Dr. Zamboni Comes To Hamilton

Italian vascular surgeon Dr. Paolo Zamboni was in Hamilton on February 8th 2010!!

Dr. Zamboni urged doctors to be more open to his ideas during a conference at St. Joseph's Hospital -- his first North American appearance since his theory of "chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency" gained worldwide attention in the fall.

The cost to fund a trial of similar research as that of Dr. Zamboni, at St Joseph's, is estimated to be $500,000. So far they have raised $50,000 with the MS Society expected to donate $100,000.

Charity Intelligence Canada, has released a report recommending that Canadians direct their MS donations to this initiative. Read the report here and please give!!

I am so excited !! I'm going to pester my doctor to try and get me into the trials when they start. I know that I have restricted blood flow in my neck veins. That was confirmed by an ultra sound last year. I will do anything I can to be a part of this.

Stay tuned for updates !!!!

Right now it's time to watch the opening games of the Vancouver Winter Olympics.

Doctors Should be More Like Dentists

Let's start with a bit of dental trivia or rather, something I didn't know. Be careful going out in the cold after having a local anesthetic. You can easily get frostbite.

First my dental update and then I move on to my doctor diatribe.

I have two teeth back in service, one that is on a death watch, and two that have to come out. I'm planning to get implants for those. The process to have implants done is very long and expensive. The benefit is that once they are in, they are good for at least twenty years.

I'm glad my dentist, likes being a dentist. It makes a big difference in how you are treated.

Only wish there were more doctors who liked their work or at least tried a little harder. Too many of them have become pill and test pushers and do very little to help patients get better. By better; I mean in the real sense of figuring out ways to either halt the progression of illness or at least allow the patient to have a decent quality of life.

Telling a person they might end up in a wheel chair and then sending them for counseling is not helping; that's passing the buck. Pressuring a patient to take certain drugs and when they refuse tell them they are not trying to get better; is not helping. Acting like a stern parent "I know what is best for you"; is not helping.

Here we are with the possibility of a very simple operation that might stop the progression of MS. Why can't I have access to this treatment? I'm willing to sign any waiver, assume all the risk, which on examination appears to be very little risk and has a high probability of working.

I'm talking about the procedure that is similar to an angioplasty. A doctor would insert a stent in my neck vein, which would allow increased blood flow from my brain back to my body. It has been proven that 100 % of MS sufferers have compromised blood flow of venous blood from the brain. 100%!! It has been shown that patients who have had this procedure can halt the progression of their MS.

Did you know that they can even tell what type of MS you will have by where blood pools in your brain ?

So what are we waiting for? How dare these doctors and MS organizations tell me to proceed with caution !! If I was willing to take all the poisonous drugs they think might( a very big might) help me, they wouldn't say that would they ?

No!! Go ahead girl and take all this garbage, ruin your internal organs, get type 2 diabetes, have insomnia, constipation, high blood pressure, mental disorders. We have drugs for all that stuff too! Don't worry if you are having a hard time. We will send you to a shrink and the shrink will give you even more drugs as part of your therapy.

Have a small operation to fix your MS? Oh!!! You better think hard about that one and anyway we won't let you do it even if you decide you want to.

How do you think I feel after reading a report from the MS Society that 80% of people with MS can no longer work, have trouble getting disability payments, tax credits, and decent care. Your caregiver gets hassled if they try to claim the tax credit. You are made to look like a moocher if you try to avail yourself of any of these things. You must fight, fight, for your rights. Some future to look forward to Huh?

And then they have the nerve to tell me to think positive!!
(There's a pill for that !)

I'll start thinking positive, when you stop treating me like a child !!!!!

So now my quest is to find a doctor that will do this for me. Wish me luck.

Waking Up To Snow

Shelly and I was both surprise to see this at 5:30 this morning as I was letting her out to take care of business. During the weather section of the news last night, there was not one word of us getting 3-5 inches of SNOW. They were too busy telling us about what was going to happen in Missouri. To make matters worse after the snow we are suppose to get some freezing rain. Lord I hope not, we just went through that a week ago. I will take SNOW ove FREEZING RAIN any day.

West Tennesse is not use to 3-5 inches of snow, I guess I will take advantage of it and take some pictures of how beautiful snow is before the traffic and people start moving about.

UPDATE...

I am not bad at taking pictures, I spot a Robin in the tree and another bird birched on a utility wire. Bad news is we are getting some more snow the next several days...I thought I left this kind of weather up North :(

Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does. ~William James

Sorry I have been gone awhile, but I have been very busy working hard with a non-profit I am very passionate about. It feels GREAT to believe in a vision, dedicate my time to cultivate programs and watch that vision come to fruition.

Our vision is that all children can develop and/or improve communication, public speaking and leadership skills; develop and/or improve self-esteem and self-confidence; and learn discipline by embracing the cultural arts.

Click and visit our website and read about the wonderful program we started in September and to keep up with future programs we will be doing. While I am at do not hesitate to become a FAN of Friendship Safehaven on Face Book. Also, I am not too proud to beg if you believe in what we are doing and can spare a few dollars, click on our donate tab to help us continue offering what we are doing for our young people FREE OF CHARGE.


UPDATE ON SMOKING




I have not stopped, but I have cut down tremendously...so please give me a little credit. The desire is there in my heart to stop, being honest to myself I do not want to stop completely. As one of my good virtual friend Black Diaspora said to me, "Once you make up your MIND to never pick up another cigarette that is when you will stop smoking." Your prayers were not in vain...I will stop smoking completely VERY SOON.

Got Milk?

So do you think it's weird we drink milk from plastic bags?

I like bag milk because I can freeze it and I always keep a couple of extras in the freezer. Saves trips to the store. Nothing more annoying than running out of milk during a snow storm.
Unlike Sheryl, I don't jiggle the bag to get it in the jug. I give it a good whack on the kitchen counter to make sure it's in there solid. I also don't cut the end with scissors. I slice it with a steak knife. Much more sanitary. Yeah I'm weird.

AND you should try ketchup and dill pickle chips!

Ground Hog Day

Looks like all the hogs are predicting six more weeks of winter!

A Plug

Today I received a very nice email from Daily Writing Tips, asking if I would give them a plug and possibly post a link to their site. Well I did do that awhile ago but it can't hurt to do it again, especially since they are celebrating 1000 posts!

If you like to write, feel the need to brush up on your grammar, or if you just find the English language fascinating, you will enjoy this site. Subscribe to the daily writing tip. I admit I have learned a few things. Amazing how the language evolves with new words and expressions emerging all the time.

Just think; twenty years ago nobody had a blog, or tweeted, or networked. Good grief! I can remember when we didn't have p.c.'s. All my work inventory was on stock cards and a typing pool did my letters. I had massive file cabinets filled with dockets. Now I can get by with a small lateral one and much of it is filled with junk(don't tell my boss).

We have to remember to try and not get sloppy with our writing. Email is so casual and txtng!! :) lol ;). Is tweeting turning us into twits? I get carried away with commas and brackets. I admit it. In my defense; I did get an almost perfect score on the grammar, spelling, and punctuation test at work. One of the very few with a level 3 in English. Not bad, considering my mushy brain and I'm surrounded by CGA's with accounting degrees, who can't even write a sentence( Hey you guys!! Can you please look up the definition of denotes? You will be surprised to find out it isn't a verb!! and No, not every silly little thing that happens is ironic!!)

So go ahead, try this site. They aren't trying to sell anything and I'm not getting a commission from them. Oh yeah! You can download a free pdf. grammar guide too. The link is in my "Other Stuff I Like" links and here

Enjoy.