Even though airlines are allowed to offer short times to make connections with different flights, travel experts recommend allowing two hours between domestic flight connections and three hours to make connections with international flights.
A US friend who broke a foot in Spain found out Medicare does not cover medical expenses outside the US.
Since poachers use social media photo tags to locate rare animals, safari travelers are advised to disable geotag functions on smartphones.
Might be a good idea to discourage a culture of begging by not handing out cash or goods while on vacation.
On a trip to a park where wild animals run free, stay in vehicles. Don't get out to take pictures like one visitor who was saved from attack when a friend called out to tell her a bear was approaching.
Be aware of surroundings when taking all photos. On trips, I've seen someone back up without noticing he was getting too close to the edge of a cliff, a giant wave knock down and swamp a couple, and a child about to step off a board walk into a volcano's flowing lava.
Showing posts with label illness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label illness. Show all posts
Saturday, May 26, 2018
Wednesday, February 3, 2016
Bacteria Talk to Each Other
Although the mosquito-borne Zika disease is a virus, its spread draws attention to how quickly illnesses from viruses or bacteria can be carried throughout the world. As many have observed, walls cannot keep diseases from entering any country.
Earlier posts, "Infection-Killing Bugs and Antibiotics" and "Global Search for New Antibiotics," have looked at various ideas for overcoming the growing resistance infections are showing to cures from existing antibiotics. Research by Helen E. Blackwell, a chemistry professor at the University of Wisconsin, adds to these findings.
Blackwell has learned bacteria send chemical signals to each other. These signals can cause bacteria, which are simple, tiny organisms with short life spans, to sense a quorum, meaning to form a group big enough to infect an animal or help a plant.
Once Blackwell discovered the communication properties of bacteria, she began tinkering with their signals in order to block their ability to cause infections. She also notes it could be possible to cause bacteria to start conversations that would do good things for their hosts.
I was interested to read in The Guardian (November 20, 2015) that, not only can one person catch an infection from another, but Chinese scientists have discovered a gene in a ring of DNA that passes resistance to the antibiotic, colistin, along with bacterial infections. In other words, in this case, humans infected with bacteria from other humans also are infected with resistance to one particular antibiotic cure.
Earlier posts, "Infection-Killing Bugs and Antibiotics" and "Global Search for New Antibiotics," have looked at various ideas for overcoming the growing resistance infections are showing to cures from existing antibiotics. Research by Helen E. Blackwell, a chemistry professor at the University of Wisconsin, adds to these findings.
Blackwell has learned bacteria send chemical signals to each other. These signals can cause bacteria, which are simple, tiny organisms with short life spans, to sense a quorum, meaning to form a group big enough to infect an animal or help a plant.
Once Blackwell discovered the communication properties of bacteria, she began tinkering with their signals in order to block their ability to cause infections. She also notes it could be possible to cause bacteria to start conversations that would do good things for their hosts.
I was interested to read in The Guardian (November 20, 2015) that, not only can one person catch an infection from another, but Chinese scientists have discovered a gene in a ring of DNA that passes resistance to the antibiotic, colistin, along with bacterial infections. In other words, in this case, humans infected with bacteria from other humans also are infected with resistance to one particular antibiotic cure.
Friday, February 13, 2015
Play, Computer Connections, and Pets Come to the Aid of Sick Kids
Years ago when my four-year-old daughter was in the hospital with an infection, there was a room reserved for play, where needles, pills and painful procedures were banned. She really perked up when she learned to play her first video game.
Nowadays, a new pilot project designed by Gokul Krishman, a Ph.D. candidate at Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt University, is bringing a mobile creative space to young patients who can't leave their hospital rooms. Drawing on the idea of the MakerMovement, a cart carries a 3-D printer, tablet computer on a swivel arm, a circuit board that cycles lights through the rainbow, and bins filled with items kids can use to create solutions to problems they face in the hospital. Of course, patients can communicate room to room using the computer.
One patient wanted to stop nurses from just entering her room without knocking, so she fitted a tissue box with wires and switches and posted a sign on her door that read, "Ring My Doorbell." Another stopped nurses from waking sleeping patients by making a Nurse Night Light that only lit up the toilet and trash areas of his room.
Developed in Israel, a new "Sesame" Google Nexus Phone enables those with certain disabilities to mAake telephone calls by using gestures and voice controls.
