Most recent international health newscast in addition to examination from our health explore band.

Warts are caused by a virus. There are different types of warts. The most common are the small warts children get on their hands and sometimes feet. Many a child has suffered the agonies of a trip to the hospital to burn the warts off. Naturopathic remedies work just as well.

Usually these warts last 3 to 6 months and are found on the fingers near the nails. They are infectious and other children can easily catch them. The best treatment is thuja taken internally as a tincture or thuja extract applied to the wart twice daily until it disappears. Echinacea can be taken internally. The white sap of the dandelion flower can also be applied to the wart twice daily until it disappears.

Beware of caustic lotions which burn the surrounding skin and sometimes cause the warts to spread. These will burn the face and the genital areas.

Plantar warts need specialist attention as they grow larger and become intensely painful. They may disappear spontaneously after a few months or last for a number of years. The base of the wart is embedded in the soles of the feet, or toes and may be single or multiple. They are firm and round with a rough surface. If this is cut off, dark spots can be seen —blood vessels supplying the wart.

The person suffering with plantar warts should wear socks and slippers around the house and have their own bath towel and bath mat. If the individual is an athletic person, plastic socks can be purchased for use in the communal shower room or in the swimming pools.

Genital warts are sexually transmitted. They can be visible around the labia of a woman or the penis of a man, or they can be inside the vagina. They look like cauliflower growths and can irritate the sufferer. Any sign of infection should be treated as quickly as possible. They are highly contagious and are related to incidence of cervical cancer in women. They have been related to cancer of the throat in cases where oral sex has taken place with an infected person over a long period of time.

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Comments (0) Apr 29 2009

Not long ago the newspapers reported that the president of Harvard University was unable to return to work. Amid speculations as to what might be wrong with him, his doctor issued a bulletin saying that he was exhausted from overwork. He was ‘running on empty’. Well, you don’t have to be the president of Harvard University to know how that feels. I have encountered this symptom in depressed patients I have treated from all walks of life. I recall a highly skilled psychotherapist who was in such great demand because of his expertise that he received many more referrals than he could comfortably handle. Unfortunately he was much more skilful at taking care of his patients than of himself, and had a hard time disappointing his referral sources. He seriously overbooked his schedule, leaving much too little time for rest, exercise and recreation. As a result, his depression was extremely difficult to treat. No matter what anti-depressants I gave him, he always seemed to be running on empty.

Population studies suggest that depression is becoming more common with each successive generation, our youngest people being most frequently affected. No one knows why this should be happening. One possible reason is that it is a cost of upward mobility. As we become an increasingly sophisticated technological society, the newly created opportunities carry with them certain risks and hazards. Increasingly, there are businesses that stay open until all hours of the night. People take their computers on holiday with them so that they can plug into their e-mail and connect to the Internet from the most remote places. They carry cellular phones and are always on-call, wired in and connected to their business associates and customers. And businesses themselves, in an attempt to become more competitive, squeeze the most they can out of each employee. One patient of mine, a chemist who supervised several pharmacies, kept being given more and more shops to supervise. Just as with the psychotherapist I mentioned, her depression was very hard to treat and only responded, finally and completely, when she quit her job.

The curious thing about depression, though, is that you can end up running on empty regardless of how great your burdens are in any objective sense. Each of us has our comfort zone in which we can function happily and efficiently, and each has our limit beyond which our capacity to function breaks down. When someone becomes depressed, that breaking point has been exceeded. It does no good to debate whether or not you should be able to handle the level of stress. Regardless of the objective level of stress that you are currently under, if your capacity for handling that stress has been exceeded, you will feel as though you are running on empty and that may be an indication that you are clinically depressed, especially when it is combined with some of the other tell-tale signs of depression.

One of the hardest things to do when you are running on empty is to start new projects. New initiatives invariably require a new burst of energy, which is especially difficult to muster when you are down.

It is also important to remember that running on empty may be a symptom of other illnesses. Chronic infections, such as glandular fever, may strip you of energy, as may many other medical disorders. Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS; also known as ME) is a particularly vexing condition, in which low energy level is the cardinal and sometimes the only symptom. Low thyroid function and other hormonal conditions may also result in fatigue and low energy levels. These can generally be diagnosed by simple blood tests. This is one reason why, in the best of all possible worlds, you should get a medical evaluation before reaching a definitive diagnosis of depression. Or, if you don’t choose to do that, to re-evaluate the situation if you try to treat your depression and it hasn’t improved substantially within a month or two.

If you have been running on empty for more than a few weeks, consider the possibility that you may be clinically depressed.

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Comments (0) Apr 29 2009