A Brief Introduction of Breast Cancer
After attaining puberty, a women’s breast develops fat, lobules, connective tissues and glands to produce milk for breastfeeding. After the onset of cancer, the cells keep multiplying uncontrollably and starts spreading after a certain point of time, to its nearby tissues as well. Breast cancer is the most common kind of cancer among women.
Men can be affected by breast cancer as well, though the count is very little as compared to that of women. Several times, the genetics plays an important role towards its prevalence, but many times, the culprit is the sedentary lifestyle. It can be addressed with chemotherapy, radiation therapy or surgical approach.
Types of breast cancer
There are mainly two kinds of breast cancer. Invasive and non-invasive breast cancer. In the prior case, the cancer cell breaks out from the inside of ducts and thus the risk of its spread remains significantly high. The latter condition is the opposite and is termed when the cells remain at the origin of the outbreak. If it is left untreated, over a period of time, it develops into invasive cancer anyways.
Symptoms of breast cancer
The primary symptom of a breast cancer is characterized by the developing either a thick tissue or a lump in the breast or armpit. Secondary symptoms comprise of one or more of the following-
- Pain in the breast or in an armpit, which does correlate with the monthly cycle.
- An inverted or sunken nipple.
- Redness of the breast skin
- Discharge blood or other fluid from the nipple
- Rash on the nipple, or around it
- Change of size or shape of breast irrelevant to the monthly cycle
- Scaling or flaking of the nipple or the breast skin
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Initiative on this world Breast cancer awareness month
On this breast cancer awareness month, we, at ILS Hospitals encourage every woman to step up and seek breast examination at least once annually, to keep the risks of breast cancer at bay. We also, motivate every adult women to learn and practice self-breast examination every three to six month and keep an eye on any growth on the breast or under the armpit. Women with either a personal medical history or family history of previous lumps or cancer are requested to be-be extremely cautious regarding the same. Going for a mammogram is often recommended by a gynaecologist.
Several of the lumps of the breast are not cancerous. However, in case of any doubt, it is best to get it checked by a physician as soon as possible.
How ILS Hospitals Contributes Towards Elder’s Health and Well Being
As Gary Snyder has rightly said, “In Western Civilization, our elders are books.” but definitely this does not hold true for every generation in every corner of the world. Unfortunately, not every elder gets adequate medical attention. In fact, finding a well-qualified geriatric specialist is often a tiresome job, if you don’t know where to look for. To address the gap between the elderly medical complication and their reliable treatment, ILS Hospitals are taking a unique initiative.
ILS hospitals are offering ILS Sparsh and ‘Care of Senior Citizen’ health package for the elderly people of our nation. Let’s explore them both in details, how these package and initiative improves the overall health of the elderly people.
ILS Sparsh
Not every elder lives with their family of children and grandchildren. Thus, getting to a hospital often becomes a challenging task in itself. Thus the initiative ‘ILS Sparsh’ is a big relief, as it collects the samples for screening at the doorsteps itself along with delivering the report and routine check-ups by a physician.
It offers the following special services for its patients.
– 15% Discount on all OPD Investigations
– 10% Discount on health check-up packages
– 10% Discount on IP services excluding medicines, consumables and doctor’s fees.
– Physician visit at home for general check-up and consultation, once in 2 months
– Blood Sugar (fasting), blood pressure & weight check-up at home, every month
– Sample collection & report delivery at doorstep, once in every month
– Free ambulance service, if hospitalized in ILS Hospitals
– Priority for admission to the cardholders
Care of Senior Citizen
This health check-up package is fabricated by keeping the needs of an elder in mind. These screenings include-
- Complete Haemogram with ESR
- Total Cholesterol
- Random Blood Sugar
- Pap Smear / PSA (Women/Men)
- Serum Creatinine
- Urea
- ECG
- Echocardiography Screening
- Chest X-Ray PA View
- USG Whole Abdomen screening
- Eye Screening
- Dental Screening
The package also comprises of a consultation from a Physician. Thus, it ensures that the patient and their family gets a full disclosure of the screenings and their interception on their life. In case, a particular aspect needs special attention, the doctor can investigate further.
On the occasion of World Elderly Day, ILS Hospitals encourages every individual to take care of the elderly people in their home and get them every medical attention they need.
What Is Low Birth Weight And Its Main Causes
After a full term of pregnancy, a baby is born with body weight ranging between 2500 to 4200 grams in order to live a normal functional life. However, very often some of these babies are born with exceptionally lesser weight than medically considered as ideal. These babies need critical care and are often kept at special care units of maternity hospitals.
