Quite Interesting #1

Things have gotten away from me a little the last few weeks which resulted in my neglecting to write anything worth posting. The writing and scheduling posts ahead thing works, but only if you manage to keep adding more content before your queue empties. Which it will when weeks pass in a blink and you don't know where all that time has gone. Alas, some weeks are better than others.

In the mean time, I figured I'd start a wee recurring series of things I've read, and the theme of this first one is medical. I dug through some of my favourited articles on Instapaper, so some of these are pretty old, but still interesting nonetheless.

• The Woman Who Needed to Be Upside-Down A woman was brought into the ER held upside down by her ankles. She only remains conscious while upside down. The problem is resolved, but she's lucky she had a companion who was tall enough to carry her that way. This article is now behind a paywall, but if you search for the opening text, there are a few sources with the full-text.
• Pregnancy as a Reset A woman with hemiplegic migraines who suffered very few pain free days even with treatment is recommended an unorthodox treatment - pregnancy. After falling pregnant, her migraines ceased. And based on other anecdotes, other women who have had similar issues found that pregnancy hormones gave them a reset that cured their migraines. They can't simulate or synthesise this yet, so it's a bit of a dice roll. And from what I've read, the doctors seem to only suggest it if the patient and circumstances are suitable. So it isn't as though it's being recommended irresponsibly.
• Tal Golesworthy - How I Repaired My Own Heart A TED talk by a process engineer who fixed his cardiac problem (weak aortic walls) by treating it as a plumbing issue. He pulled together a multidisciplinary team and had a CAD model of his aorta made to cast a porous mesh that could be 'installed' and reinforce his aorta. Conventional medicine for this condition would usually involve highly invasive surgery that results in a lifetime of anticoagulation therapy.
• Roald Dahl and the Curious Shunt Roald Dahl, world renown childrens' author, was also co-inventor of the Wade Dahl Till (WDT) valve. This is another multidisciplinary team that developed a cerebral shunt used to treat hydrocephalus or cerebrospinal fluid build-up.
• With Genetic Testing I Gave My Parents the Gift of Divorce People are so concerned about the privacy issues surrounding being 10-printed at customs, or social media collecting (and disseminating) personally identifying information. And yet Ancestry and 23 and Me aren't collecting bits of info just relating to you when you get a DNA or ancestry test, but also everyone you're potentially related to. It's all well and good being able to trace your genealogy if you're also prepared for the consequences of learning more than you bargained for.

Read any interesting medical or non-medical stories? Comment below.