Health Journal Online

Tag: Symptoms

  • Dad Dies Year After Brain Tumor Diagnosis, Doctor Initially Dismissed Symptoms As Stress, Accused Him Of Faking

    Dad Dies Year After Brain Tumor Diagnosis, Doctor Initially Dismissed Symptoms As Stress, Accused Him Of Faking

    A 53-year-old U.K. man with troubling signs, including headaches and jumbled speech, was initially dismissed as stressed. His doctor even accused him of faking symptoms before being diagnosed with an aggressive brain tumor. A year later, he died. Now, his daughter is running a marathon to raise awareness and money for cancer research.

    Stephen Blakeston, from Hull, England, started experiencing massive headaches and was jumbling up sentences when his wife noticed the symptoms and took him to a doctor in October 2010.

    “I couldn’t believe it when we visited the GP, who dismissed his symptoms as stress-related and even said he was faking, something I know my dad wouldn’t do,” Blakeston’s daughter Hollie Rhodes recollected.

    Blakeston later got a CT scan done and realized that a tumor was growing on the left side of his brain, which was affecting his speech. He underwent surgery soon, and a biopsy confirmed that the tumor was a glioblastoma, a fast-growing, incurable cancer, leaving him with just 12-18 months to live.

    After the surgery, Blakeston underwent intensive radiotherapy and two rounds of chemotherapy to halt the growth of the tumor and scans showed no signs of further regrowth.

    However, around 9 months later, Blakeston suddenly collapsed and died after a blood clot, believed to be related to his treatment, or the tumor traveled to his heart.

    “It was horrible for us to lose him so suddenly, but there is some comfort in knowing it was quick and likely the way he would have wanted to go. I’ll always miss hearing his laugh,” Rhodes said.

    Glioblastoma is a fairly common form of brain tumor, with more than 13,000 Americans are diagnosed with it every year. The symptoms vary but often include persistent headaches, nausea, confusion, memory loss, and personality changes. Other signs to watch out for include vision problems, speech difficulties, muscle weakness, and seizures, especially in those without a history of them.

    “It’s the biggest cancer killer of children and adults under 40, so it should absolutely be a priority to stop these deaths. It almost feels like people view brain tumors as a final prognosis. That whole narrative needs to change because more funding in research would bring hope to those impacted,” said Rhodes, who is running the London Marathon to raise money for Brain Tumor Research.

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  • Fitness Trainer Gets Diagnosed With Rare Blood Cancer At 25 After Brushing Off Strange Symptoms

    Fitness Trainer Gets Diagnosed With Rare Blood Cancer At 25 After Brushing Off Strange Symptoms

    For a 23-year-old fitness trainer, Dilan Patel in the U.K., life was going normal until he began experiencing a strange, recurring symptom that kept him up two to three times a night. For nearly two years, Patel ignored night sweats and several other warning signs. However, when they became impossible to overlook, he was faced with a life-altering diagnosis: Hodgkin lymphoma, a rare type of blood cancer.

    Hodgkin Lymphoma is a cancer that affects the lymphatic system. Although a serious form of cancer, the tumors in the lymph nodes can be cured if diagnosed and treated early. However, most often signs such as night sweats can easily be mistaken for less serious issues.

    “You won’t believe it… I was 25 years old, living my life like any other young adult – working hard, working out, hanging with friends, and trying to figure out my future. Life felt normal. I had no reason to think anything was wrong. But then something strange started happening,” Patel said in a TikTok video.

    “I’d wake up in the middle of the night drenched in sweat. I mean SOAKED. My clothes, my bed – everything would be wet. It happened 2-3 times every single night. At first, I just thought, ‘Maybe I’m getting too hot under the covers?’ So I brushed it off,” he added.

    Apart from night sweats, Patel experienced persistent itchy skin, which he brushed off as nothing more than dryness, and fatigue and lumps on his neck that he assumed were from intense gym workouts.

    “Everything had an explanation – or so I thought,” Patel said. However, by the time Patel was diagnosed with stage 4B Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, he already had five tumors and the cancer had even spread to his lung.

