Zouk Surgical

  Interplast Nurses in Saris 
  Originally uploaded by interplast.

Jalandhar, India - Seth Mazow, Interplast staff:  Dawn Lambie made such an impression as a nurse educator on the local nursing students that they wanted her and the rest of the nurses to go to a candle lighting ceremony at the nursing school. To my knowledge, it was the first time that Interplast nurses have been so honored.

Some of the lecturers came to the hotel early to dress up the nurses in traditional saris for the ceremony. They looked stunning.

Jalandhar, India - Seth Mazow, Interplast staff:  I talked with some of the nursing students after one of Dawn’s lectures and asked them about what they learned.  It’s a little hard to hear since the rest of the students were leaving the lecture room and we couldn’t really break away to a quieter place.  Sorry!

  Nisha In The Recovery Room 
  Originally uploaded by interplast.

Jalandhar, India - Seth Mazow, Interplast staff:  Nisha’s surgery went very well. Even though she is wearing a brace, you can see that the burn contracture has been released and her head is now free from her chest.

Garlic may add flavor to your meals but if you think that it would help you reducing your cholesterol level too, then you are wrong. Actually, this idea of researchers from Stanford University, California has come out refuting the previous assumptions according to which garlic may help reducing cholesterol level. According to the report published, whether it was raw garlic, aged garlic or garlic extract, it was not associated in any way with cholesterol level.

Before bringing out this report researchers studied 192 volunteers with moderately high levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), also called ‘bad’ cholesterol, by dividing them into four groups. One group was provided with raw garlic, one received Garlicin powdered garlic, one received Kyolic aged garlic and one received a placebo. Finally, results that came stated that it wasn’t found that garlic intake helped reducing cholesterol level. Touting ineffectiveness of garlic against increased cholesterol level, Christopher Gardner, a Stanford professor of medicine who led the study said:

It (garlic) just doesn’t work. If garlic was going to work, in one form or another, then it would have worked in our study. The lack of effect was compelling and clear.

This is definitely a significant finding but its reliability is still ambiguous because previous studies (which had touted garlic quite effective against cholesterol) had also wrapped their findings with scientific facts. Still this fact can’t be spurned away that the promulgation of this new idea is a serious concussion to the older ones. To know precisely what previous studies stated about garlic and cholesterol association just go through the following links:-

• Garlic Cholesterol - Lower cholesterol with garlic

• Garlic and ‘bad’ cholesterol

• Cholesterol Lowering Benefits from Garlic

• Garlic Helps To Reduce Cholesterol in Rats

Via: Reuters

Regular intake of common painkillers like paracetamol, aspirin, ibuprofen and acetaminophen may put you at higher risk of stroke and heart attack by pumping up your blood pressure level.

U.S. researchers expressed this concern after conducting an intensive study, which tracked about 16,000 male volunteers in a long-term research project. Main facts springing out of this study were as following:-

1. Those who took 15 pills per week, regardless of type, have almost a 50 per cent risk of higher blood pressure than those who do not.

2. Those diagnosed with hypertension – high blood pressure – are at greater risk of stroke, heart attack and disease, and kidney failure.

3. Those taking paracetamol, aspirin or NSAIDs six or seven days per week were respectively 34 per cent, 38 per cent and 26 per cent more likely to have been diagnosed with it than those who had not been taking painkillers regularly.

4. Compared with men who took no pain relief medication, participants who took 15 or more pills each week, irrespective of type, had a 48 per cent higher risk of higher blood pressure.

These figures clearly suggest that somewhere use of these painkillers is also playing a crucial role in increasing people’s susceptible to heart diseases, especially if we look at it in the light of the fact that in the recent years there has been noticed a boom in people’s susceptibility to cardiovascular diseases. Moreover, this finding has given way to a dilemma like situation because arthritis patients are also normally prescribed painkillers. Therefore, question arises that how far prescribing such painkillers to patients with arthritis is correct. However, those who use these painkillers irrationally should take a lesson from this finding since it may pose serious threat to their lives. The following advice by Ellen Mason, of the British Heart Foundation sounds quite convincing:

We advise that painkillers should be taken at the lowest possible dose for the shortest amount of time. All medicines have side effects, and if you find yourself in frequent need of pain relief, it makes good sense to discuss your health with a pharmacist or GP.

Image credit: Reuters

Via: Telegraph

  Nisha About To Have Surgery 
  Originally uploaded by interplast.

Jalandhar, India - Seth Mazow, Interplast staff:  Nisha is shown here on the operating table, wincing as the anesthesia is injected into her wrist. As eager as she was to have the surgery, she was a little scared of the needle.