As per World Health Organization, babies having a body weight of 2499 grams or less are considered as low birth weight. This is further subdivided into very low birth weight (having less than 1500 gram) and extremely low birth weight (having less than 1000 grams).
Having a low birth weight puts the baby subjected to developing a wide number of medical complications, both in short term and in long term.
Causes of low birth weight
The low birth weight is either caused due to preterm birth or due to being small for the gestational or environmental factor of the prenatal growth and development.
Preterm birth
The gestational period ideally consists of 37 weeks and any pregnancy than matures before this duration is considered as preterm birth. Being born before the ideal time than the baby is supposed to, results in making the baby susceptible to multiple medical issues and being born with a low birth weight is one of them.
Being small for gestational age
As already mentioned, the gestational duration does play an important role. However, some babies born with low birth weight even with a full term. This happens when the baby is doing full term but is underdeveloped with respect to his or her age. It is often a result of some or the other medical or genetic condition. As any malnourished individual would perform less and will be less immunized, the rules apply same for an infant only to a bigger proportion.
Environmental factors
Several factors such as a young age of mother, previous low birth weight babies, multiple pregnancies, poor nutrition, substance abuse and malnourished prenatal stage etc contribute towards negatively affecting the birth weight of the baby. It also includes exposure to smoke, pollutant air, water, lead and other toxic substances as well.
As already mentioned, the babies having a low birth weight is highly likely to suffer immense adverse health conditions. Thus, every family having an expectant mother is advised to take proper care of the mother and the child in every aspect to ensure a safe pregnancy and healthy child. In case of any doubt, it is always wise to approach a maternity hospital as soon as possible.
History, Evolution, And Importance Of Stethoscope In Medical World
The very first thing that everyone visualizes about a doctor is undoubtedly the stethoscope. A stethoscope is a medical device with a disk-like resonator, which is placed on the chest and a set of ear piece to enable hearing of the same. It is used to trace the auscultation, which is the technique of listening to the internal sounds produced inside the body.
Doctors of almost every domain in the hospitals carry a stethoscope for primary evaluation of the patients approaching the facility for check-up and treatment. But earlier what happened when the stethoscope was yet to be invented? Let’s understand in brief, how medical evaluations were carried out along with the birth of the first stethoscope.
Before the discovery of stethoscope, the doctors used the technique of simultaneous percussion and auscultation. For the same doctors used to put their ear directly on the chest of the patient. Though the procedure remained effective for a considerable amount of time, it was awkward for both the doctors and patients, when a lady patients were involved and the obvious fact that the number of female doctors in the world could have been counted on fingers.
The same problem was faced by the French physician Rene Laennec as well, in the year 1816, when he was to treat an overweight young lady, suffering from some type of cardiac and respiratory problem. To avoid embarrassment, he rolled up a few sheet lying around in a tube like structure and placed it over the heart of the patient and listened from the other open end.
To his surprise, this method yielded an excellent result and he began administering the same for all his patients. Also being a musician, he himself invented an improved structure, the monaural model with only one ear piece.
In the year 1819, he made the findings public and with time the model was improved as more and more physicians began to understand its importance. In the year 1851 came the first ever bi-aural stethoscope.
The ones we see these days are similar to the ones manufactured around the early 1930s, with a few changes in the aspect of material and the resonator etc. Gradually, the stethoscope was used alongside the sphygmomanometer to obtain the blood pressure as well. Nowadays some stethoscope also comes with a recording device to keep a record of the same for the future evaluation.
It is the first and foremost pathological device for diagnosis. We pay our tribute to the great minds that invented and improvised this useful medical device, which is literally the icon of medical science in the world.
Eye Care-Check The Color Plates To Evaluate The State Of Color Blindness
For clicking the HD images we crave for getting a newer model with more and more megapixels, but do you know, of the resolution of a human eye is? It is round about 576 megapixels! Amazing right! The human eye indeed is a gift and it is important to take proper care of it. In India, we all must have had an eye test at least a couple of time in our life, but only a small proportion of people have been screened for color blindness in any eye hospital. The most common form of colorblindness is the green red deficiency.
So, today we bring you a series of a color plate to evaluate primarily whether your eye responds to color well or need a further check up in an eye specialist in the hospital. We present some of the selected plates of the original Ishihara plates, which is a set of 38 plates. Try to guess the number hidden in every plate and cross check with the answer and please be honest as it reflects the original state of your eyes.