    “I couldn’t believe it. I’d spent so long brushing off my symptoms, convincing myself they weren’t a big deal. But my body had been screaming at me for almost 2 years,” Patel said.

    The symptoms of Hodgkin lymphoma include painless, swollen lymph nodes in the neck, underarm, or groin, unexplained fever, drenching night sweats, weight loss over six months without a clear reason, persistent fatigue, and itchy skin, particularly after bathing or drinking alcohol.

    “If there’s one thing I’ve learned from this experience, it’s to pay attention to your body. Those little signs and symptoms? They’re there for a reason. Don’t wait until it’s too late,” Patel added.



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  • Managing PTSD symptoms at work

    Managing PTSD symptoms at work

    Having post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can affect people in the workplace, but there are coping strategies that can help, according to Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health’s  Karestan Koenen.

    In a Dec. 12 Forbes article, Koenen, professor of psychiatric epidemiology, said that having PTSD at work can lead people to re-experience trauma, become avoidant, and experience emotional dysregulation. “Avoidance can look like poor performance or not caring if it leads to missing meetings or obligations,” she said. “Emotion dysregulation can show up exactly how it sounds—losing your temper at work or exploding at a colleague over something small.”

    She recommended several grounding, distraction, and relaxation techniques. Grounding can include feeling your feet on the floor or holding something with a comforting texture. She added, “Have a go-to video or music or something to distract your mind while the flashback runs its course. Really mastering breathing techniques that induce relaxation by practicing them every day (twice a day) is helpful.”

    Read the Forbes article: How To Deal With PTSD Symptoms At Work

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  • Nearly 23% Of Adults Face Long COVID Symptoms: AI-Based Study Reveals

    Nearly 23% Of Adults Face Long COVID Symptoms: AI-Based Study Reveals

    Long COVID, a complex condition with lingering symptoms like fatigue, chronic cough, and brain fog may be affecting far more people than once believed.

    A recent AI-based study conducted by researchers at Mass General Brigham in Boston finds that nearly 23% or one in five U.S. adults report symptoms of long COVID. The new finding reveals a rate strikingly higher than the 7% prevalence suggested by previous studies.

    “Questions about the true burden of long COVID — questions that have thus far remained elusive — now seem more within reach,” said senior researcher Hossein Estiri, head of AI research at Mass General Brigham in a news release.

    The latest study utilized a specialized AI tool to navigate through medical records for symptoms of long COVID using a database of nearly 300,000 patients across 14 hospitals and 20 community health centers in the Mass General Brigham system. The novel technique called “precision phenotyping” sifts through individual records to identify symptoms and conditions linked to COVID-19, tracking them over time and distinguishing them from symptoms of other illnesses.

    According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), long COVID is a serious condition that occurs after SARS-CoV-2 infection leading to chronic conditions or disability. Although the exact number of people experiencing the condition is unknown, the CDC considers it a significant public health concern impacting millions of lives.

    Typical symptoms of long COVID or (PASC), including fatigue, chronic cough, heart problems, and brain fog may develop weeks or months after a person gets over the COVID-19 infection. It may resolve, reemerge, or persist for several weeks or months.

    Using the new precision phenotyping technique, the algorithm could determine whether symptoms like shortness of breath are linked to a patient’s pre-existing conditions or long COVID. Patients were classified as having long COVID only after all other possibilities were ruled out.

    “Our AI tool could turn a foggy diagnostic process into something sharp and focused, giving clinicians the power to make sense of a challenging condition. With this work, we may finally be able to see long COVID for what it truly is — and more importantly, how to treat it,” said senior author Hossein Estiri, an associate professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.

    “Physicians are often faced with having to wade through a tangled web of symptoms and medical histories, unsure of which threads to pull while balancing busy caseloads. Having a tool powered by AI that can methodically do it for them could be a game-changer,” said Dr. Alaleh Azhir, the co-lead author.

