OSTEOPOROSIS

Osteoporosis
Osteoporosis is a very common condition in the present world , perhaps because we are living longer. Osteoporosis in simple language means fragile bones. It is more common in females. One in Five females suffer from this after the age of fifty, the recent study done in Australia showed that there were 1.3 million osteoporotic women in Australia compared with 50 million women in USA in 2010. 80 thousand women each year in Australia, suffer from a fracture from minor trauma, usually in the arm , hip and spine.
Billions of dollars are spent on health budgets to look after these women and men.
And the misery they suffer from the complications are immeasurable.
Osteoporosis is a preventable disease and we can save so much pain and suffering and cost if we act early.
This prevention really should be started in childhood, its like the foundation of a house, the better , the longer the house will stand. Like the repair of the house , the body also needs constant care to prevent osteoporosis.
The four important factors that are adequate nutrition, calcium, vitaminD and physical activity. 
In very young children up to the age of 4 you need 500mgs of calcium per day, then in adolescents about 700mgs and teenagers about 1000mgs. In older women the need increases again to 1300mgs per day.
Five to ten minutes of sport in the sun each day is enough to keep their vitamin d levels up to around 50units.
So as you can see it is very simple to maintain your bone health.
The best bone health is around late twenty's and it is called peak bone mass.
So if you have your best bone density at that age, your risk of osteoporosis is 30% less in old age.
There are some risk factors which increase the risk of osteoporosis , the most important being genetics, a frail figure, smoking, long term use of steroids, for example in Asthma, early menopause, poor gonadal activity(poor development).
The diagnosis is best made by bone density scan, called "dexa scan".
More tests are performed in complicated cases to study the calcium metabolism, and hormones involved in bone formation.
The treatment is simple, keep your calcium, Vitamin D and exercise up. 
The drugs required fall in to two categories' one is to stop the bone destruction, and the other is to make the bones remodel. The bones get repaired all the time by the process of absorption and remodelling .
Hormone replacement in women is the best treatment for prevention and management of osteoporosis, except where this cannot be given. 
It is very useful to take HRT in early menopause preferably before the age of sixty.
DO NOT BE AFRAID of HRT or MHT, do not suffer and enjoy life.
There are many other drugs available, for the management of osteoporosis, and they fall under the group of drugs called anti absorptive, they are called Bisphonates.
Nothing is worse than lying in a hospital with a broken hip, hanging in a sling, counting days, don't let it happen, do not be anti HRT, you cannot treat osteoporosis by calcium , vitamin d only.
To build a house you need a builder which is the HRT and you need concrete which is Calcium and Vitamin D.

"HOT FLASHES" Timing is everything in managing them. So how old are you today?. and you couldn't sleep all night yesterday because of them. So now is the right time to start HRT (Hormone Replacement Therapy), take the real diamond (the proper commercial drug) not naturopathic or homeopathic. They have not been scientifically tested and they do not really help. While all HRT carries some risks, but they are very useful in giving you a new lease of life, no hot flashes, good sleep, and happy sexual interludes. It prevents the long term side affects of menopause such as Osteoporosis , Bladder control, and newly diagnosed Diabetes. If you are between 45 and 60, now is the best time to start to enjoy life. See a doctor who is familiar with all forms of HRT and have it tailored to your needs. Use of custom-compounded bio identical therapy is not recommended. Special care has to be taken if there is risk of venous thromboembolism, stroke, ischemic, heart disease. The risk of breast cancer in women over fifty years is a complex issue and needs very special attention. In women with premature or surgical menopause HRT, should be given up to the age of normal menopause. There is a lot more to menopause than this brief summary. DO NOT BE AFRAID of HRT or MHT, do not suffer and enjoy life.

it is getting important to study vitamin d levels in pregnant women these days , although no rickets is seen as was seen 100 yeara ago. roughly 3 percnt of women required manupulation for delivery. many had obstructed labour, still birth and a fistula. it was a sad state of affairs unfotunately some of it still goes on . In my working life in 1968 1 had to deliver a very severely ricketty woman . almost doubled up . i wondered how she ever got pregnant. i was unable to examine her . the baby was alive . I decided to do a caesarian . the normal lower caesirian could not be performed . a classical caesarian was done. this can be dangerous for future . this was in the city of new delhi. The god was not kind to them , the baby was grossly malformed incompatible with life. I hope this will never ever happen again I am pleased to note that a lot of work is being done with reference to women and vitamin D.

Tongue Tie

Underneath the tongue there is a string of tissue that attaches the tongue to the mouth. If this tissue is short then there is difficulty for the tongue to move around and then this causes difficulty in breast feeding,and later on maybe speech. The baby has trouble latching on to the breast and slips off while feeding. The baby may not gain weight. The mother gets frustrated and gets painful nipples. The diagnoses is usually made at the routine intial examination of the newborn baby,by putting the finger in the mouth and feeling the cord like structure below the tongue. It occurs in 4 to 11 percent of babies. Some doctors do not believe that this needs any treatment,however if there are feeding diffuculties it is easier to snip it. A very fine scissors is used and the baby is supported so it does not move. No anesthesia is required. There is no bleeding. Sometimes there is a blood vessel in this and you have to be careful to watch this. I have generally found that there is immediate improvement after the tongue tie is snipped. Mostly a frustrated mother leaves my office with a big smile.

vitamins and minerals

We are all familiar with words about vitamins and mineral. Are they really needed, in the societies where we have plenty of food and a wide variety of vitamins and minerals are organic compounds required in very small quantities for cell function and also for growth developement and body metabolism . This keeps us in good health.

there are 13 types of vitamins that we know so far they can be divided into two groups fat-soluble and water-soluble. The fat-solubl A,E,D,and K.The water-soluble ones are B group and these contain B1 B2 B3 B5 B6 B9(folic acid) B12.

Normally if you have milk green leafy vegetables fruits legumes meat fish nuts all your vitamin needs are met.Some of these vitamins are synthesised within over body for example vitamin K it is synthesised in the large intestines by microbes. Bile salts are needed for this absorption you may have heard how newborn babies are given vitamin K at birth this is because their gut is sterile and therefore they cannot synthesise vitamin K.

Vitamin K is required by the liver for production of clotting factors and its deficiency can lead to bleeding problems. Babies born with vitamin K deficiency can get the bleeding disease of the newborn and therefore it is recommended that newborn babies are given vitamin K in the dose of 1 mg at birth.

The other important vitamin is Folic acid in pre pregnancy stage in the dose of the 400 µg per day from three months prior to getting pregnant and 12 weeks during pregnancy. This has been shown to prevent fetal abnormalities particularly of the nervous system in the newborn.

Besides these two special needs if we eat a healthy diet including fruits and vegetables it meets all our requirements of vitamins and minerals we need not to spend hundreds of dollars.

SAY A PRAYER

Say a prayer to lord Ganesh as in Hindu mythology, it stops all the obstacles in your progess.
lets me ask for his blessings as I start my blog today . you will hear from me again . bye for now .
Asha