Archive for August, 2008

Which is more important?

Wednesday, August 27th, 2008

Modern articles are much better even than modern blogs. Yet, when you look at these books, you are confronted by mountains of facts about increasingly minute processes within the body. Instead of simple engineering analogies of muscles and cables, human knowledge has become obsessed by the identification of ever more complex chemical and molecular processes. This is my wood-for-the-trees moment.

Unfortunately, many partnerships do not get treatment for the underlying causes of the dysfunction. Although most will know that the dysfunction can be a symptom of diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, fear of exposure may force the couples or groups to ignore or deny the problem until it is too late for the easy treatment represented by cialis to continue on its own. By then, the chances of an effective treatment for the underlying cause may be remote.

This is two completely different cultural imperatives in conflict. Men are socially conditioned to believe that they will always be able to have an erection. Any publicly acknowledged failure means shame. Yet they are only allowed to have erections in certain very carefully defined social situations. Step outside those situations and you are into potentially disapproved or even criminal territory. In theory, doctors are bound by duties of confidentiality, but the fear of exposure means that many men and their partners do not get treatment when the research shows that couples who are in love and share a strong commitment to their relationship are the ones who would most benefit from that treatment.

Erectile dysfunction can now be described in terms of complex chemical interactions and illustrated with wonderful diagrams. There are still all kinds of analogies with hydraulic engineering. However, it is not a part of the medical books to observe and describe the entirely human context in which the erection is supposed to operate. A single male may masturbate. A heterosexual couple may engage in sexual intercourse. A homosexual couple may offer mutual manual satisfaction, oral or anal intercourse. Multiple partners may engage in group sex. Many different social taboos would potentially be breached in any more detailed explanation. The common denominators are that the party or parties are expressing their sexuality in the ways that give them the most pleasure. If you gain a lot of pleasure, you gain a lot of problems when you don’t get this pleasure.

Will medical treatment be asked for and a success? In part, this will be determined by the nature of the relationship. Where the relationship is socially disapproved, the man may well not seek treatment at all because of fear. A physical examination might reveal different types of sexual activity, or a chance remark in the consultation might expose the forbidden practices. This is ironic. If the parties to the relationship have a strong mutual commitment and lovingly support each other, the likelihood is that the co-operation between all involved would produce excellent medical outcomes. Well-established sexual intimacy and commitment preserve the right level of desire and motivate everyone to getting a solution that works well. Were it not for online pharmacies and their willingness to supply medications like cialis without prescription, many partnerships might never be able to get appropriate treatment of any kind.

Xanax is the most popular benzodiazepine in the US

Tuesday, August 26th, 2008

Every year, Xanax has been winning the prize in the “most prescribed” category.

The US Government now accepts that prescription medications are routinely abused. You only have to go into the emergency departments of hospitals to see the truth of this. In 2005, there were more than 2 million admissions caused by the non-medical use of drugs. One of the reasons for this is the easy availability of drugs that can give you a “high” both over-the-counter and through the internet. Add in the continuous barrage of advertisements for drugs, and people are persuaded to take FDA-approved medications without worrying about the consequences.

Xanax is the type of medication that does help only in the short periods of time. But it’s not helpful to see drugs as the only solution. Yes, xanax relieves anxiety, but you don’t want to become an addict. You need to change yourself. This drug gives you a breathing space. Use that opportunity to get counseling and therapy. In the medium to long term, psychological support is the way to learn how to control your fear and worry. Live life the natural way, don’t pay endlessly for “help” through a bottle of tablets.

What can we do about pain?

Tuesday, August 19th, 2008

You can ask anyone who suffers the pain in his back what did he doing when the injury occured. It is often something trivial. I twisted awkwardly as I was getting out of the car or as I was lifting the bag of groceries out of the trunk. When the individuals are more sporty, they may tell you about the tennis match they were on the point of winning or the strikes they were racking up at the bowling alley. But the fairly consistent theme is that pain always follows an injury.

But, more often than not, this confuses cause and effect. Most of the time we have a condition that is slowly reducing our mobility. In everyday life we don’t think about problem until a little twist will call our attention. This is not to deny that some people do have traffic accidents in which their necks and spine are damaged, or play sports and pick up injuries. But, most people have a moment when the minor problem becomes more obvious. It is easy to link the cause of the pain with the event and not recognize that the pain has been slowly creeping up on us for months.

What happens then? Great amounts of money were spent to pursue people that pain is a serious problem. Even though you might think it is obvious, pharmaceutical companies have to teach you that you solve the problem of pain by buying a medication like ultram. Wherever you look, advertisements sell the idea of science as the best treatment for pain. And there is a lot of science that backs up this idea. Thousands of people have been through clinical trials for medications like ultram and have reported reductions in pain with few side effects. This is all intended to reassure the public. “Look”, it says, “you don’t have to walk around like you’re treading on eggshells. We know pain is terrible but you don’t have to be afraid anymore. Just take this pill.”

But what used to happen in the “good old days”? If pain had become too severe to bear, people started to use narcotics like opium and its derivatives. It was notoriously addictive and many would only consider using it when there were no alternatives. The rest of the time, people lived with the pain. This is not what modern capitalism wants us to remember. The pharmaceutical industry needs us to keep refilling the medicine cabinet. But pain management was as much art as science. It varied from relaxation techniques to reduce tension in the muscles and to control fear (when you anticipate pain, fear magnifies the slightest twinge), to religious groups like the Christian Scientists who believed you can transcend pain through prayer.