Crimson Tide

26 year old Christine Drury, suffered from severe blushing. She worked as a nightly news reporter and was always visible to the public. Her face would constantly turn bright red all over and she had to use a lot of green concealer to try to counteract the redness, but it just didn't work. She struggled with often being embarrassed but she fought over it. Blushing can cause confusion and lost of focus. Embarrassment causes blushing and blushing causes embarrassment and Christine wanted the cycle to stop. Christine went to doctors and they assured her she would grow out of it and prescribed anti depressants and then anxiety pills. Nothing worked not even physchotherapy.  A year later she was forced to quit her job by the intolerable blushing. She started searching more about her condition and found others had the same problem. There was a doctor in Sweden how could preform a surgery and stop the blushing. The surgery is called Endoscopic thoracic sympathectomy. It involves severing fibers of the sympathetic nervous system that's part of the involuntary nervous system which controls breathing heart rate sweating and blushing. The back of your chest there are two white strings call the symphatic trunks, the road where the nerves travel. A scope is inserted through an incision in the chest and severs the fibers. Christine had the surgery done and it cured her. She still struggled with the feeling of embarrassment but no longer had blushing. She did not lose any of her facial color and her face does not sweat, but her lower extremities do much more now. Christine felt embarrassed that she had a surgery to cure what some people think to be minor, but it gave her normal life back. She got her job back and created the Red Mask Foundation to help others with conditions like she had.

Achondroplasia

Achondroplasia is a bone growth disorder that causes the most common kind of dwarfism. The signs you see associated with this disease include increased frontal head circumference, shortened upper and lower limbs and a broad flat nose bridge.  This disease has no gender nor racial preference.  It also does not affect their intelligence and most live normal independent lives.  Complications occur when they have a narrow spine canal or are knock-kneed or bow legged, this all requires surgery. People get this disease by a gene from their parents, it is a dominant gene so if one parent passes it down to the offspring the offspring will have achondroplasia. If both parents carry the gene and give it to the baby the infant will only live a few days at best.  A common misconception is that if a "little person" has babies with another "little person" it will most likely be a dwarf and have achondroplasia, but in all actuality about 80% of people who have achondroplasia both have normal sized parents.

Perthes Disesase

Perthes is a condition mostly in children, that happens when the blood supply to the hip is lost. The hip is a ball and socket joint and when the hip doesn't receive and adequate supply of blood they ball part of the bone dies. The area then becomes inflamed and irritated. Perthes disease has many stages of process. Treatment requires periods of immobilization and limitations on activities. Perthes disease is found in children 4-10 and is more seen in boys than girls. Its commonly referred to child arthritis in the hips. Symptoms include irritation and pain when the hip  is having spasms from the swelling around it. Pain can also be felt in the groin or knee and is more noticeable when rotating the hip. Rest is a must when you have intense pain. There is non surgical treatment which is taking anti inflammatory pills regularly and going to a physical therapist to do hip stretches to work on rotation. Surgical treatment is for the more extreme cases where the pain is very intense. The surgery establishes the proper alignment of the bones of the hip. In some cases the socket is made deeper. After the surgery children are put in a cast for 6 to 8 weeks from chest to toes. After the whole process, children go through physical therapy to learn how to only bear weight on their normal hip. X-rays of the bones will be taken throughout all the stages to make sure healing goes under way.

Ready or NOT

Mistakes are unwanted but do happen on very critical cases when the pressure is high and time is scarce. Surgeons are trained to be able to  make last minute decisions and to have a sense of problem solving and finding a solution. It was 2 a.m. on a winter morning. I had worked a 12 hour shift with no sleep and only one break for food. I have had cases back to back since I have been lined to take cases in the emergency room. I was in the middle of opening an knife victims abdomen when a women in critical condition was being rushed in. I left the knife victim to the other residence in the room and rushed to the woman being brought in. The first step was to make sure she could breath. She was not oxygenating well so I put an oxygen mask on her. Her air was very low so she needed to have  a breathing tube inserted into her. We could not get it in due to her low o2 sat. We lost her airway which could result in death if not fixed quickly. The only option left was to do a emergency tracheotomy; cutting a hole in the neck and insert a breathing tube directly into the trachea. The lighting was terrible and was not experienced enough on doing this. I was unsure how to make an incision in her neck; vertical or horizontal but I went ahead and did what I thought was best since I was trusted to do this. I made a three-inch horizontal cut and hit a vein. I didn't loose hold of a lot of blood but enough to fill her wound. Ball, the general surgeon walked in and immediately took over. She was with 3 minutes without oxygen and with 4 minutes the brain can be damaged. In thirty seconds ball inserted the tube and got her sat back up to 98. I felt very relieved that what I made a disaster did not turn out to be a disaster. If I could have slept a few hours, ate a meal and had a break before I proceeded with this case, maybe I could have succeeded  in what I failed at. Surgeons are sometimes believed to machine like figures that turn on and work well when ever they are needed. Surgeons are just like everyone else and are under a tremendous amount of stress while being hungry, dehydrated and sleep deprived. Surgeons save lives, and when they cant completely save them they do everything they can to help them. Next time you or someone you know has surgery, take the time to thank them for what they do.

Revamping the Criminal Mind!

Dr. Stanton E. Samenow has proposed a new approach to working with criminals that he learned from a study he assisted in.  Dr. Samuel Yochelson introduced this reverse way of thinking to him not long after he entered the field of psychology.  The first step in this new procedure is recognizing the myths of society and in the professional field of psychology about criminals.  First we need not view them as victims of some disease, every crime is planned out and executed based on that plan.  Secondly, although an environment that is not stable could contribute to the criminals way of thinking, it does not turn someone into a criminal. Finally, they do not become criminals because society rejected them. Dr. Samenow makes it very clear that as a criminal they reject society and the responsible citizens belief long before society deems them an outcast. Where we can start is understanding and recognizing these myths. This could lead to a better understanding of how they work so people can treat them and help the ones capable of change.