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Pancreatitis - symptoms and causes

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Pancreatitis is inflammation in the pancreas into a long, flat gland that sits tucked behind the stomach in the upper abdomen. The pancreas produces enzymes that help digestion and hormones that help regulate the way your body processes sugar in the body.  Symptoms   Symptoms vary based on the type of the disease. Acute pancreatitis symptoms include: Upper abdominal pain Abdominal pain that radiates to your back Abdominal pain that feels worse after eating Fever Rapid pulse Nausea Vomiting Tenderness when touching the abdomen Chronic pancreatitis symptoms include: Upper abdominal pain Losing weight without trying Oily, smelly stools (steatorrhea) Causes   Pancreatitis occurs when digestive enzymes become activated while still in the pancreas, irritating the cells of the pancreatic glands and causing inflammation. Abdominal surgery Alcoholism Certain medications Cystic fibrosis Gallstones High calcium levels in the blood (hypercalcemia), which may ...

Mood Disorders - Types, Symptoms & Causes

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What is mood disorder? Mood disorder is a condition that affects a person's moods and it's other related functions. This usually includes all different types of depressions and bipolar disorders. Symptoms for this may range from extremely low to extremely high or manic.  What are the types of mood disorders?  Mood disorders are classified into bipolar disorder and depressive disorders.  Main types of mood disorders include: Major depressive disorder - This involves long periods of extreme sadness, hopelessness and/or fatigue that last for 2 or more weeks.  Bipolar I disorder - This includes euphoria and/or irritable moods and increased energy or activities that can result in painful consequences. Bipolar II Disorder - One episode of current & past hypomania, which is a less severe form of mania, and at least one episode of current or past major depression. And also criteria for mania, hypomania and major depression remain the same for t...

Arthritis - Causes, symptoms & diagnosis

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Arthritis is the swelling and tenderness of one or more joints, the main symptoms of arthritis are joint pain and stiffness, which typically worsen with age.  Types of arthritis: The most common types of arthritis are osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis . Osteoarthritis causes cartilage -  the hard, slippery tissue that covers the edges of bones where joints are formed to break down. Rheumatoid arthritis is a condition where joints, beginning with the lining of joints are affected due to the immune system. Uric acid crystals are formed when there's too much uric acid in the blood, which can cause gout. Infections or underlying disease, such as psoriasis or lupus, can cause other types of arthritis in the patients.  Causes - In both osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis damage of joints are found in different ways. Osteoarthritis The most common type of arthritis, osteoarthritis mainly involves wear-and-tear damage to a person's joint's ca...

Down's Syndrome - Causes, symptoms & diagnosis

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What is Down syndrome? Down syndrome (sometimes called Down’s syndrome) is a condition in which a child is born with an extra copy of their 21st chromosome — hence it lead to trisomy 21 this causes physical and mental developmental delays and disabilities. Many of the disabilities are lifelong, and they can also shorten life expectancy, people with Down syndrome can live healthy and fulfilling lives by taking support from their families, and others cultural institutions provides many opportunities to help overcome the challenges of this condition. What causes Down syndrome? When the baby’s cells develop, each cell is supposed to receive 23 pairs of chromosomes, for 46 chromosomes total. chromosomes are received equally from the mother, and from the father. In children with this syndrome, one of the chromosomes doesn’t separate properly, so the baby ends up with three copies, or an extra partial copy, of chromosome 21, instead of two. The extra chromosome causes ...

Health risks of smoking & tobacco

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Smoking harms nearly every organ of the body and in turn leads to diseases and disorders. Smoking causes cancer, heart disease, stroke, lung diseases, diabetes, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Smoking also shows higher risk for tuberculosis, certain eye diseases, and problems of the immune system, including rheumatoid arthritis. In adults secondhand smoke causes stroke, lung cancer, and coronary heart disease. Children who are exposed to secondhand smoke are at higher risk for sudden infant death syndrome, acute respiratory infections, middle ear disease, more severe asthma, respiratory symptoms, and slowed lung growth, etc.  Cancer Smoking mainly causes lungs cancer and can pass cancerous cells to other part of the body, that may include: Blood Bladder  Trachea  Bronchus  Colon and rectum  Esophagus  Stomach  Kidney  Renal pelvis  Mouth & throat...

AI tools to fight Covid-19

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Artificial Intelligence  is an upcoming and useful decision-making tool to identify early infections due to coronavirus and also to help in monitoring the condition of the infected patients. Healthcare systems are in the crisis of this decision-making tool to handle Novel coronavirus infection and to get proper suggestions in real-time to avoid it's spread. Applying AI tools can help in identifying the high-risk patients, track spread of virus and in controlling the infection in real time. It can also be used to predict the future deaths using the current available data, and for population screening, medical help,  protocol and suggestions about infection control.General procedure of AI & Non-AI based applications can help general physicians in the hospitals to identify the Covid-19 symptoms. Main applications of AI in Covid-19 include: Early detection and diagnosis of the infection  - AI is helpful in the diagnosis of the infected cases with the help of m...

Health risks of poor menstrual hygiene

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May 28th is celebrated as World Menstrual Hygiene Day (MHD) across the globe, it aims to raise awareness of the importance for women and girls to hygienically manage their menstruation. Menstrual hygiene plays a key role in every girl and woman's life, most of the women suffer from various diseases at some stages of life due to lack of proper hygiene practices during their periods. Theme of World Menstrual Hygiene Day 2020 is ' " Periods in Pandemic" . It helps to catalyse  a growing, global movement for Menstrual Hygiene Management and supports partnerships at global, regional, national and local levels, and also creates opportunities for advocacy for the integration of MHM into global, national and local policies, programmes and projects taken by government and health sectors. Even though several menstrual hygiene products like sanitary napkins, tampons, and menstrual cups are available; 88% of Indian women don’t use the most basic form of menst...