Small Doses column

July 10, 2010 – 12:14 am

MAKE SURE GLASSES ARE 3-D CLEAN

In its July issue, Good Housekeeping magazine tested seven pairs of 3-D glasses, three that were wrapped and four unwrapped, and found that none of them were bacteria-free. While most of the bacteria (collected via swabs that were sent to an independent lab) was deemed harmless, one set of glasses bore Staphylococcus aureus bacteria, which can cause pinkeye and other infections. The magazine, which doesn’t say which theaters it visited, recommends cleaning 3-D glasses with alcohol wipes or even taking them to the restroom to wash them with soap and water. A dry tissue rubdown removed some, but far from all, of the bacteria. Even if you don’t think to take any such measures, your risk of getting sick from movie glasses is pretty low, according to this account.

NURSES TELL STORIES IN FIRST PERSON

“When Chicken Soup Isn’t Enough” (Cornell University Press, $24.95) is an anthology of 70 first-person essays about nursing. It starts out with a feisty introduction by editor Suzanne Gordon slamming the stereotype of nurses “as modern angels endowed with extraordinary powers of empathy and compassion” rather than health-care professionals who benefit from education and job experience. One chapter is called “Excuse Me, Doctor, You’re Wrong”; another is “Choking on Sugar and Spice: Challenging Nurses’ Public Image.”

REMEMBER: PLAY GAME, TAKE BREAK

Doctors from Hunan Province in China are reporting a syndrome that might be described as modern medicine meeting “The Joy Luck Club.” The patient they describe in a letter to the medical journal Lancet was a 40-year-old woman with painful swelling in her left leg. While her blood tests were normal, an ultrasound showed deep-vein thrombosis, a dangerous blood clot. She recovered and is on maintenance therapy with a blood thinner. But curiously, she had no health problems or family history of thrombosis, and only one known risk factor: birth-control pills. Ultimately, the diagnosis the doctors came up with was “mah-jongg-related deep-vein thrombosis.” They noted that she had spent eight hours sitting motionless the previous night playing the ancient Chinese tile game mah-jongg so intently that all she consumed was a small soft drink. “Our patient’s condition is similar to ‘economy-class syndrome’ in its underlying pathophysiological mechanisms,” they wrote. “However, the mechanisms of mah-jongg-related DVT could be complicated by stress (especially when it involves monetary bets) and sleep deprivation.”

LOCAL EVENT

“Managing Medication Safely at Home,” talk by nurse from Home Staff, 10:30 a.m. July 15 at Barnstable Senior Center, 825 Falmouth Road (Route 28), Hyannis. Information/reservation (required): 508-862-4750.

FROM WIRE AND OTHER REPORTS

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