HEALTHWATCH : Patient Grows Hair--and Another Problem
What if every day were a bad hair day? That apparently is the case for a 39-year-old woman thought to be the first documented victim of “acquired uncombable hair”--not to be confused with congenital uncombable hair syndrome.
Doctors at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, in a letter to the American Medical Assn.’s Archives of Dermatology, outlined what they called the first documented case in which the condition was acquired, rather than inherited. The Cleveland-area woman developed the condition (also known as pili trianguli et canaliculi ) after being treated for hair loss with spironolactone, a diuretic sometimes used to increase potassium in the body.
The good news was that she did lose less hair and grow more. The bad news was, it looked awful and was too tangled to comb.
People with pili trianguli et canaliculi have dry, coarse blond or light brown hair that stands straight out from the head and looks wildly disordered, although it is not brittle.
The woman, who has had the condition for about two years, was taken off the diuretic and treated with steroids. But so far her hair has not improved. Conditioners haven’t helped either.
*
Panic Situations: A recent study on panic attacks conducted for the National Institute of Mental Health found that:
* 7% of Americans have suffered panic attacks sometime in their lives.
* 1% of respondents suffer from the more severe panic disorder--where sudden, fearful spells that occur for no reason can be mistaken for a heart attack or other life-threatening medical situation.
* Panic attacks plague twice as many women as men.
* The lower the level of formal education, the higher the likelihood of having a panic attack.
*
Some dry skin facts:
* Dry skin is the most common cause of itchiness.
* Dry skin increases with age.
* The legs tend to be the first area to dry up.
* Dry skin is more common in the winter.
* Moisturizers work best when applied directly after bathing.
* Avoid harsh soaps that dry out skin.
* Avoid excessive bathing when you have dry skin.
*
Treating Angina: Unstable angina, a disease that can be a precursor to a heart attack and sends 500,000 Americans a year to the hospital, is often inappropriately treated, a new government report says.
Some patients are overtreated, which causes undue expense; others are undertreated.
Angina occurs when arteries that carry oxygen to the heart are partially blocked.
If the blockages are small and the symptoms little more than fleeting pain after exertion, doctors call it stable angina. When the blockages are larger and symptoms occur when the individual is resting or even asleep, it is termed unstable angina.
Guidelines from the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute propose that exercise stress tests and electrocardiograms be used before resorting to more invasive diagnostic methods, such as cardiac catheterization or angiography.
The guidelines also recommend first calling an ambulance and then your doctor if chest pain lasts longer than 20 minutes; pain accompanies weakness, nausea or fainting; pain is not helped by three nitroglycerin tablets; it is the worst pain you’ve ever had.
