Medicine questions
- What are the constituents of phlegm and snot? Why can at times one produce great quantities of this material, and other times can't?
- Recently, the recommendation of five plus a day of fruit and vegetables has changed to only two servings of fruit, the rest of vegetables. Given that some vegetables are actually classed as fruits, e.g. tomatoes, does your tomato count as fruit or vegetable, are all berries fruit, or do dieticians have different definitions for fruit and vegetables?
- When I clean my teeth, I find I always shut my eyes to do it, without knowing why. Is it to keep flying toothpaste droplets from getting in my eyes, or because I can rely on the feel of the brush doing its good work round my teeth and gums? or some intriguing reflex action? What do scientists do when they clean their teeth?
- The human retina receives a view of the world that is upside down and the brain learns to re-interpret this. I read recently of a man who wore spectacles which provided the upside down image. It took only 8 days for his brain to get the image the correct way up. How long does it take for a baby's brain to learn to see the world the right way up?
- Why do we not get goosebumps on our hands, feet and face?
- Why do fingernails grow much faster than toenails?
- Why do our eyes weep when running in cold air?
- I often reheat leftovers in the microwave oven but was recently told that destroyed the protein in
the food. Is that so?
- When my grandma was young there were no plastics.
Are foods sold in plastic containers and liquids that have
been in plastic pipes, kettles or bottles bad for us?
What would happen if I ate some plastic?
- My favourite tramping party trick gets an airing if ever we come upon
a substantial waterfall in the bush. First, my companions are asked to
choose a spot in the landscape near the waterfall. Next, they stare at
a fixed spot in the face of the waterfall. When, after 30 seconds they
are asked to switch their gaze back to their chosen spot the landscape
there appears to travel upwards.
- Are people of certain blood groups more predisposed to various types of cancer?
- Here’s a question for us hot yogis. Bikram Yoga is a series of 26 hatha
yoga postures performed in a heated room (40°C) over 90 minutes.
- A TV expose showed video footage from a pig farm where
rats were living with the pigs, and carcasses of dead pigs were
left with the living pigs. Apart from the animal welfare issues,
this kind of farming practice raises also human health issues.
Could you please explain what is the chance of getting Trichinosis
and/or Creutzfeld-Jacob disease ("mad cow disease") when consuming
meat from the pigs living in these kind of conditions?
- For disaster preparedness we are told to keep a supply of food.
What is the life of canned food?
- To get quick relief from Gout, a doctor once prescribed Colchicine.
This caused me to empty my whole "poisoned" system by vomiting, a horrid
heaving experience, and extreme diarrhoea. Would consuming a whole bottle
of prune juice, which is much more pleasant and cheaper have the same effect?
- Why is it that some children and teachers get nits constantly but
others don't get them at all? Is it something to do with blood?
- Why does a breast feeding mother who eats a strongly pigmented food
like beetroot have her breast milk stay white but the baby's poop go pink?
- Why do some people get seasick and others in the
same boat don't? Are there any good cures for seasickness ?
- Nutritionists often stress the importance of including green and leafy
vegetables in your diet. Do broccoli, green bean pods and green peppers
have the same nutritional value? If not, how do they differ?
- I have been told that I shouldn't use aluminium cooking pots because
aluminium can contaminate the brain. Is this so?
- Why is it that as they age men’s bottoms shrink, while women’s expand?
- Why are some people severely poisoned by one mosquito bite,
while others merely experience a slight reddening which soon disappears?
- When cooking food in a microwave, will it destroy all the organisms
that could give you food poisoning?
- Why do I have a dimple in my chin?
- Why does hair colour change with age?
- In a recent column re What causes cramp? the explanation concentrated on
that occuring during physical activity and hinted at other causes. From time to time
I suffer cramping when I am in bed. I have to roll myself out of bed and stand
on the cold floor, then make my way to the kitchen to take 'dolomite' tablets
which usually do the trick. I can't recall ever having cramp during or after exercise.
