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The Other Half

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Re: The Other Half

#151

Post by jasonmp85 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #132
DanBC wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah, but where do you draw the line? You can search the English NHS Choices website. That gives calm mostly evidence based advice and lets you know when you should self care, or when you should see a doctor. For example, here's "chest pain": http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/chest-pain/Pages/Introduction.a... It says there are a variety of causes, but it says you must never ignore it, and gives some criteria for when y…

Yeah we have something like this in Ontario ("TeleHealth") and from my experience the calls usually end with "Go to the doctor / emergency room" because they're mostly unwilling to tell you "you're fine, it's in your head" unless it's completely obvious.

On the other hand, that kind of presentation can often COMPEL a doctor to prevent discharge, so lots of, uh, problem patients know they can eke out a few extra days if they mention those words to the right person.

Re: The Other Half

#152

Post by textfiles »

athenot wrote: post #130
chrisper wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the article he said he could see his heart on a monitor. Was he maybe referring to the camera they use when they are in your body?

There is imaging but not from a camera in the body (blood is not exactly transparent). It's a form of x-ray video with a tracer in the blood, so they can observe both the guide and the blood irrigation. The doctor will use live x-ray pictures to carefully guide the catheter up into your heart and arteries. Dye will be injected into your body to highlight blood flow through the arteries. This helps the doctor see any…

Verified - this is what I saw and what was used on me.

Re: The Other Half

#153

Post by Peradine »

gtrubetskoy wrote: post #27

I wonder if a finger blood oxygen meter ($20 on Amazon [1]) is a good tool to diagnose that you might be having a heart attack. It's easy to carry one with you. I am not a doctor, and Googling for it isn't turning up much useful, but it'd seem logical that during a heart attack your blood oxygen would be abnormally low? Perhaps someone in the know can comment? [1] https://www.amazon.com/Santamedical-Generation-SM-165…

A pulse oximiter measures the oxygen content of arterial blood in the peripheries. A heart attack is caused by a localised blockage of the arteries to the heart, causing reduced oxygen and nutrient delivery to an area of heart muscle. A heart attack alone would not affect peripheral oxygen content unless it was severe enough for a complication such as heart failure to develop, but by that stage it's much too late.

Indeed the vast majority of patients with an acute heart attack would have completely normal pulse oximetry findings, the only way to properly diagnose a heart attack is with an electrocardiogram (EKG) and/or blood tests to look for markers of heart muscle damage

Re: The Other Half

#154

Post by thaumaturgy »

ganley wrote: post #140
tombone12 wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"What’s the biggest single factor that puts you at risk for ignoring your health? Being a man. Sociologist Lisa Wade, interviewed in New York Magazine, says that 'some scholars argue that being male is the single strongest predictor of whether a person will take health risks.' Men like risk it turns out. Most of them also hate putting lotion on their skin (too girly) and being afraid of things (not manly). They are a…

About a decade ago, I got a physical after having not set foot in a doctor's office in about 12 years. The doctor asked what made me come to get a physical after so long, and when I said nothing in particular, he pretended to write on his clipboard "Wife made me come here." He said middle-aged guys with no obvious health problems pretty much only come to the doctor for one (or both) of two reasons: Their wife made th…

It's not just a macho thing.

I pretty severely injured an ankle back in September, at MMA, and for the first time in my life (at 38) it doesn't seem to be healing up very well. I keep finding new little movements that cause it to feel pretty wrong ("popping", "pulling", cold sensation, mild short-term pain, weakness).

One of these happened in front of my girlfriend, who ordered me to see a doctor, so I did. I filled out new copies of all the paperwork I filled out a year ago when I was grievously ill, sat around for a bit, got into the doctor's office, his assistant appeared and asked me a couple of questions, then the doctor appeared after a bit and asked me the same questions again. He palpated my ankle for a few seconds, told me to get a brace, and then left the room without another word.

Unless you're wealthy enough to afford a dedicated physician, there's just really no point in seeing a doctor for anything less than "I might be about to die".

...which sucks, because I'm a huge proponent of preventative medical care. It's just not available for most people.

Re: The Other Half

#156

Post by Peradine »

spinchange wrote: post #28

I wonder all the time why we don't have more widely available, "consumer grade" tech like handheld ECGs, etc., to help better detect stuff like this. (There are products like this, but not in U.S. markets to my understanding - at least not without a prescription) If you're unfortunate enough to suffer from something like anxiety attacks and also have heart trouble in your family's medical history it is very difficult…

To properly rule out a heart attack you would need

a) A twelve-lead EKG - which requires twelve wires to be connected to specific locations on your body

and

b) Blood tests

Therefore for a consumer-grade device to properly rule out a heart attack it would need to be a large EKG machine with multiple connectors as well as a blood test analysis machine. And that's not even considering that proper analysis of an EKG trace requires a trained medical professional, as the automated traces are notoriously unreliable

Re: The Other Half

#157

Post by spatulon »

RandomInteger4 wrote: post #40
joebeetee wrote: post #9

A (35ish y/o) family friend died 2 months ago from a heart attack, suspected high cholesterol. He was seemingly healthy, active and not overweight. Anyone else have experience with cholesterol in early 30's?

Last time I had my cholesterol checked about 6-7 years ago, it appeared normal, though my HDL was low. I'm 31 now and have been having a weird heart feeling. Not a pain though, but like beating issues. Depending on what I eat and which supplements I take, my heart starts beating weird and my blood pressure goes up. The weird beating seems like my heart is either beating normally or weakly and then there's a "hiccup"…

Consider asking your doctor for a coronary artery calcification (CAC) scan. It only takes a few minutes and in the US typically costs only $100. For some reason it doesn't seem to be very well known, but high scores seem to be a reliable indication of heart disease.

Some more info:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFRCzuAdl6A [11:54]

https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/health-topics/topics/cscan

Re: The Other Half

#159

Post by [deleted] »

chrisper wrote: post #19

This is why it is important that you monitor your stress level and eventually just say "stop." Yes you may miss due dates, plans, and even make some people angry, but at least you don't die. I realize this is not always possible, but the "can do (everything)" attitude is not always the right one. Also, having a surgery while being awake? Not sure how to think about that. I mean just imagining that makes me feel weird…

[deleted]

Re: The Other Half

#160

Post by Peradine »

jinjin2 wrote: post #41
spinchange wrote: post #28

I wonder all the time why we don't have more widely available, "consumer grade" tech like handheld ECGs, etc., to help better detect stuff like this. (There are products like this, but not in U.S. markets to my understanding - at least not without a prescription) If you're unfortunate enough to suffer from something like anxiety attacks and also have heart trouble in your family's medical history it is very difficult…

There are plenty of those available in the US. Check out https://www.alivecor.com/en/ for an example.

That wouldn't be able to detect a heart attack, its to look for atrial fibrillation (AF), which is a long-term abnormality of heart rhythm associated with increased stroke risk
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