This
might be a lifesaver if we can remember the three questions!
IS IT A STROKE?
Sometimes symptoms of a stroke are difficult to identify. Unfortunately, this
lack of awareness can spell disaster. The stroke victim may suffer brain
damage when people nearby fail to recognize the symptoms of a stroke.
Now doctors say a bystander can recognize a stroke by asking three simple
questions:
1. Ask the individual to smile.
2. Ask him or her to raise both arms.
3. Ask the person to speak a simple sentence.
If he or she has trouble with any of these tasks, call EMERGENCY immediately
(000 in Australia/911 in America) and describe the symptoms to the
dispatcher. After discovering that a group of non-medical volunteers
could identify facial weakness, arm weakness and speech problems,
researchers urged the
general public to learn the three questions. They presented their conclusions
at the American Stroke Association's annual meeting last February.
Widespread use of this test could result in prompt diagnosis and treatment
of the stroke and prevent brain damage.
HEART
ATTACK SELF HELP
A cardiologist says if everyone who gets this e-mail sends it to 10 people,
you can bet that at least one life will be saved. Read this ... it could
save your life.
Let's say it's 6:15 p.m. and you're driving home (alone, of course) after an
unusually hard day on the job. You're really tired, upset and frustrated.
Suddenly you start experiencing severe pain in your chest that starts to radiate
out into your arm and up into your jaw. You are only about five miles
from the hospital nearest your home. Unfortunately, you don't know if
you'll be able to make it that far. You have been trained in CPR, but the
guy that taught the course did not tell you how to perform it on yourself.
HOW TO SURVIVE A HEART ATTACK WHEN ALONE
Since many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack, without help, the
person whose heart is beating improperly and who begins to feel faint, has
only about 10 seconds left before losing consciousness. However, these victims
can help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously. A deep
breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep and prolonged,
as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest. A breath and a
cough must be repeated about every two seconds without let-up until help
arrives, or until the heart is felt to be beating normally again. Deep
breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze the heart
and keep the blood circulating. The squeezing pressure on the heart also
helps it regain normal rhythm. In this way, heart attack victims can get
to a hospital. Tell as many people as possible about this. It could
save their lives. And remember, you don't have to be 'old' to have a heart
attack.
Chinese News article:
患了中風，腦部的微血管，會慢慢的破裂，遇到這種情形，千萬別慌，患者無論
在什麼地方(不管是浴室、臥房或客廳），千萬不可搬動他。
因為，如果移動，會加速微血管的破裂。
所以要就原地把患者扶起坐穩止防止再摔倒，這時開始（放血）。
家中如有專為注射用的針，當然最好，如果沒有，就拿縫衣用的銅針，或是大頭
針，用火燒一下消毒，就在患者的十個手指頭尖兒（沒有固定穴道，大約距離手
指甲一分之處）上去刺，要刺出血來(萬一血不出來，可用手擠），
等十個手指頭都流出血來(每指一滴)，大約幾分鐘之後，患者就自然清醒。
如果嘴也歪了，就拉他的耳朵，把耳朵拉紅，在兩耳的耳垂兒的部位，各刺兩
針，也各流血兩滴，幾分鐘以後，嘴就恢復原狀了。
等患者一切恢復正常感覺沒有異狀時再送醫，就一定可以轉危為安，否則，若是
急著抬上救護車送醫，經一路的顛跛震動,恐怕還沒到醫院，他腦部微
血管，差不多已經都破裂了。
萬一能夠吉人天相，保全老命，能像孫院長，容得勉強行動，那要靠祖上的陰
了。
放血救命法，是住在新竹的中醫師夏伯挺先生告訴我的。且是經自己身實驗。
敢說百分之百有效。
大概是民國六十八年我在台中逢甲學院任教，有天上午，
我正在上課，一位老師跑到我的教室上氣不接下氣的說：劉老師快來，主任中風
了；我立刻跑到三樓，看到陳幅添主任，氣色不正，語意模，嘴也歪，很明顯的
是中風了。
立即請工讀生到校門外的西藥房，買來一支注射用的針頭，就在陳主任十個手指
頭上直刺。等十個手指尖兒都見血了（豆粒似的一滴），大約幾分鐘以後，
陳主任的氣色就變過來了，兩眼也有神了，只有嘴還歪著，我就拉搓他的耳朵，
使之充血，等把耳朵拉紅,就在左右耳垂之處，各刺兩針，兩耳垂都流出兩滴血