Usually the cramp seems to come for no reason that I can think of.
What causes these cases?
- What causes cramp?
- Although I take magnesium daily I still get cramp in my legs at night –
to the extent that sometimes I have to go out to the kitchen and
have a “wet finger-tip” of salt which makes the cramp go away.
Why does salt taken in this manner work for cramp?
In this day and age of processed food and high salt content of so many
foods, I add only a small amount to cooking for flavour enhancement.
Maybe not enough?
- Why do we female humans (and possibly other mammals) have all our eggs
present in our ovaries at birth? Are there not advantages in making
new ones (like sperm) when needed?
- Why do we female humans (and possibly other mammals) have all our eggs
present in our ovaries at birth? Are there not advantages in making
new ones (like sperm) when needed?
- Why is vitamin C essential to humans?
- I was told that humans are one of the few mammals who cannot produce vitamin C.
However some people are hardly ever sick.
Is it possible these people produce their own vitamin C?
- Is fresh or frozen chicken safest? I have heard that in some countries chicken
cannot be sold fresh.
- What is congenital diabetes insipidus?
- Why don't we sneeze when asleep?
- Can eye colour change with age?
- How does light make us see in the dark?
- Why does looking at the sun make you go blind?
- Why do our eye lids close vertically not sideways?
- What causes tinnitus?
- What is the best way to thaw a frozen chicken quickly?
- How do doctors know what medicines to give patients for their illnesses and diseases?
- What causes migraine headaches?
- How long does a brain last without water?
- Why does your brain swell when you break your skull?
- What do nerve cells look like?
- Why do we have five senses?
- How do scientists know what part of the brain controls memory, touch, taste, etc?
- Why do we only use 20 per cent of our memory?
- Why does our brain make us think?
- Why do we have an outer, middle and inner ear?
- Why do we get earache?
- Why and how do your teeth fall out?
- Recently I had several X-rays on my dodgy hip.
How many X-rays are safe?
- I and many others have to walk under a bridge in whose steelwork live hundreds of pigeons.
Could these droppings we have to walk through be a danger to health, especially if someone
slipped and fell into it, and for children in bare feet, or with cuts in their skin, or with
respiratory problems?
- M Pollard, of Palmerston North, asked:-
- I was adopted as a baby. A few years ago I found a younger brother who, also as a baby,
had been adopted by another family. Could DNA testing tell if we had the same father?
- What is ‘phlegm’ and ‘snot’.
- My Year 13 students have asked how dangerous is the radiation when using cell phones
or cordless phones. Is there something that you can buy to insert in the cell phone that
absorbs/stops the radiation. If so how effective is this?
- I am curious about how radiation causes cancer, yet also cures it?
- A chef told me polypropylene chopping boards are less hygienic than wooden boards.
Is this so?
- New Zealanders are reportedly exposed to about 40 per cent more cancer-causing
sunrays than North Americans living at similar altitudes. What are the potential long-term
effects of such exposure on plants and animal life?
- Does brain weight increase with age?
- If I eat a really big meal does some of that instantly become body fat?
Also I weighed myself after shifting 2-3 tonnes of hay bales one
weekend and was gutted to find I had gained weight and people
said it had converted to muscle. Is this so? If I do a lot of exercise
I'm told I can gain weight as muscle is heavier than fat, but how
fast does it happen?
- Is it true that flying cures whooping cough?
- Why do people need to drink water?
- Why is water healthy for us?
- Why do we shed tears from our eyes when hurt or upset?
- Why, when one person starts yawning, does everyone
else around them appear to do the same?
- What causes autism?
- What causes autism?
- Why do we have a philtrum, the indentation on our upper lip below the nose,
and is it true that the Greeks considered it an erogenous zone?
- What causes a random itch
that isn't caused by external events such as an insect bite or a rash?
- Why do our teeth chatter when we are cold?
- How many insects carry diseases?
- What can an elderly male do to build up white blood cells?