Let’s get started,
In case, you are unable to see the proper number or see a different number, go to eye specialists and avail treatment for the same in a hospital. However, it is less likely to happen that you can’t see any of the number plates properly, indicating the state of total color blindness. Even if it was true, you would have realized that a long before (during everyday life) than you come across this particular blog.
A Brief Introduction Of Dengue
Independent of the fact whether you even had it or not, everyone is aware of this particular disease. it is an extreme condition of fever that infects about 390 million patients every year from all around the world. It is prevalent in certain geographical location as compared to others. The main reason for the same is the Aedes mosquito as they are the vector of the deadly dengue virus, which in turn is the pathogen of dengue fever.
These are becoming very common during monsoon in India as well, and several patients with suspected dengue are made to take test, post confirmation is admitted for the same.
Symptoms of Dengue
Symptoms of Dengue fever often onsets after 4-6 day of exposure to the infection. These are mostly-
- Fatigue
- Severe joint and muscle pain
- Sudden, high fever
- Vomiting
- Nose or gum bleeding, or easy bruising
- Pain behind the eyes
- Nausea
- Severe headaches
- Skin rash, that onsets two to five days after fever
These symptoms are often mistaken for signs of flu and thus are neglected.
Complications of Dengue
Young children and first timer to this particular virus become more severe to the symptoms and are at risk of developing complications such as hemorrhage fever, bursting of a blood vessel and lymph etc. In rare condition, it can progress to a potentially dreadful condition which is called the dengue shock syndrome that can lead to mass bleeding, shock or even death. It is more common among young children, people with weak immune system and people with subsequent dengue infection.
Diagnosis of Dengue Fever
Dengue infection can be diagnosed with a blood test. However, often this stage comes much later due to the negligence of people or mistaking as some other common illness.
Treatment for Dengue
There is no guaranteed medicine that can cure dengue fever completely. Pain killers are mostly prescribed for the same along with guideline for rest and recovery. This includes drinking plenty of fluid, adequate rest, avoiding any un-prescribed medicine as it can induce bleeding, and affect the biological blood clot mechanism. And it is extremely important to report any change to the hospitals of Kolkata for immediate treatment.
Prevention of Dengue
There is no particular immunization for preventing the dengue fever as of now. The only way to do so is by preventing the mosquitoes biting. This includes keeping the surrounding clean and prohibiting breeding and blooming of mosquito around by all means possible. In event of any doubtful symptoms, getting in touch with a hospital is highly recommended.
A Brief Introduction Of Endoscopy
Endoscopy is one of the most employed diagnostic probes that are used in the domain of medical science in the leading hospitals of India, which also includes Kolkata. The term endoscopy literally means to ‘look inside’ and for medical purpose, it rightfully enable the doctor to look inside the body and figure out the probable cause of any discomfort or as a treatment approach for some medical conditions. The technique is very similar to a laparoscopic surgery and is done by inserting a particular kind of instrument into the cavity and hollowed organs.
There are multiple types of the same depending upon the site on the body. Also, the patient may or may not be given a dose of anesthesia, depending upon the procedure. Endoscopy in broader term refers to the procedure, in usage, it is synonymously used for the procedures carried out in the upper gastrointestinal tract, primarily inserted through the nose or mouth.
An endoscopy is a highly efficient procedure to determine the underlying cause of any illness or discomfort without opening it up by making a large incision. Several times, it is also used to extract a few tissues for the site for the purpose of biopsy and other screenings. Though it is a bit rare and executed only when a possible case of cancer or malignancy is suspected. It also proves to be an extremely beneficial tool to determine the effect of any medication and new treatment procedure.
As already mentioned, for upper gastroenterology, the endoscopic probe is mostly inserted through the mouth, nose or rarely through a small cut made on the epidermal layer of the skin. It is stitched back after the completion of the procedure. The endoscopic procedure is almost similar to that of a laparoscopic surgery.
To aid the visuals, the endoscope probe also comprises of a cold light source and camera, which projects the real time image of the internal organ. The internal images can either be decoded and evaluated by the pathologist directly or can be screened and saved, for the respective doctor to analyze it later.
The endoscopy is an extremely popular diagnostic tool in the medical world. It is usually sufficient for determining the underlying cause. After it reveals the primary results, it might lead to either oral medication, drug therapy or surgical approach, depending upon the individual case and type of illness.