Backache is pain, soreness, or stiffness occurring anywhere in the back. Backache is almost as common in children as in adults. Almost as soon as children are old enough to complain of pain and to explain where the pain is, they complain of occasional backaches. Backache may occur more frequently during adolescence. Most back pains [...]

Type A-ngry Cardiologists used to say that being a high-pressured, ladder-climbing, positively type A kind of guy was enough to put you in your own risk category for an early departure. In one study of 1,305 men, Harvard researchers found that anger caused a two- to threefold increase in risk for heart disease. Here’s how [...]

When his number was up, Timothy Leary, the king of the counterculture, embraced dying as one of the greatest journeys man can make. Just after midnight on May 31, 1996, surrounded by close friends, Leary went into the great beyond. His last words were, “Why not?… Yeah.” Leary had long expressed interest in being put [...]

Control of infections Many of the most common infections around the world can now be prevented by vaccination. The notable exception is malaria. Public health programmes, if strictly adhered to, can prevent epidemics of almost all the childhood and most adult infections. It is almost impossible to prevent new influenza-virus epidemics, and genital herpes, gonorrhea [...]

Many household tasks can be broken up into simple, step-by-step instructions. Cooking is a favourite activity in many day hospitals and day centres because it is not too complex, does not involve much walking around, and people often have a feeling of satisfaction when they can see what they have achieved, and also eat it. [...]

The onset of dementia in a person changes all sorts of roles within the family, from the more obvious ‘children caring for parents’ situation to that in which a spouse has to take on the role traditionally undertaken in their family by the sufferer until he or she became ill. The role of physical carer [...]

If it is necessary for a person with dementia to go into hospital, whether for a short-term admission or longer-term care, it is very likely that all sorts of worries and fears will spring up in the minds of relatives. Much of this is caused by the unfamiliarity with the hospital routine and the fear [...]

One of the most important features that helps to differentiate MID from other types of dementia is the stepwise nature of its progression. A person with multiple infarct dementia will function at a reasonably constant level between strokes, deteriorating suddenly each time there is another small stroke causing death of brain tissue. Very often there [...]

It is commonly assumed that most people with severe dementia live in institutions, especially hospitals. Nothing is further from the truth. Most studies that have looked at this have discovered that only 15-20 per cent or less of people with dementia are living permanently in an institution, and that a large proportion of those who [...]