The later post, "Want to Reach Global Citizens?" reports on the free AFLAC ducks the insurance company gives hospitalized children to help them use emojis to tell the medical staff and visitors how they feel.
Even back in 2002, before there was Skype, Len Forkas worked with a school system's head of technology to equip his sick son's home bedroom and fourth grade classroom with computers and cameras and an internet connection. Microsoft's NetMeeting software enabled the boy with acute lymphoblastic leukemia to see his classroom and to talk with friends every morning and after recess. Based on this initial experience, Hopecam (hopecam.org) now works with schools to cut through red tape to provide kids homebound with
cancer with tablet computers, web cameras, and high speed internet connections that enable them to participate in classroom activities and interact with their friends. Sometimes, even if a child only Skypes for a half hour with classmates each week, parents report that this little spot of sunshine makes a big difference.
Julia Havey, a nurse at the Marcella Niehoff School of Nursing at Loyola University in Chicago,
observed that brief interactions with pets also could make a big difference for a group of her patients. If they received daily visits from specially trained dogs for five to 15 minutes while they were recovering from total joint-replacement surgery, they required 28% less oral pain medication than those in a group similar in age, gender, ethnicity, length of hospital stay, and the same type of total joint replacement who did not receive animal therapy visits. Havey concluded that therapy animals can have a positive influence on human recovery, because the animal-human connection reduces stress and generates a sense of well-being. Indeed, other research has found that interaction with pets decreases the level of the cortisol stress hormone and increases endorphins, considered the happiness hormone.
The organization, Dogs on Call (dogsoncall.org), provides pet therapy dogs not only to hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and hospices, but also to libraries, dorms, and schools where students are stressed, especially during final exams.
(For other examples of ways to improve the lives of sick kids, see the blog post, "Robots for Good.")
Nowadays, a new pilot project designed by Gokul Krishman, a Ph.D. candidate at Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt University, is bringing a mobile creative space to young patients who can't leave their hospital rooms. Drawing on the idea of the MakerMovement, a cart carries a 3-D printer, tablet computer on a swivel arm, a circuit board that cycles lights through the rainbow, and bins filled with items kids can use to create solutions to problems they face in the hospital. Of course, patients can communicate room to room using the computer.
One patient wanted to stop nurses from just entering her room without knocking, so she fitted a tissue box with wires and switches and posted a sign on her door that read, "Ring My Doorbell." Another stopped nurses from waking sleeping patients by making a Nurse Night Light that only lit up the toilet and trash areas of his room.Developed in Israel, a new "Sesame" Google Nexus Phone enables those with certain disabilities to mAake telephone calls by using gestures and voice controls.
The later post, "Want to Reach Global Citizens?" reports on the free AFLAC ducks the insurance company gives hospitalized children to help them use emojis to tell the medical staff and visitors how they feel.
Even back in 2002, before there was Skype, Len Forkas worked with a school system's head of technology to equip his sick son's home bedroom and fourth grade classroom with computers and cameras and an internet connection. Microsoft's NetMeeting software enabled the boy with acute lymphoblastic leukemia to see his classroom and to talk with friends every morning and after recess. Based on this initial experience, Hopecam (hopecam.org) now works with schools to cut through red tape to provide kids homebound with
cancer with tablet computers, web cameras, and high speed internet connections that enable them to participate in classroom activities and interact with their friends. Sometimes, even if a child only Skypes for a half hour with classmates each week, parents report that this little spot of sunshine makes a big difference.
Julia Havey, a nurse at the Marcella Niehoff School of Nursing at Loyola University in Chicago,
observed that brief interactions with pets also could make a big difference for a group of her patients. If they received daily visits from specially trained dogs for five to 15 minutes while they were recovering from total joint-replacement surgery, they required 28% less oral pain medication than those in a group similar in age, gender, ethnicity, length of hospital stay, and the same type of total joint replacement who did not receive animal therapy visits. Havey concluded that therapy animals can have a positive influence on human recovery, because the animal-human connection reduces stress and generates a sense of well-being. Indeed, other research has found that interaction with pets decreases the level of the cortisol stress hormone and increases endorphins, considered the happiness hormone.
The organization, Dogs on Call (dogsoncall.org), provides pet therapy dogs not only to hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and hospices, but also to libraries, dorms, and schools where students are stressed, especially during final exams.
(For other examples of ways to improve the lives of sick kids, see the blog post, "Robots for Good.")
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