來，奇蹟出現了，大約不到三五分鐘，他的嘴形，恢復正常了，說話也清清楚楚
了。
讓他靜坐一陣子，喝了一杯熱茶，才扶他下樓，開車送到惠華醫院，打一罐點
滴，休息了一夜，第二天就出院回學校上課了。一切照常工作，毫無後遺症。
反觀一般腦中風患者，都是送醫院治療時，經過一路震盪血管急速破裂，以致多
數患者一病不起，所腦中風，在死因排行榜上高居第二位，其最幸運者也僅能保
住老命，而落得終身殘廢。
這是一個多麼可怕的病症。如果大家都能記住這放血救命)的方法，立刻如法施
救，在短短時間它能起死回生，而且保證百分之百的正常。
這個急救法，希望大家告訴大家。那腦中風，在死因排行榜上，就可以除名了。
●閱後傳知他人，添福添壽，也可減輕家庭負擔，為社會謀福●
Vampire bats flutter on the edge of
starvation, relying on two spoonfuls of blood a night. But blood is sticky.
It begins congealing while the bat's teeth are still embedded in its victim.
Fortunately, an enzyme in the tiny nightcrawler's saliva prevents blood from
clotting before the bat can fill its belly.
Now neurologists are praising this bat
spit as a boon to medicine. A study published today in the journal Stroke
reports a substance distilled from the saliva of common vampire bats can be
used for three times longer than the clotbusting drugs currently in use. And
patients treated with desmoteplase (DSPA) have a lower risk of brain damage
than those treated with other drugs.
"The real issues in stroke ... is
that we need stronger treatments," said Alastair Buchan, a stroke
specialist and professor of neurology at the University of Calgary.
Strokes are caused when a blood clot in
an artery blocks circulation to the brain, causing brain cells to die within
hours. Until a decade ago, doctors could do little. But the development of
such clot-dissolving drugs as tissue plasminogen activator (t-PA) now allows
doctors to melt the clots before brain cells succumb in large numbers,
causing disability or death.
However, because t-PA is not strong
enough to clear all the brain's arteries, patients must be treated within
three hours of a stroke. "Our perennial problem is that people are
still arriving [too] late to hospital" for t-PA to be effective, Buchan
says.
In the mid-1980s, Wolf-Dieter Schleuning,
now chief scientific officer of the German biotechnological company PAION
GmbH, found the vampire bat enzyme was genetically related to t-PA but was
more potent. Schleuning and Robert Medcalf, an Australian researcher, were
among the first scientists to study clot busters such as t-PA. They believe
DSPA could give doctors more precious time.
"When the vampire bat bites its
victim, it secretes this powerful clot-dissolving [fibrinolytic] substance
so that the victim's blood will keep flowing, allowing the bat to
feed," explains Medcalf, senior research fellow at Monash University's
department of medicine in Victoria, Australia.
The drug DSPA destroys fibrin, the
structural framework of blood clots. In tests, Medcalf and Schleuning found
the clot-dissolving power of DSPA rose 13,000-fold when exposed to fibrin.
The activity of t-PA increased only 72-fold.
Another troubling feature of t-PA, noted
in some animal studies, is that it can worsen the degree of brain cell
death. As a result, some doctors are loath to give t-PA too long after a
stroke, when cells are already dying en masse.
In the current study, researchers
injected t-PA or DSPA into the brains of mice, then traced the survival of
brain cells. While t-PA activated two brain receptors that can promote brain
cell death, DSPA zeroed in on fibrin.
This specific activity may make DSPA a
safer option for treatment over a longer period. The drug is being tested up
to nine hours after stroke onset in patients in Europe, Asia and Australia.
Health Canada is reviewing the drug's safety profile and North American
trials could begn this year. -
Brad Evenson National
Post
10 January 2003
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