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  • Just 80 Minutes Of Weekly Exercise Reduces Baby Blues, Postpartum Depression Symptoms: Says Study

    Just 80 Minutes Of Weekly Exercise Reduces Baby Blues, Postpartum Depression Symptoms: Says Study

    For new moms who are looking for an all-natural way to ease their baby blues or depression, here’s some good news: a brisk walk or yoga might be just what you need to relieve symptoms. Researchers have found that mothers who engage in exercise programs with at least 80 minutes of moderate activity each week experience significant reductions in the severity of baby blues and postpartum depression.

    Postpartum depression is a serious mental health condition impacting over 10% of women in the first year after childbirth. Hormonal shifts, genetic predisposition, and environmental factors can trigger it. In contrast, the ‘baby blues’ is a milder, temporary form of depression that usually fades within a few weeks as hormone levels stabilize.

    Researchers behind the latest study investigated the benefits of exercise on maternal mental health by evaluating 35 studies involving 4072 participants from 14 countries. Participants exercised at different frequencies, from 1 to 5 days a week, with sessions lasting between 15 and 90 minutes. Activities included aerobic exercise, strength training, stretching, yoga, and combinations of these forms.

    “Pooled data analysis of the study results showed that compared with no exercise, exercise-only interventions were associated with less severe symptoms of depression and anxiety after giving birth and an almost halving in the odds (45%) of developing major postpartum depression,” the news release stated.

    Although with an increase in exercise volume, there were greater reductions in depression symptoms, researchers noted significant positive effects, even with a minimum threshold of 80 minutes per week of moderate activities spread across at least four days. Moderate activities included brisk walking, water aerobics, stationary cycling, and resistance training with bands, weights, or body weight.

    Based on these findings, researchers recommend starting postpartum exercise within the first three months after childbirth for improved mental health.

    “The findings of this review show the efficacy of exercise in improving mental health outcomes for postpartum individuals. Given the comparable effectiveness we observed of postpartum exercise in reducing depressive symptom severity to conventional treatments, exercise could provide mothers with relatively safe, accessible and inexpensive alternatives to address mental health conditions,” the researchers wrote in the study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

    “Additionally, using exercise to improve postpartum mental health could reduce current concerns with conventional treatment options, such as the largely unknown long-term effects of antidepressant use during lactation on the child or prohibitive costs of regular psychosocial therapy visits,” they added.

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  • Know Symptoms, Learn How To Protect Yourself

    Know Symptoms, Learn How To Protect Yourself

    Whooping cough cases are on the rise in the U.S., with cases skyrocketing to the highest levels seen in a decade, health officials reported.

    Pertussis or whooping cough is a highly contagious respiratory illness that is a common endemic disease in the U.S.. The infection tends to surge in cycles, with peaks in reported cases occurring every few years.

    In the past few years, whooping cough cases dropped to lower-than-expected levels, largely due to pandemic precautions like masking and remote learning. However, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is now sounding the alarm as the country returns to pre-pandemic trends, or even surpassing them, with more than 10,000 cases typically reported annually.

    “Preliminary data show that more than five times as many cases have been reported as of week 41, reported on October 12, 2024, compared to the same time in 2023. The number of reported cases this year is higher than what was seen at the same time in 2019, prior to the pandemic,” the CDC said in a report.

    Meanwhile, health officials urge people to get vaccinated as it is the best way to prevent whooping cough. However, the CDC expects a rise in cases across both vaccinated and unvaccinated populations as infection patterns return to normal, largely due to waning immunity from earlier vaccinations.

    Know Symptoms:

    The symptoms can begin just like a common cold with a runny or stuffed nose, occasional cough, and low-grade fever for around two weeks. Young children, particularly those under the age of one are likely to get severe infection.

    As the infection progresses, patients may experience intense coughing fits lasting up to 10 weeks. These fits often produce a distinctive “whoop” sound when inhaling after a coughing episode. Other signs include vomiting during or after coughing fits, extreme fatigue, difficulty sleeping, and even trouble breathing. In severe cases, the force of coughing can lead to rib fractures.

    Prevention

    Whooping cough vaccination is recommended for prevention for people of all ages including babies, preteens, teenagers, and pregnant women. However, the effectiveness of vaccines can wane over time. In the case of individuals who are already exposed to pertussis bacteria, the use of preventive antibiotics is also recommended.

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