Mothers.

From the moment a woman falls/becomes pregnant, you start what becomes a lifefong run of 'advice'. Mostly unwarrented and unwanted, sometimes downright hostile.  I have a few friends who got very dodgy looks and tut tuts from people (fellow colleagues, a lot women) whilst they worked up to the end of their pregnancy.  Heaven help them if they went to the pub, even if only to get out of the house.  Disapproving looks everywhere.

This state of affairs does not stop at birth either.   There are a myriad of things to make her feel guilty about too.   To breastfeed or not.  When to start solids.   What to do when they're ill.  If they get a bit hyper/noisy/cry in public.  Behaviour, potty training, reading, friends, school...well, you get my point. 

Here's one more log onto the old fire.  An article about a study on expectant mothers.

"Preliminary research suggests that feelings of anxiety and stress throughout pregnancy may contribute to subtle changes in fetal development....During the stress test, the women experienced increases in their blood pressure and heart rate. On average, however, no increase or decrease in heart rates of the fetuses was seen. But when the team of researchers singled out data for fetuses belonging to mothers who reported higher levels of anxiousness on a day-to-day basis, they found that their heart rates were higher than those of fetuses whose mothers reported less anxiety. "The long term implications about fetal development, if there are any, would be subtle," she added. "

I really wish they'd make up their mind.   The final paragraph states- "This indicates that variations in women's emotion-based physiological activity can affect the fetus and may be centrally important to fetal development."

Monk C. Effects of Women's Stress-Elicited Physiological Activity and Chronic Anxiety on Fetal Heart Rate. Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics. 2003; Vol. 24(Issue 1): pgs 32-38.

ABSTRACT.

This study examined the effects of pregnant women's acute stress reactivity and chronic anxiety on fetal heart rate (HR). Thirty-two healthy third trimester pregnant women were instrumented to monitor continuous electrocardiography, blood pressure, respiration, and fetal HR. Subjects completed the trait anxiety subscale of the State Trait Anxiety Index, then rested quietly for a 5-minute baseline period, followed by a 5-minute Stroop color-word matching task and a 5-minute recovery period. Fetal HR changes during women's recovery from a stressful task were associated with the women's concurrently collected HR and blood pressure changes (r = .63, p < .05). Fetal HR changes during recovery, as well as during women's exposure to the Stroop task, were correlated with their mothers' trait anxiety scores (r = .39, p < .05 and r = -.52, p < .01, respectively). Finally, a combination of measures of women's cardiovascular activity during recovery and trait anxiety scores accounted for two thirds of the variance in fetal HR changes during the same recovery period (R2 = .69, p < .001). The results from this study link changes in fetal behavior with acute changes in women's cardiovascular activity after psychological stress and women's anxiety status. This indicates that variations in women's emotion-based physiological activity can affect the fetus and may be centrally important to fetal development.

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9:45:22 PM    

The glorious knee

Don't be deceived by your knees. They might look incredibly simple and you might not ever think about them even. They take a lot of strain over the years, and if you knew what jogging on a hard pavement does... ouch.  Ever seen a great dancer? Well, it's all in the knees.

The medical examination of the knee illustrates how versatile this simple hinge joint is.  When done thoroughly, it takes a good 10 minutes.  The knee doesn't only flex and extend, there is some lateral rotation too and lots of gliding movement.  Like so many parts of the body, you don't notice it's there until something goes very wrong. 

Take sports injuries for example.  The most common is that of the anterior cruciate ligament.  Due to the natural diva tendencies of surgeons ;-) there is much debate about whether or not surgery is indicated for repair. One thing is certain, female athletes are more at risk.

For more resources on athletic injuries try OMNI

A less dry site on the knee specifically try Kneeguru

9:33:55 PM    

Lung Cancer.

A formula to calulate lung cancer risk. Hopefully not a ploy by various companies to jusitify declining specific investigations.  Lung cancer is essentially a clinical diagnosis which should be CONFIRMED by such investigations.

Scottish guidelines are found here

9:31:31 PM    

Women in Control

I feel rather hard done by, not having this experience in OBGYN.

Women in Control- BMJ article

I have had some volunteer experience at a Brook Advisory Centre late last year, I found it invaluable and am sorry my OBGYN block was first. I would have taken so much more out of it then.

6:27:21 PM    

Obesity

Looking at the statistics below, the increase is found in the obese categories for both men and women.  The proportion of people in the overweight category has remained more or less the same over the past 20 years.   Not too that the most recent data in this article is from 1994.

  (BMJ 2002;Vol 325:pg 757-761)

Currently:

1 in 5 people are obese (BMI* >30).  This is a three-fold increase over 20 years.  

• >66% of men are overweight/obese
• >50% of women are overweight/obese

Succintly put, being obese leads to many health complications.  The four most common are-

• Heart Disease (including angina and heart attacks)
• Type II Diabetes
• Hypertension
• Osteoarthritis

The estimated medical consequences include-

• an estimated 18 million sick days a year
• 30,000 obesity related deaths a year
• a reduction in life expectancy, on average of 9 years
• 1/2 billion in NHS costs every year

For more information, advice and statistics:

Tackling Obesity in England (pdf from the National Audit Office)

Aim for a Healthy Weight

WHO- Nutrition

* BMI- Body Mass Index.  Weight (kg)/height (m)²

5:38:47 PM