Herbal Health

Once you’ve found a doctor whose medical ability you trust, there are practical steps you can take to maintain a good working relationship between the two of you.

For instance, when you call the doctor’s office because your child is sick, you may not talk to the doctor but to a professional nurse practitioner who acts as the go-between in your communications with the doctor. You can have the same confidence in the nurse that you do in the doctor. The nurse is a qualified medical professional in his or her own right, and is well able to handle many of your questions. This means you don’t have to wait for the doctor to get through with a patient before he or she can talk to you. Of course, if your child’s condition does require the doctor’s attention, the nurse will have the doctor talk to you on the phone, or help you set up an appointment to see the doctor.

Whether you talk directly to the doctor or to the nurse when you call the office, be prepared to give the following information:

• Your name and the child’s name.

• Your child’s approximate weight; this is important because medications are prescribed by body weight, and the dosage that is appropriate for a 55 kilos teenager is very different from that given to a 11-12 kilos toddler.

• Your child’s temperature; whether or not the child is running a fever – and if so, how high a fever – is a clue to the child’s condition. Use a thermometer to take the child’s temperature. A guess based on flushed cheeks or a hot forehead isn’t good enough.

• Information on any illnesses the child has been exposed to recently.

• Details of medications the child is allergic to.

• The name, phone number, and business hours of your pharmacist so that the doctor can phone in a prescription if necessary. (Although the nurse can handle many of your questions and perform some examinations and medical procedures, only a doctor can prescribe medication.)

Be sure to have a pencil and paper at hand so that you can write down any information or instructions the doctor or nurse gives you.

When you call the doctor’s office you probably have an idea as to whether you just want some advice on the telephone, or whether you want to bring the child in to see the doctor. So tell the doctor or nurse what you have in mind – don’t expect them to guess. If the doctor or nurse feels it’s not necessary to bring the child in, you’ll be told the reason for that advice. However, the decision is yours, and if you still want a personal consultation you’re entitled to insist.

Another way to stay on good terms with your child’s doctor is to plan ahead so that both you and the doctor know what an office visit is intended to achieve. A common cause of communication breakdown between parent and physician is the parent’s complaint that the doctor was too busy, didn’t answer questions, or cut the visit short.

To avoid this, at the time you make the appointment also tell the receptionist what the visit is for. If you feel you’re going to need extra time with the doctor, make a point of saying this so that your request can be included in the doctor’s schedule. And, when you see the doctor, do not confuse the issue by trying to get a complete update on other family members’ problems in the course of one appointment. Let the doctor examine your child and deal with the reason you brought the child into the office. If you have other concerns not directly related to the present one, make an appointment to come back another time.

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If you are bottle-feeding, you must have clean water and refrigeration available. Be sure to clean the top of the can before you open it, and follow the directions carefully when you’re preparing the formula. Some formulas are concentrated, so you must add water. Others are “ready to feed,” and if you dilute this type the baby will not get enough to eat

Bottles and nipples must be cleaned and sterilized through the baby’s fourth month. After that, only the nipples must be sterile. To sterilize, clean the nipples with soap and water, making sure the hole in the top is not clogged with dried formula. Then boil them in water for 15 minutes. Bottles should be cleaned first and then sterilized. After four months, the bottles can be washed in hot water or in a dishwasher.

Hold and rock the baby when you’re bottle-feeding. Do not prop the bottle up and leave the baby alone to eat. Human contact is important to the baby’s development, so don’t rush the feeding time. However, try not to spend more than a half-hour to 45 minutes on each feeding.

Whether you are breast-feeding or bottle-feeding, remember that your baby’s appetite is generally a reliable measure of how much he or she needs to eat. A characteristic, demanding cry will let you know when the baby is hungry. After a few weeks or months you’ll probably be able to identify that hunger cry.

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In 1921 Charles Best and Frederick Banting, both Canadians, came together in Toronto to work on an idea of Banting’s to try to isolate a substance from the pancreas of dogs that might be successful in treating diabetes. They worked in experimental laboratories in the University of Toronto, Department of Physiology.

Up to this time the problem was that the digestive juices also made by the pancreas tended to destroy the chemical substance that they were trying to extract. Their first stage was therefore to inactivate the part of the pancreas making digestive juices. They did this by tying the tube or duct leading from the pancreas to the intestines and this led to the degeneration of all the pancreas except the important islet cell tissues.

This pancreatic tissue they then ground up and extracted with fluids. This extract they then injected into dogs with diabetes.

The extract led to control of the diabetes in these dogs and the substance they had extracted they called ‘Isleton’ because it had been made from the islet cells. Later they changed the name to ‘Insulin’.

This happened in 1921, and during that eventful year they conducted many experiments to find out the best way to produce a potent and effective preparation of insulin which would be suitable for using on human patients with diabetes.

The first patient to receive insulin treatment was a boy called Leonard Thompson, who had developed diabetes two years earlier when he was 11 years old. He was now at the last stages of diabetes and was dying. He was given insulin that had been extracted from beef pancreas by Banting and Best’s method. As a result of this insulin, his condition dramatically improved and his diabetes was controlled. His life was saved, and a tremendous medical achievement was made. This demonstration of the success of the insulin in treating persons with diabetes led to the urgent work of finding a way to make insulin in large quantities commercially for the many diabetics requiring treatment. This was done, under Charles Best’s direction, in the Connaught Laboratories with the assistance and support of The Lilly Company of Indianapolis USA. So successful was this work that commercial quantities of insulin were being produced in 1922, the year after its first discovery.

One drawback of the early insulin was that it had to be given several times a day as it only acted for a few hours. Further research on insulin has been directed to perfect its production and to produce forms of insulin which have a prolonged action so that they need to be given only once or twice a day. Dr Hagedorn of Copenhagen in Denmark found that when insulin was combined with a protein chemical called protamine its action was prolonged. Further lengthening of insulin action has been achieved by combining this protein and insulin with the element zinc. Since then other research work has led to several newer and different forms of insulin with different ranges of activity. These different insulins make it possible for the doctor to choose a suitable insulin or combination of insulins to meet the varying needs of different patients.

Currently, research is going even further into the precise ways that insulin works to control the body’s use of glucose and fats and also to discover the basic cause of diabetes. When we know these things it may be possible to achieve one of our ultimate goals, which is to prevent people developing diabetes. We hope it will also lead to even better and easier ways of treating it.

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