Life & Style
www.innercityweekender.com.au
STAYING HEALTHY
by Elisha Stein
Drugs can be dangerous, no matter what e all know misuse of drugs can be deadly. But not many people know that using them correctly can sometimes be just as dangerous! I read an article in The Australian this week about Professor Nick Buckley, a medical toxicologist at the University of NSW. He says one in 15 deaths in Australia is drug related and more people die from drug poisoning than from car accidents. A lot of new drugs will be approved this year and he knows there could be a killer among them. He’s rightly worried as once a drug is being used by the public it may be making people experience side effects, but there is no formal method of sharing data or tracking drug-related side effects or even deaths! He is leading a $7 million project to examine prescription drug reactions, medical and chemical poisonings and snake and spider bites. One of the drugs on his radar is a legal painkiller that goes by the street name ‘hillbilly heroin’. There is not enough information about how many people it and other legal drugs are killing. “We need the same approach as we have with the road toll,” he says. “But there is no monitoring once a drug is introduced, so we do not know where the black spots are. There are 1,700 deaths a year from drug poisoning. That’s more than one and a half times the road toll.”
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Prof Buckley is planning to monitor coroners’ cases, hospital admissions, prescription patterns and poison calls to start establishing some sort of pattern and help identify problem drugs. He says one of the worst killers to slip under the radar was the poisonous painkiller Dextropropoxyphene, which caused 10,000 deaths worldwide before it was banned in Europe and the US. “It has still not been banned in Australia, but was taken off the PBS in 2000 and doctors have been warned to stop prescribing it.” Drugs can certainly have a role in disease treatment but they do have side effects, always be aware you can get a second opinion and never be afraid to look into viable drug free alternatives if they are available.
Elisha is a registered nurse and midwife who has years of experience working in emergency departments, general wards and maternity wards
Friday, May 3, 2013
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The Inner City Weekender
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KEEPING FIT by David Stein
If it’s in a packet, don’t pick it up
I
have worked with a lot of people over the years but I have never had a person sick or overweight from eating too much good, nutritious food. Next time you’re standing at a checkout look at the amount of bars and junk surrounding you. There’s enough calories to feed a starving country within arm’s reach; only problem is the starving people would still suffer from malnutrition, and unless we eat good, healthy food as well then we will too. So how do we fi nd good, healthy food, when there are big companies who prioritise making money over our families’ health? Firstly, ignore the packaging like you would a dodgy salesman and educate yourself. Cartoon characters and words that sound healthy, like ‘low fat’, ‘no MSG’, ‘natural colours’ and ‘high in iron’ could be found on a box of cereal but could describe a can of paint as well. Something like ‘High in Omega 6’ sounds good, until you know the average modern diet has way too much Omega 6 in relation to other essential fats, which is linked to heart disease, stroke, cancer, immune system damage and hormone imbalance. Best option: don’t buy packaging. Get your chip packet, rip it open and pour it straight in your trolley! Ok not really... I mean buy items that have minimal
packaging. If it still looks like it did while it was growing, that’s a good start. Secondly, always read the ingredients list, they are listed in order of amount used. We can’t afford to be brainless consumers as companies are pushing the limit of what they can put in a wrapper and call food. Sugar, flour, salt are very cheap and easy to make taste nice. But putting stuff in your mouth doesn’t mean you are feeding yourself properly. If you want to feel good and have energy all day, eat food that can make it happen. Good, nutritious food will have you bouncing off the walls. You know how you’ll feel after late night with pizza and a drink too many, but you can be sure when you eat good, fresh food that your body will feel a whole lot better for it.
David Stein, Owner & Manager of Fitec, Penrith www.fitec.com.au e:david@fitec.com.au