you can't really tell the difference yourself. Low doses are good though, well away from when you want to sleep. Beneficial even. Just one coffee or two small teas per day. Otherwise water is good. No sugar or other drugs that slowly fuck you up at all in it. If you do cut back, most people can't do cold turkey, because not functioning for over a week is really inconvenient. Cut by 1 small daily cup every couple weeks.

Nachtigallerator · Post by **Nachtigallerator** » Tue Jul 05, 2016 4:48 am

That statement reminds me of one of these annoying test questions where you have to assess two parts of a sentence and the way they are connected for validity.

Well, coffee actually does not dehydrate people in a meaningful way. You are correct that coffeine withdrawal with headaches and such exists, but that has nothing to do with hydration status and everything to do with the fact that it's a (mild) stimulant with very quick tolerance buildup for most people. Medically, there's little to stop anyone from drinking coffee, unless they are prone to acid reflux or pregnant.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Tue Jul 05, 2016 5:45 am

Yes, the general advice from doctors has been "Either don't consume meaningful amounts of caffeine, or consume meaningful amounts regularly without stopping. Don't just be erratic about it or you'll suffer from spikes of anxiety and withdrawal."

Omegonthesane · Post by **Omegonthesane** » Sat Jul 23, 2016 9:27 pm

The discussion of tourniquets and police shootings in the US News thread makes me wonder how bad a bullet wound has to be before fucking up a tourniquet application can't possibly make it any worse.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Sun Jul 24, 2016 2:55 am

What a tourniquet does is stop blood from getting in or out of the limb. This prevents blood from escaping from wounds in that limb, but it also prevents that limb from getting any oxygen. Limbs are less sensitive to oxygen deprivation than brains, but they still need -some- blood flow, even when immobilized. Arms are slightly more sensitive than legs, but they're roughly comparable.

At ~1 hour, you start to get potentially fatal blood clots forming. These can lead to stroke or heart attack and are annoying to treat because the last thing you want to give to someone who's been bleeding out is anti-clot medication. A tourniquet applied this long will almost certainly require extensive hospitalization so that you can be observed while on the anti-clot medication.

After ~2 hours, you start doing permanent damage to the limb. Even if you get treated for blood loss and blood clots, you'll have circulatory damage and cell death throughout the limb that will respectively need surgical repair and physical therapy to correct. You will probably eventually get full functionality back, but it can take years.

After ~4 hours, necrosis is a concern and amputation will probably be required. A skilled surgeon may be able to save (or reattach!) the limb, but they might be unable to. It depends on how badly the gunshot itself damaged the limb. Even if the limb is saved, you can get sepsis and just straight up die. Lengthy hospitalization can prevent sepsis, but you'll be in there for at least a month, if not more.

After ~8 hours, even a skilled surgeon will probably not be able to save the limb, no matter how wonderful its condition before the tourniquet.

The only time a tourniquet is appropriate is if the probable harm from blood loss (given non-tourniquet care) is worse than the probable harm from circulation loss for the duration between the application of the tourniquet and the arrival of the patient to a vascular surgeon.

If a police officer is shot or is shooting someone, the shot person will hopefully be taken to a hospital within the hour. This tilts the calculus significantly toward applying a tourniquet, as it won't be on long enough to do really nasty things to the patient. But, on the flip side, we really really don't want police officers using a tourniquet as the default treatment for every gunshot to the extremities. We already have problems with officers being too gungho about shooting people, and they can face prison for that if they make the wrong call. What are cops going to be like when they have good samaritan laws backing them up?

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Fri Aug 19, 2016 5:49 am

I keep a portion of my anti-depressants (20mg DULoxetine in a small pillbox in my bag, for days when I have to be out of the house before I'd usually take them, noon.

I seem to have misplaced said pillbox, and am out of the portion I keep in my room. My next appointment with my doc is a week from today, and the prescription is non-refillable.

Obviously, the best thing to do is to try to get in touch with my doc tomorrow morning before I'd normally take my dose for the day and see if she'll authorize an early refill.

If that doesn't work, what's better: going off my anti-depressant for a week, or taking what I've still got of the one she tried me out on before (37.5mg Venlafaxine) until I can get a refill?

Blasted · Post by **Blasted** » Fri Aug 19, 2016 6:20 am

The obvious solution is to ask the doc if she says no.
Having gone cold turkey (admittedly, my meds were the lowest possible dose already) it's not a fun experience in many ways and screwed me up much more (for about a week) than anything I'd previously experienced.

Nachtigallerator · Post by **Nachtigallerator** » Fri Aug 19, 2016 8:09 am

You can switch between two drugs from the same category, which venlafaxine and duloxetine are, without a waiting peroid, and the doses you're on are low. However, as soon as you get your next prescription, you'd be going back to duloxetine, so you'd basically get "combination therapy" for however long it takes for the venlafaxine to completely leave your system, i.e. more than the one week you'd take it.

You're also on low doses for both drugs (i.e. not used to high levels), and both drugs are supposed to activate you in addition to fixing your mood - which means you might get increased anxiety if you overlap them like that. Seriously dangerous interactions (i.e. serotonine syndrome) are not likely in that scenario, but since I don't know your medical history, I can't judge how unlikely.

