IGIHE

Category: Health

  • Sex and coffee raise risk of brain rupture


    If you have a brain aneurysm, drinking coffee, having sex or even getting angry may boost the risk of it rupturing, a new study suggests.

    Although the risk is extremely small, people who have aneurysms should be careful, said Dr Sahil Parikh, assistant professor of medicine at University Hospitals Case Medical Centre in Cleveland.

    “For those patients who do have aneurysms, it would be advisable to avoid those behaviours,” said Parikh, who’s familiar with the study findings.

    Aneurysms occur when the wall of an artery weakens and bulges out.

    They can occur anywhere in the body, but are particularly dangerous in the brain, where they can cause a haemorrhagic (bleeding) stroke if they burst.

    In the study, published online May 5 in the journal Stroke, researchers asked 250 patients who had suffered a ruptured brain aneurysm about their exposure to 30 possible triggers before the haemorrhage.

    The investigators found that being startled raised the risk of burst aneurysm in someone who already has an aneurysm by the highest level — 23-fold. Anger boosted the risk by 6 times.

    Other things raised the level, too : Coffee (2 times), cola (3 times), straining for defecation (7 times), sexual intercourse (11 times), nose blowing and vigorous physical activity (both 2 times).

    Seems to be higher blood pressure, said study lead author Dr. Monique H.M. Vlak, since all eight activities cause blood pressure to rise.

    Vlak said about two per cent of the population has a brain aneurysm. They are often symptomless and frequently harmless.

    “You shouldn’t be scared because the likelihood of this happening is extremely rare,” said Parikh. “I would encourage patients not to worry excessively about it and consult with their doctor if they feel at risk of an aneurysm.”

    Even if you do have an aneurysm, it’s unlikely to bother you. “We think most aneurysms never rupture,” said Vlak, a neurologist at the Utrecht Stroke Centre at University Medical Centre in Utrecht, the Netherlands.

  • Number of AIDS patients on ARV treatment rises

    Additional 4,187 AIDs patients in Rwanda have registered for Anti-Retroviral treatment since 2009.

     This has increased the number of patients on ARVs by 5.8% to 76,726, this year, from 72,539 in 2009, according a recent report released by the National AIDS Commission (CNLS).

     CNLS officials attribute the increase to the nationwide sensitisation programs aimed at creating more awareness on HIV/AIDS.

    Rwandans living with HIV are estimated at 3 percent or 300,000 in a population of 10 million plus, the report says.

     Currently, the number of sites that offer ARVs is estimated at 517 countrywide.

     The report further shows that out of 1,393,081 people who took HIV test, 34,239 were positive.

     The report says that women aged between 30-44 years are increasingly taking the lead in accessing treatment.

     The report says that the ABC strategy, which means Abstinence, Faithfulness and Condom, is bearing fruits in educating Rwandans about the HIV spread.

  • No need for mistrust in legalising marijuana for medical purposes

    June last year laid the groundwork for The drafting of a law seeking to establish the rules and regulations in the use of narcotics in our healthcare system. This provoked a lot of controversy due to the implications behind using marijuana for medical purposes, a substance that is illegal in many countries around the world.

    The use of the drug in the medical sense proposed the possibility of it having inadvertent consequences in its regulation and control, perhaps promoting the use of recreational marijuana.

    This move undoubtedly raised a couple of eyebrows with claims of Rwanda being the only nation in Africa to do so. However, the draft law is nothing out of the ordinary. This would be because of the very well known and widespread use of narcotics in the medical world. Morphin and Opium, which are both illegal substances are drugs whose properties are used occasionally to relieve pain or anesthetise.

    Such drugs have resultantly made a substantial contribution to the pharmaceutical industry. Despite its negative reputation, marijuana has been proven to have medical properties that are used in the treatment of many diseases and conditions such as cancer or AIDS.

    “Marijuana is classified as a psyhoctropic drug and the healthcare system in Rwanda, which is under the convention with the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) in Vienna, simply drafted a law in the parliament that would help in the regulation and control in the use of this drug,” says Alex Ruzindana, the officer in charge of Pharmaceutical Information Pharmacy Task Force within the Ministry of Health.

    “It has completely nothing to do with the legalisation of marijuana. It is strictly for medicinal and research purposes. In fact, it is not even administered as a herbal drug , but rather its components are used and integrated into other substances making its administration come in other forms. ”

    According to Ruzindana, the law is in concord with the INCB, and its infringement would therefore go beyond the realm of the medicine thus leaving the issue to be dealt with by the authorities. He adds that medical Marijuana would only be prescribed by a specialised physician and its use would be significantly limited.

    “Other countries across the world have taken a further step by establishing pharmacies that specialise only in the sale of medical marijuana that come in various forms. But we have not implemented that at all. The use of this drug is only exclusive to the prescription given out by the doctor according to the patients needs,” says Ruzindana.

     He advises that due to the strictness in the prescription of the medicine, misconceptions should not arise when it comes to the consummation of this drug. Marijuana remains highly illegal outside the medical world and its distribution in limited dosages will continue to remain exclusive to the medical domain.