Home

Worth Checking Out

2012-06-12T20:00:23Z

Radiolab's Guts podcast: learn how a stray bullet turned one man into a guinea pig for life and helped the medical community to better understand the previously mysterious process of digestion.

The Health Sciences Assocation of BC TV commercial reminds us all that health care is provided by many professionals - not just doctors and nurses.

Health resists reductionism

2012-05-23T16:02:28Z

Reading A.J. Jacobs latest book Drop Dead Healthy, which reinforces the complexity of "health" as a concept.

He uses the following Carl Sagan quote as a guide - I may adopt it as I continue in my own research:

What is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas.

The Hundred Acre Wood & Sherlock

2011-09-11T02:15:57Z

The Hundred Acre Wood

How does a pediatrician draw some much-needed attention to psychological and neurodevelopmental issues and how often they go unrecognized? Why - write an article for the holiday issue of a medical journal about the undiagnosed psychological conditions of well-loved characters from a favourite childhood series of course! Or at least that is what Dr. Sarah Shea et al. (2000) of Dalhousie University decided to do.

So, what does Pooh struggle with, according to these experts? ADHD - inattentive subtype

Piglet? Generalized anxiety disorder

Eeyeore? Chronic dysthymia

Owl? Dyslexia

Rabbit? Narcissistic personality disorder

Tigger? ADHD - hyperactivity-impulsivity subtype

No wonder these characters are so well-loved! Even children are fascinated by complex characters with notable flaws. Speaking of complex characters with notable flaws...

Sherlock

The BBC aired a series in the Summer of 2010 that I have just had the pleasure of watching. Sherlock is a modern take on the well-loved 19th century stories, written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, of Sherlock Holmes and his faithful partner Dr. John Watson. The tools of Sherlock's trade (detective work) have been updated to include smart phones and, of course, the internet, which, happily, does nothing to take away from his powers deductive reasoning. Benedict Cumberbatch plays a Sherlock who is true to that represented in Doyle's stories - fascinating, infuriating (particularly for Watson), and not entirely likeable. Martin Freeman, of Shaun of the Dead and Love Actually fame, plays a likeable, intelligent Dr. Watson, who tolerates Sherlock's insensitive behaviours without being a total pushover. I particularly enjoyed certain stylistic additions to the show; the viewer sees words appear on the screen as Sherlock reads them or is occasionally given a running dialogue of Sherlock's thought process during his detecting. The DVD/Blu-Ray of Series One has been released and Season 2 is expected to air in 2012. Each Season is only 3 episodes long but each episode is near movie-length (~90 minutes). Netflix.ca has Season 1 available for subscribers.

Source: Pathology in the hundred acre wood: a neurodevelopmental perspective on A.A. Milne (http://www.cmaj.ca/content/163/12/1557.full.pdf+html) by Shea, SE, Gordon, K, Hawkins, A, Kawchuk, J, Smith

Items of Interest

2011-08-31T02:13:31Z

- The Centre for Disease Control held a telebriefing on August 2nd to address the contents of a recent Vital Signs Report that examined hospital practices to support breastfeeding. In sum less than 4% of hospitals in the US were assessed as providing adequate support of breastfeeding. The CDC estimates that $2.2 billion dollars could be saved per year if breastfeeding rate were high vs. low (current state); formula-fed babies and those who are weaned early are more likely to be obese, develop ear and respiratory infections, and to be diagnosed with diabetes. The report was released to correspond with World Breastfeeding Week, which began August 1st.

- The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, a recent, critically-acclaimed non-fiction book by Rebecca Skloot that explores the life of Henrietta Lacks, her contribution to modern medical research, and the lives of her children and grand-children has been selected as the September #1book140 (a Twitter-based book club) selection. It is a wonderful book that will surely provoke discussion and debate on the topic of medical ethics and on the history/existence of racism and classism within the healthcare system.

- A new school food policy will be implemented in Edmonton public schools this fall that further restricts the sale of foods deemed unhealthy to students from K-12. Last year saw the removal of "junk food" from vending machines and this year foods deemed unhealthy (i.e. high in fat, sugar, and salt) will be removed from school cafeterias and canteens. Alberta has developed clear and progressive Nutrition Guidelines for Children and Youth.

- A children's book, due for release in October 2011, has generated a great deal of controversy within the past few weeks. Maggie Goes on A Diet, written by Paul Kramer, introduces us to Maggie, a young girl who, after going on a diet, loses weight, and becomes celebrated as a skilled soccer player. The book is written for children between the ages of 4 and 8. It is generally accepted within the field of dietetics that diets don't work and that encouraging children to adopt restrictive eating patterns can have long-term negative physical and emotional consequences. Additionally, the book seems to discredit the notion that "fat" children can feel good about themselves and be accepted by their peers. The author defends the book by saying that he only wanted to introduce children to "a new way of eating" and to help them "learn to do exercise."