- How does the body makes new blood cells?
- Why do we have dreams?
- Why is human urine sometimes yellow and sometimes colourless?
- Why are the people of the
world showing such different eye shapes? Slit, round, mongolian
fold, etc. I had thought slit eyes might be for protection from
the sun but natives of Africa have bold, round eyes.
- Does food go rotten in space?
- Why did people evolve with four fingers and one thumb? Why not some other combination?
- Why is sugar bad for the heart? I recently purchased a can of pears in juice,
which had a Heart Foundation tick, and a can of apricots in syrup, which did not.
(The pears were sweeter than the apricots.) As a sweet-loving, non-smoker,
non-meat eater is my risk of heart disease as bad as, or worse than, my brother
who smokes and eats meat?
- Why are people's teeth white? Why aren't they pink or blue?
- How long does it take for Tb to develop, and do birds have a different disease to mammals?
- When were germs first discovered?
- What causes curly hair?
- Why do we have 5 fingers?
- How do eyes work?
- Why does my tummy grumble?
- Why are the wheels on racing wheelchairs splayed?
- Why do our ears pop when we drive up or down hills?
- Why does my heart keep beating?
- Why do we get butterflies in our stomach when we are about to go on stage?
- Why do we have toenails? What use are they?
- What is our immune system and what does it do?
- Why is muscle heavier that Fat?
- How long does it take for a human body to decompose?
- What causes the goosebumps I get on cold days?
- Can HIV be transmitted from
an infected person to someone else via a sandfly or mosquito bite?
- What makes and keeps our body warm?
- I understand that most of our body cells are replaced
often during our lifespan. So how do our memories transfer to new brain cells?
- When an embryo is dividing, how do cells know what function they are going to
perform?
- What would happen to a living creature if it was exposed to
radiation for a long period of time? Would it mutate and die,
mutate and live, its offspring mutate, something else?
- What is atherosclerosis?
- Rebecca Cadogan, of Clyde, asked:-
- How does ultraviolet radiation cause skin cancer?
- How and why do people dream?
- Why cannot people live forever?
- Why are people sick when they put their fingers down their throats?
- Do moths spread germs?
- Why do some people have bulging varicose veins?
- Why can we have mucus in our nose when we don't have a cold?
- Why are some people claustrophobic?
- Why do women live longer than men?
- What causes cramp?
- Why do some medicines tast sour?
- When do your feet stop growing?
- How does food colouring make kids hyperactive?
- How can scientists tell the age at death just from a human skull?
- Why do we have blood?
- What causes pins and needles?
- What causes pins and needles?
- Why do we go pink when sunburnt? (Is it blood?)
- How do we make tears?
- What causes aging?
- Why are some people deformed?
- Why do we have hair in only certain places?
- Why can't I eat dairy food when I am sick and vomiting?
- Lydia Gallagher, of St Josephs School, Port Chalmers, asked:-
- Why do the ends of my fingers go wrinkly when washing dishes?
- Emma Wagstoff, of Rongotea School, asked:-
Megan Sharrock, of Westland High School, asked:-
Bryn Barlow, of King's High School, asked:-
- How is epilepsy triggered?
- What causes Alzheimers disease?
- How often does the skin on my face change layers?
- How come bruises come up purple while blood is red?
- Has there been any suppression of research of electromagnetic
radiation? If not has there been any research proving or
disproving the question that electromagnetic radiation can
cause disease in humans?
- Why does alcohol make you drunk?
- Why do we sweat mostly on our forehead and under our arms?
- Why do some people have to have their tonsils out?
- How do people get colds?
- Why do we have different hair colours?
- Why do our cheeks go red when we are embarrassed?
- Why does a loud noise such as from an explosion cause a ringing
sensation in the ears for some time afterwards?
- Claire Fallon, of Ardgowan School, asked:-
Abigail Spinoglio, of Green Island School, asked:-
- What causes asthma?
- Why does pubic hair grow where it does in human beings?