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While working from home can have its perks (attending meetings in sweatpants, anyone?), for many people the change in work environment and schedule has been a headache — literally. “My experience and what I’ve heard from other physicians is that a lot of people are reporting worsening of their tension headaches and migraines since the pandemic began,” says Katherine Hamilton, MD, an assistant professor of clinical neurology and a headache specialist at Penn Medicine in Philadelphia....

Are you doing everything you can to manage your heart condition? Find out with our interactive checkup. Blood pressure is measured with two numbers: systolic pressure (the top number) which is the pressure when your heart beats, and diastolic pressure (the bottom number) which is the pressure when your heart is relaxed. Ideally, your blood pressure should be 120/80 millimeters of mercury (mmHg) or less, according to Gbenga Ogedegbe, MD, MPH, MS, a clinical hypertension specialist, director of the Center for Healthful Behavior Change, and associate professor of medicine for the division of general internal medicine at New York University School of Medicine in New York City....

As friends revel at parties, officemates gather at the local pub after work, and families prepare for festive meals, it’s not uncommon for people with multiple sclerosis (MS) or other chronic illnesses to long for calm and quiet rather than seasonal frivolity. Self-care goes a long way, and often, staying in is just the thing. Not always, and not for long stretches, but sometimes it’s what you need. The social pressures to meet up, go out, and make merry can be overwhelming for some of us, particularly when we consider sensory overload, fear of falls, cognitive difficulties, and the ever-looming question: “Where is the toilet?...

About 10 years ago, at the age of 22, Evans was putting in 70-hour weeks as a pastry chef when she started feeling breathless and unusually tired. Over the next 11 months, she visited an allergist and five other doctors, all of whom gave her different diagnoses, including the old standby “It’s all in your head.” By then, she says, “I was so sick I could hardly speak without stopping to catch my breath....

In a new study, study, published in May 2020 in the British Medical Journal, researchers at the University of Bristol used genetic data from nearly half a million people in the United Kingdom (UK) to determine how a person’s body size during childhood and early adulthood influenced the risk of developing heart disease and type 2 diabetes later in life. To do this, the researchers asked participants to recall what their body size was at age 10, and then compared that with their current body mass index (BMI) as an adult; the average age of the participants was 57....

Why Is Bone Cancer So Painful? Bone cancer disrupts normal bone cell activity that is intended to help keep bones strong without becoming too bulky. This disruption in bone cell function can cause a bone to become either too brittle or too thick and overdeveloped. Either of these situations may then lead to intense pain by irritating nerves inside the bone or by stretching the membrane that covers the bone....

Dyskinesia, or involuntary and uncontrolled movement, can range in its severity and may look like fidgeting or swaying. For many people, living with dyskinesia is easier than dealing with the symptoms of Parkinson’s, says Alex Pantelyat, MD, an assistant professor of neurology at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, in Baltimore. But for others, it can be painful and can interfere with their social activities. The goal is to find a treatment regimen that minimizes your side effects and allows you to live a full life with Parkinson’s disease....

The National MS Society, MS Ireland, and the MS Society of the UK, for example, all offer information on COVID-19 for people with MS, but they vary in the depth to which they cover the topic and link to other sources of information. One area that seems to be rarely addressed, if ever, is specific advice on masks for people with MS. Mixed Messaging Around Masks The science of combatting SARS-CoV-2 (the virus behind COVID-19) is a fast-moving target....

The answer is simple, says clinical psychologist Roberta Temes, PhD, a psychotherapist in New York City and author of Getting Your Life Back Together When You Have Schizophrenia. “If it interferes with your relationships, your work, your sleep, your daily feelings of contentment, or if it negatively impacts someone else, it’s a problem. And if it doesn’t interfere with any of that, it isn’t a problem.” If you’re worried that something might be wrong or frequently ask yourself, “Do I need help?...

Public health officials in Georgia said on Monday that they are following 43 people who may have been exposed, but so far none have symptoms, according to Georgia Health News on July 26. The CDC said that it is working with the airline and state and local health officials to contact airline passengers and others who may have been near the patient during two flights: Lagos, Nigeria, to Atlanta on July 8, with arrival on July 9; and Atlanta to Dallas on July 9....