When you call your doctor, also mention you still have the venlafaxine. If you can't get your early refill, waiting for one week is the safer option. Duloxetine is known to cause discontinuation symptoms about 24h after the last dose, but you're risking less that way.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Fri Aug 19, 2016 1:37 pm

Most doctors are willing to give you refills of stuff they've prescribed you just for asking. So definitely ask about that first.

erik · Post by **erik** » Fri Aug 19, 2016 2:44 pm

Grek wrote:Most doctors are willing to give you refills of stuff they've prescribed you just for asking. So definitely ask about that first.

Yah. It is routine for us to get calls from patients needing refills for lost meds or meds than ran out too soon. Tho probably more than most types of doctor offices since most of our meds are eyedrops and people needing eye meds often don't have the best aim and wind up wasting a bunch.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Tue Sep 06, 2016 4:02 am

What can cause successive waves of shivering and sweating at room temperature without a fever?

sendaz · Post by **sendaz** » Wed Sep 07, 2016 11:09 pm

name_here wrote:What can cause successive waves of shivering and sweating at room temperature without a fever?

Without a bit more history, ie gender, age, weight, conditions it might take a bit to pin down.

Some swing in body temp is normal, but sounds like you are getting rapid changes.

Rarely some types of blood poisoning can cause feelings of hot and cold, but this usually also has things like jacked up heart rate and respiration happening as the body suffers from impaired oxygen distribution, and if you are having all of that it would be unlikely you would be typing about it and not just going straight to A&E.

For something, more normal -Thyroid issues jump to mind. My own father had thyroid problems and he often complained about being burning hot one minute and freezing the next. It's detectable and fairly easy to treat once you know it's an issue.

Tying in with this is adrenal gland imbalance/exhaustion. Not really something I have seen, but deficiencies here are often found in conjunction with thyroid problems so if you are checking for one, may as well check the other.

Type 2 diabetes can cause temp shifts, so if you have never been tested for diabetes, this may be a good sign just to check.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Wed Sep 07, 2016 11:16 pm

Constipation.
Somebody walking over your grave.

Grek · Post by **Grek** » Thu Sep 08, 2016 4:12 am

How sure are you that you don't have a fever? Hand test, or actual thermometer?

Nachtigallerator · Post by **Nachtigallerator** » Thu Sep 08, 2016 10:20 pm

Fun fact: You shiver when you're about to have a fever or about to have more of a fever - not so much when your fever is stable. Shivering is your body generating heat by muscle action when the temperature is lower than the internal thermostat says it should be. When the temperature is what it should be, you won't shiver any more. So, you may very well have a fever soon, even if it's not there yet. Conversely, if you're sweating, that means your body is trying to reduce temperature - so whatever is going on with your temperature, it's going all over the place. Now, if you have a fever from some sort of immune reaction, that is plausible because the immune system has both pro- and anti-fever agents. You probably have some kind of common infection coming on. Note that this is assuming the problem is happening right now. If it's been going on for a few weeks, I'd be a bit more inclined towards thyroid problems. Or protracted infection you haven't noticed.

Sendaz, what is "adrenal gland imbalance/exhaustion" - do you mean that as an actual condition (because then I think you've been conned by naturopaths) or are you just trying to avoid using jargon?

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat Oct 01, 2016 10:21 am

Is there anything that really really helps against a full body muscle soreness?
I am dreadfully out of shape and still helped a buddy move for te better part of 24 hours and now everything hurts in places i did not remember could hurt x.x

Nachtigallerator · Post by **Nachtigallerator** » Sat Oct 01, 2016 11:41 am

Time and rest. Add a mild painkiller if it's really distressing - like paracetamol, aspirin or ibuprofen. Get moving and again as soon as you can tolerate it: Muscle soreness is localized swelling and inflammation from microtrauma in your muscles, so getting the blood pumping through there will "wash out" the inflammation faster. It'll also make you feel better from being more active.

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Sat Oct 01, 2016 11:58 am

Yeah, i was just hoping somebody would know of a miracle cure for this.
Thank you anyway <.<
Scientists really need to get on fixing this and the common cold . . .

Hadanelith · Post by **Hadanelith** » Sat Oct 01, 2016 5:04 pm

Hot bath. Adding some epsom salt would help even more (to the bath, I mean. Don't eat the stuff). But relaxing in a tub (which supports your weight so you don't have to) that is very warm (which helps relax tense muscles) will make you feel much better.

LR · Post by LR » Sat Oct 01, 2016 10:01 pm

My nose is often runny, and I've been doing well with OTC antihistamines (fexofenadine, specifically). But about every one or two weeks, I spend a day or two constantly leaking from my nose and sneezing when I sniffle too much. Decongestants don't help, and even diphenhydramine does nothing to slow it down. Blowing my nose only causes it to leak more, and it seems like the only treatment available to uninsured me that does anything is keeping a box of tissues handy to sop up the mess. Any idea what might be wrong?

Edit: I have toothaches from wisdom teeth, I was in a minor car crash a year ago (just some cuts from the airbag), and I haven't been sick with anything worse than the flu since about five years ago when I had some sort of stomach virus (treated with bedrest and tylenol, of course).