My favorite medications to take for pain are NSAIDs, also known as non-steroidal anti-inflammatories. You may know them as the brand names Advil, Aleve, Midol, etc. or the generic ibuprofen, naproxen, diclofenac, etc.
I love them because they actually work in my personal experience.
NSAIDs help with swelling, pain, and inflammation. They don't always work the same on everyone, but they do work on me and I am very thankful for that!
Something important about NSAIDs is that they should never be taken without food, or something in your stomach besides water. When taken chronically or on an empty stomach, NSAIDs can create holes and ulcers in the stomach and gut.
When taken in large amounts, or chronically they can harm your body with a buildup of toxic effects. Never exceed the amount your doctor says you can take!
How do they work? They interfere by binding up and blocking the binding receptors of something called substance P, a very small neurotransmitter that transmits pain signals. Basically, it keeps pain signals from traveling.
Hooray for NSAIDs!
As a nurse I love Flu Vaccines. Influenza is so bad that I gladly roll up my sleeve and ask a coworker to jab me in hopes that I won't get fever, chills, muscle aches, headache, cough, congestion, runny nose, and sore throat. Being sick is bad enough, but with young, healthy individuals sometimes dying from the flu, I know that it is more than just an inconvenient illness. Dying from the flu is NOT how I want to go.
If I could get a vaccination with ALL the flu strains in it I would. I wish that they would put out two flu shots a year, with a second one updated once they have a better idea of what strains are actually going around.
Recently, I stumbled upon this post: 8 Damn Good Reasons Not to Get the Flu Shot
The listed reasons were so bad (incorrect, misleading, etc.) that I had no choice but to respond to them.
REASON #1: NEUROTOXIC INGREDIENTS
There is more mercury in a can of tuna than there is in the flu shot. Believing that the mercury in a shot will hurt you is ignorance.
The quotes in this article are taken out of context and warped. It is true that some in the medical community remove or want to remove a harmless, yet culturally controversial ingredient, but that is because it keeps people from being protected through ignorance and fear, NOT BECAUSE THE INGREDIENT IS ACTUALLY HARMFUL.
For an example... let's say a bunch of fictional people are dying from a bacterial disease that penicillin can cure. Let's also say that the penicillin pills are pink, and that there is a cultural taboo to not eat anything pink because pink will make your insides rot and your teeth fall out. We know that is not true, but the fictional people believe it, so despite the fact that this medicine would keep them from dying, they will die because they refuse to eat it. So the doctors seeing this talk to the people who make the pills and ask them to make the pills blue. They agree and the pills are blue, the people eat them and everyone lives. This is like the ingredients in immunizations, except that some of the ingredients in question actually are a vital part of how the immunization actually works. They tried to take out the pink color, but all it did was reinforce the idea that pink is bad, and therefore red is bad, and white is bad, and yellow is bad, etc.
REASON #2: 4250% INCREASE IN FETAL DEATHS REPORTED
This is just basic statistics. They only looked at three years, and three is not a statistically viable number here. Also, correlation does not mean causation. It's like flipping a coin three times... you get heads, tail, and heads, and Emily sneezed the one time it landed on tail, so tail will always make Emily sneeze.
If I could get a vaccination with ALL the flu strains in it I would. I wish that they would put out two flu shots a year, with a second one updated once they have a better idea of what strains are actually going around.
Recently, I stumbled upon this post: 8 Damn Good Reasons Not to Get the Flu Shot
The listed reasons were so bad (incorrect, misleading, etc.) that I had no choice but to respond to them.
REASON #1: NEUROTOXIC INGREDIENTS
There is more mercury in a can of tuna than there is in the flu shot. Believing that the mercury in a shot will hurt you is ignorance.
The quotes in this article are taken out of context and warped. It is true that some in the medical community remove or want to remove a harmless, yet culturally controversial ingredient, but that is because it keeps people from being protected through ignorance and fear, NOT BECAUSE THE INGREDIENT IS ACTUALLY HARMFUL.
For an example... let's say a bunch of fictional people are dying from a bacterial disease that penicillin can cure. Let's also say that the penicillin pills are pink, and that there is a cultural taboo to not eat anything pink because pink will make your insides rot and your teeth fall out. We know that is not true, but the fictional people believe it, so despite the fact that this medicine would keep them from dying, they will die because they refuse to eat it. So the doctors seeing this talk to the people who make the pills and ask them to make the pills blue. They agree and the pills are blue, the people eat them and everyone lives. This is like the ingredients in immunizations, except that some of the ingredients in question actually are a vital part of how the immunization actually works. They tried to take out the pink color, but all it did was reinforce the idea that pink is bad, and therefore red is bad, and white is bad, and yellow is bad, etc.
REASON #2: 4250% INCREASE IN FETAL DEATHS REPORTED
This is just basic statistics. They only looked at three years, and three is not a statistically viable number here. Also, correlation does not mean causation. It's like flipping a coin three times... you get heads, tail, and heads, and Emily sneezed the one time it landed on tail, so tail will always make Emily sneeze.
