Heather's Blog

One of my fellow Durant Fellowship winners recently left for Bolivia to begin her work. She has started a blog, and I wanted to post a link to it here. I hope you enjoy following along on her adventures.

http://hshimmy.blogspot.com/

To Know Or Not To Know

I had a patient who was fighting cancer but ended up at the hospital for other reasons. She was a real spitfire of a person, a real fighter. I was happy to get the chance to talk to her and ask her a question that has been on my mind recently after my post about telling a patient a terminal diagnosis.

I got the chance to ask her about how she felt when getting the terminal diagnosis, what was really going through her head and how she reacted to the news. When telling me about how the first doctor she went to gave her 12 months to live, she explained to me about how angry that made her that somebody else put a time on the rest of her life. She felt he had no right to tell her that. She would have preferred he wouldn't have said anything at all about how long she had when telling her the news. Granted, I wasn't in the room the day when she was told that, and she may be looking back at the situation with a selective perspective. For all I know she could have been the one to ask "How long?" No matter how it happened, at this point in time she wishes the doctor would have never said anything.

I always thought people wanted to know the time they have left. I truly feel I would want some sort of estimate. But maybe some people really don't want to know and we are doing them a disservice by telling them.

Random Cleaning Post

I love to clean. I have even been known to clean the med room, and regularly wipe down the keyboard or phone I'm about to use with an alcohol swab. I've always been a fan of harsh chemicals, "Kill it all!!" was my motto. Being a nurse, this of course crossed over into the home. I used harsh chemicals and anti-bacterial soap.

But, with all the research coming out about chemicals I've decided it's time to limit my exposure to chemicals I don't need to be in contact with. I've slowly been switching over my cleaning products to the Seventh Generation brand or Method. I must say......so far so good. Items are just as clean, and I no longer need to wear a mask and gloves as they are safe for touch and inhalation. I wonder what will happen to our nation's health as more people go with this trend for being greener and chemical free. Will there be less allergies and super infections? Maybe a decrease in Autism or skin disorders such as eczema?

Research Money

Let me first start off by saying that I have nothing but respect for people who do research and the work that they do. Without them, we'd still be stuck without antibiotics.

I am curious what would happen if a percentage of the money that is donated for research for things like heart disease was spent on prevention. Huge issues like this get millions if not billions of dollars a year for research (which is very important,) however, we known that one of the main ways to prevent cardiac disease is by diet, overall health care, and exercise. What if we spent a few million in just one high incidence area on prevention? Would we see a more dramatic decrease in people with that diagnosis??

Just a thought.