Source: Majority of U.S. hospitals do not fully support breastfeeding (http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2011/p0802_breastfeeding.html)
Source: Maggie Goes On A Diet kids book sparks debate (http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2011/08/25/f-childhood-obesity-maggie-goes-on-a-diet.html?ref=rss)
Source: Edmonton public schools go junk food free (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/story/2011/08/29/edmonton-schools-junkfood-banned.html?ref=rss)
Source: Is a book about going on a diet suitable for kids? (http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2011/08/is-a-book-about-going-on-a-diet-suitable-for-kids.html)

March is Nutrition Month!

2011-03-10T01:45:00Z

Thought I'd call your attention to the fact that March is Nutrition Month. This year the theme for the month is "Celebrate food...from field to table!"

The aim is not only to encourage and support healthy eating but also to promote sustainable eating habits in the Canadian population. Canada is a huge country, but, at least at present, only 7.3% of our land is designated as agricultural. But we do a lot with the space we have - more that 160 species of fish and seafood are supported here in addition to more than 120 land-based crops such as apples, tomatoes, cranberries, and potatoes. And who hasn't heard of Québec maple syrup and Alberta beef! In order to encourage Canadians to explore the foods that Canada has to offer, Dietitians of Canada has created a consumer factsheet with helpful information re: Canadian-produced foods from all four food groups.

While you are on the Dietitians of Canada website checking out the available factsheets I would encourage you to check out the different tools available for consumers, such as the Eating + Activity Tracker, the Recipe Analyzer, and the Virtual Grocery Store.

Bon Appétit!

Canadian Breastfeeding Statistics

2011-02-09T01:23:23Z

Just came upon these statistics on Duration of Exclusive Breastfeeding in Canada; data came from the 2007-2008 Canadian Community Health Survey.

Some highlights:

- 23.1% breastfed exclusively for >6 months

- Women with less than a secondary education were much less likely to breastfeed exclusively for the recommended six months (12.1%) than those women with post-secondary degrees (24.8%)

- Cultural/racial background had an impact; 34.3% of Asian mothers and 32.7% of "other" mothers exclusively breastfed for >6 months vs. 20.8% of "White" women

- Off-reserve women of Aboriginal descent were less likely to breastfeed exclusively for >6 months (17.5%) than non-Aboriginal women (23.5%)

- As maternal age increased, so did the percentage of mothers who breasted exclusively for >6 months

- Urban mothers were more likely to breasteed exclusively for >6 months (24.3%) than those residing in rural areas (17.7%)

- As can be seen in the diagram above, duration of breastfeeding varies widely by province; 38.2% of mothers in BC breastfed exclusively for >6 months while only 14.4% of those in the Atlantic Region did so

Hopefully researchers and health care professionals in public health can determine some of the causes of this variation and effectively decrease the variation while simulateneously encouraging a greater percent of mothers to make a commitment to exclusive breastfeeding for >6 months. I don't mean to get up on a soapbox but there are just so many benefits of exclusive breastfeeding.

Saturday Morning Round-Up

2011-01-29T17:37:40Z

To make up for my lack of recent updates I will try and squeeze a few interesting items into one sensational blog post!

- According to an entirely unreferenced article by Dr. Jaan Sidorov - Generation Y/Millienial physicians will be less concerned with issues of rank than their predecessors and will be more flexible by allowing other health care professionals to adopt and utilize skills sets once firmly entrenched within the medical profession.

- I recommend checking out www.ifitweremyhome.com, which compares any (or almost any) two countries to one another based on a number of different criteria commonly linked to quality of life and sustainability such as energy usage, birth rate, earning power, employment, cost of health care etc. and provides the results to you in a neat, simple. graphic. You can then upload your selected comparison to your Facebook page or Twitter feed.

- If you are interested in health care and the arts and how the two meet and mingle, you should check out the open access, peer-reviewed journal The International Journal of the Creative Arts in Interdisciplinary Practice. Access to full-text articles is free (that's what open access means :) The latest issue has an article about using literature to help medical students better understand issues of social justice and public heath.

If Only It Were That Simple

2011-01-20T02:08:21Z

Don't mean to offend - this video isn't politically correct but it is amusing.

My Profession - Registered Dietitian

2011-01-15T16:40:56Z

The profession of dietetics has a strong reputation for relying on evidence to dictate best practice. We are taught to look to the research before acting, whether it be recommending a change in diet or vitamin supplement to a patient or recommending guidelines for school food programs. During our education, both academic and practical, we are taught many of the necessary skills to advocate for our profession because programs/services don't always see the need for a dietitian or understand our unique role.

Dietitians of Canada has been a front-runner in providing evidence-based practice information to practicing dietitians. PEN (Practice-based Evidence in Nutrition) is a "dynamic knowledge translation subscription service." DC has recently partnered with the British Dietitian Association in offering this service. There is a 2-week free trial available right now.

We also have some prolific dietitian researchers who have elected to look at the practice of dietetics from different points of view (vs. the traditional medical viewpoint). Dr. Jacqui Gingrashas undertaken research from a sociological point of view and Dr. Catherine Morley has integrated the arts into her practice of dietetics - specifically textile arts and filmography. At our next national conference, which will be held in Edmonton, there will be an inaugural "Dietitian as Artist" exhibit, which will highlight the work of dietitians in any number of creative mediums.

My Favourite Podcasts

2011-01-12T02:07:42Z

8 of my Favourite podcasts + some honourable mentions