Nationwide, death rates from fall-related traumatic brain injuries rose from 3.86 fatalities for every 100,000 people in 2008 to 4.52 fatalities per 100,000 in 2017, a 17 percent climb, according to the CDC report. Death rates were about 8 times higher among adults 75 and older — at about 54 fatalities for every 100,000 people — than they were for adults 55 to 74 years old, the study also found....

Past research suggests nasal polyps affect up to 4 percent of the population. And while anyone can get nasal polyps, they’re most common in people with asthma, allergies, repeat infections, and chronic rhinosinusitis (long-term inflammation of the nasal passages), per the Cleveland Clinic. Not all patients can be cured of nasal polyps. People who are diagnosed with chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps (chronic inflammation of the nose and sinus cavities accompanied by nasal polyps), for example, may deal with polyps over the long-term....

“I describe it as electrical short-circuiting in the nerves that signals to the brain something is wrong in the area those nerves supply,” explains Robert Bermel, MD, a neurologist at the Mellen Center for Multiple Sclerosis at Cleveland Clinic. “It’s like false pain signals being sent because the nerves aren’t functioning correctly.” (By contrast, an injury prompts nociceptors — a nerve ending that senses pain — to send signals to the brain so you feel pain where you’ve been hurt....

First, know that you’re not alone. Psoriatic arthritis can interfere with job productivity and lead to missed workdays, according to the National Psoriasis Foundation (NPF). It also can affect your bottom line. A review of studies on the effect of psoriatic arthritis on quality of life published in December 2017 in the journal Seminars in Arthritis and Rheumatism revealed that up to 50 percent of those with the condition were unemployed and nearly 40 percent considered themselves unable to work because of their symptoms....

Researchers found that optimists aren’t any better than the rest of us when it comes to dealing with stressful situations and conflict, nor do they get over those episodes any faster. Rather, their higher sense of well-being came by encountering fewer daily stressors than people who were less optimistic, according to the findings, published on March 7 in The Journals of Gerontology. The reason for that isn’t entirely clear, says Lewina O....

Now a new analysis, published online May 1 by the journal Neurology, suggests that the costs of care are dramatically increasing for those with MS. The authors of the paper, from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, found that out-of-pocket expenses for those with neurological conditions in the United States exceed $500 billion annually, and that these charges increased by a factor of 20 over a 12-year period from 2004 to 2016 for people with multiple sclerosis....

But beyond its reputation, there are also a lot of misconceptions, says David A. Fishman, MD, a gynecologic oncologist and the director of the cancer center at NewYork-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City. Here, Dr. Fishman sifts through some of the myths and facts regarding the disease. Myth 1: Ovarian Cancer Symptoms Can Mask Others Fact: The discomfort is real, not vague. It’s more that you can mistake symptoms for other things....

COPD-related pain is usually located in the shoulders, neck, lower back, and chest. And the combination of pain, anxiety, difficulty sleeping, and trouble breathing can take a toll on your quality of life. According to a review of studies published in 2014 in the journal BMJ Open, anywhere from 32 to 60 percent of people with COPD reported experiencing COPD-related pain. So if you have COPD, you may benefit from pain management strategies....

Correctly identifying pancreatic cancer stages also helps determine the odds of recovery. Pancreatic cancer staging is a particularly complex process that may involve additional tests and surgery after diagnosis. Endoscopic ultrasound (EUS), an imaging test that works by bouncing sound waves off internal tissues or organs, is often used for staging. EUS involves a small probe placed at the end of an endoscope (a thin, flexible tube) and threaded through the mouth, esophagus, and stomach and into the small intestine, close to the pancreas....

“I thought then that HIV was AIDS and that I was going to die. I walked around for 10 years wondering, ‘Is today the day that HIV will kill me?’ because I didn’t have the information,” says Moon, who is Black and lives outside Atlanta. She also lived in fear that she might infect her children. She threw out plates and forks after she used them because she worried (incorrectly) that sharing these items might spread HIV....