Conditions & Diseases

“I was scared, but I knew it had to be done.”

When you are going through can­cer treat­ment, and more specif­i­cal­ly chemother­a­py, your health care team is there to make sure you are com­fort­able. You will have the lux­u­ry of your own pri­vate reclin­ing chair along with med­ica­tions to help man­age side effects but bring­ing a favorite book, movie, blan­ket or friend can also pro­vide com­fort dur­ing your treat­ments. The num­ber of chemother­a­py ses­sions and dura­tion of each treat­ment will vary from patient to patient and even vis­it to vis­it, but it is help­ful if you bring some things to help pass the time and keep you com­fort­able while receiv­ing treatment.

As tem­per­a­tures drop and sea­sons change, it’s not uncom­mon to devel­op symp­toms such as nasal con­ges­tion, sneez­ing, itchy eyes, cough­ing, facial pres­sure and body aches. You may shrug off these symp­toms as noth­ing more than a head cold, but they may be caused by sea­son­al aller­gies or a sinus infec­tion which may require dif­fer­ent treat­ments to resolve. To help you deter­mine what’s behind your symp­toms, board-cer­ti­fied oto­laryn­gol­o­gist (ENT), Feodor Ung, MD, shares dif­fer­ences between colds, aller­gies and sinus infec­tions and how you can get symp­tom relief.

Every­day life can seem like a bal­anc­ing act. The demands that come from our fam­i­ly and work often make putting our own health last on our pri­or­i­ty list.

Many peo­ple expe­ri­ence joint pain, espe­cial­ly in the hands. Joint pain becomes par­tic­u­lar­ly more preva­lent as we age. It is impor­tant to dis­tin­guish pain that is due to inflam­ma­tion in the joints, from pain that is due to degen­er­a­tion of bone and cartilage.

As you age, it is not uncom­mon for one or both eye­lids to begin to sag or droop. This con­di­tion is known as pto­sis, and can be caused by a vari­ety of fac­tors includ­ing your age, an injury, or anoth­er med­ical con­di­tion. In addi­tion to the vis­i­ble sag­ging, you may also expe­ri­ence sore­ness or aching around your eyes, and your face may appear tired.

Chances are you’ve expe­ri­enced dizzi­ness at some point in your life. That sen­sa­tion of light­head­ed­ness can be a symp­tom of many things — med­ica­tion, heart and/​or neu­ro­log­i­cal con­di­tions and head trau­ma. But what hap­pens when that dizzi­ness does­n’t go away, lasts for days and makes the room seem like it’s spin­ning even when you’re not moving?

Veins are blood ves­sels that car­ry blood back to the heart. To keep blood mov­ing toward the heart, veins have one way valves. When the valves break­down, blood does not flow well and can cause Chron­ic Venous Insuf­fi­cien­cy (CVI) and vari­cose veins. The abnor­mal flow of blood is typ­i­cal­ly referred to as ​‘reflux’ since the blood moves back­wards and for­wards. Venous reflux occurs most often in veins clos­est to the skin (super­fi­cial veins) and vari­cose veins can be blue, red, or flesh-col­ored. They typ­i­cal­ly look like cords under the skin and can be twist­ed or bulging. Spi­der veins are like vari­cose veins, but much small­er. The look like small tree branch­es on the sur­face of the skin.

Irri­ta­ble bow­el syn­drome (IBS) is a func­tion­al dis­or­der of the colon that caus­es a vari­ety of uncom­fort­able gas­troin­testi­nal symp­toms. In addi­tion to affect­ing between 25 – 55 mil­lion peo­ple in the Unit­ed States, IBS is the sec­ond high­est cause of ill­ness-relat­ed work absences. Dur­ing nor­mal diges­tion, your brain and gut work togeth­er to send sig­nals to your hor­mones, nerves and the good bac­te­ria found in your gut to acti­vate the mus­cles of your colon. When you are expe­ri­enc­ing an IBS episode, these sig­nals become jum­bled, caus­ing the mus­cles of your diges­tive tract to become tense. This leads to symp­toms such as con­sti­pa­tion or diar­rhea, gas and stom­ach cramp­ing. IBS symp­toms and their sever­i­ty vary by per­son, but often include: