Forums → The Tavern → Your medical questions answered!
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In an effort to procrastinate doing everything...okay, really simply to revise my material for next semester when I start working at hospitals (but the first one sounds less dorky D
...anyway...
In an effort to revise my material, I'm inviting each and every one of you to ask any questions you had on the human body (and mind). As long as it's medical, it can be pretty much anything- and I'll attempt to answer it as quickly as possible, hopefully off the top of my head.
HAVE AT IT
- 327 Replies
I know a question about cracking knuckles was just answered, but I have a weird...disorder, I suppose.
Whenever I move my hand from an open "hi-five" position into a fist, the knuckles pop. Loudly. I can control this by not making a total fist and closing my hand slowly. It's kind of inconvenient whenever I forget though. I can do this movement and have the knuckles pop as many times as possible.
First, what could cause this? Every other person I know can only pop their knuckles once or twice a day, let a lone an unlimited amount of times simply by making a fist.
Second, are there any problems that could be associated with this?
@Zoot- Just a fact. You cant get arthritis from cracking your knuckles. Just throwing that out there.
The "joint crepitus post":
A study found that after many years of cracking habitual knuckle crackers may have reduced grip strength compared with people not cracking their knuckles.
I have also read this part, but would like to say that this is still controversial, as (forgive me for not providing a source on this) if I recall correctly, a separate study estimated that the amount of kinetic energy released in a joint crack was approximately 7% of that presumably required to cause acute damage to the joint. However since I can't remember the source I wouldn't want to be quoted on that.
The association with reduced knuckle cracking I imagine would be varied- most people who crack their knuckles, let alone most people as a whole, don't do much exercise, let alone isometric exercises.
@ Zootsuit_riot: on the previous page I mentioned joint capsule laxity or some anatomical idiosyncracy, which may be pertinent to your case. I have a similar issue with my shoulder- when internally and externally rotating against resistance they will, without fail, pop. Fortunately I don't have any functional issues, in fact my shoulder frequently bears my entire bodyweight under movement with ease, thus I would only be concerned if you experience pain, weakness or loss of movement.
Stuff from a while back that I missed:
I have a question. If my tooth is hurting and the dentist can not see anything wrong. What's wrong?
(Following tennisman24's reply) I'm not a dentist, but from what I know, if one can't see anything on visual inspection, there may still be decay, an abscess, or some nerve impingement present, which would have to be investigated with an X-ray (presumably orthopantogram in this case), blood cultures etc.
Hey Strop. If you get food poisoning, should you wait a couple of hours and if it doesn't get better, go to a hospital or just go to the hospital?
Most cases of food poisoning are self-limiting so fluids and bedrest is usually sufficient. However there are times they may be more severe. If at any time there is blood in your vomit or your bowel motions, which in this case will more likely appear dark or like coffee grounds, then I would recommend going to the hospital. Also if you are vomiting uncontrollably, as prolonged vomiting can cause traumatic injury to the oesophagus and stomach (it can also precipitate vomiting blood), or if going for some period of hours, dehydration.
Those would be the usual circumstances I can think of. So how long one would wait before going to a hospital depends on the symptoms. Blood warrants a fairly urgent admission. Uncontrolled vomiting should be addressed within hours. Diorrhea would depend on just how bad it is and whether one can tolerate oral fluids. But for the most part food poisoning should pass within a week or two- longer and something else funny might be going on.
And now for the WTF, i.e. Milos' post:
I don't even need to see the video to know what it's about- "weird alien baby" says it all. This is a congenital, terminal condition called harlequin ichthyosis, which is ultra-rare, not least because survival is even rarer.
Ichthyosis (if I recall correctly) is defined by the overproduction and distribution of keratin in the skin (one could call it a hyperplastic keratosis). This basically means the skin becomes super thick and hard, like armour, and loses its elasticity. The reason the baby is born looking like an alien (or, as the ichthyoid name suggests, a fish) is not only because the skin becomes scaly like armour, but also because it deforms and obscures the nasolabial folds (i.e. it covers up your nose), and also causes the conjunctiva to evert (hence the red eyes), and stops hair from growing.
Other complications include loss of mobility and eventually the inability to breathe, if one wasn't already suffocating from the lack of nose and mouth. As you can imagine, this would be the commonest cause of death in people with this disorder, and it would happen within days of birth.
However there are documented cases of survivors who have reached and even passed adolescence. It was from watching a documentary about some of these people that I happen to know about this condition, in fact. Treatment, currently, involves a gruelling process of aggressive bathing, exfoliation and applying topical lotions which takes 2 hours and is extremely painful (imagine sandpapering yourself until you bleed every day), but in this case, if they want to live, that's what they have to go through.
Why can a person blur their own vision? Is it because we have voluntary control over our optic nerve to some degree, or what?
Does cracking your nuckles realy increase your chance of arhritis?
Does cracking your nuckles realy increase your chance of arhritis?
Answered over the last two pages!
Why can a person blur their own vision? Is it because we have voluntary control over our optic nerve to some degree, or what?
A normal person can blur their own vision by changing the length of their focus which would affect the convergence point of the line of sight of each eye- think what happens when you cross your eyes. I think (this is off the top of my head and I haven't revised neurology yet) that the pupillary muscles (which directly control the focus of your lens) are controlled by the autonomic nervous system, so they aren't directly voluntarily controlled, but would change when one changes their focal distance or completely relaxes all their oculomotor muscles.
There's no way a person can directly control their optic nerve by definition- it's a nerve so it's purely there to convey information.
I know Stroppy'll prolly hate me for this, but . . . .
THREADUS REVIVUS!!!!
Anyway, I've been having lotsa of chronic sinusitis lately, and I'm going to get a nasal CT scan soon. I doubt I have a deviated septum or a polyp . . . so is the most likely cause of this just bad luck, or is there another possibility? Btw, all of my bouts with it have been severe and usually once a month, lasting for ~2 weeks. And I can't even count all the augmentin/omnicef/amoxicillin/penicillin I've been on since New Year's -_-
I have a question... Apparently when our appendix explodes it releases a toxic liquid.... why does it do this??
Help me Doctor Strawp! I don't want to get circumcised what should I do?
I have a question... Apparently when our appendix explodes it releases a toxic liquid.... why does it do this??
OO! OO! Pick me! I know this one!
The reason that the appendix releases a toxic liquid when it 'explodes' is because the toxic liquid is what makes it explode in the first place.
For starters, an appendix doesn't actually explode. It simply ruptures, but hopefully the doctors can get to it before this.
When the appendix, which is a tiny thing attatched to one of your intestines with no apparent purpose, gets infected it fills with a sort of pus which can make expand. It is like when you have a cut and it gets infected. However, this pus can't go anywhere besides into your intestine...so there is probably some body reaction which stops this from happening...and so the appendix swells and gets bigger.
When the appendix walls can no longer hold, they can split and release the pus into the surrounding organs.
Strop will need to clarify this...
how much % of brain are normal poeple using
All of it, I'm pretty sure, but not all of it for thinking. Your brain is what keeps your body running, and only about 10% of it is your cerebral cortex. The other 90% is used for other functions.
See Alt, I thought I heard something about humans not using very much...umm...
Ah, the 10 percent of our brain thing is a myth, we actually do use almost all of our brain in a day.
Clever alt.
Thread is locked!