For The Union-Tribune
Just kidneys
Kidneys are the most commonly transplanted organ. Last year, roughly 16,000 procedures were performed in the U.S. Nonetheless, the nationwide waiting list for a donor organ is more than 90,000 people, which necessitates some innovative thinking.
That’s where “transplant chains” come in.
The idea is that one donated organ can trigger another, then another and so on.
Surgeons at Ohio State University recently set an institutional record for kidney transplants, performing 10 transplants from 10 donors to 10 recipients. A “chain” begins with one person donating their kidney to an unknown recipient. Each of the recipients has a loved one whose organ wasn’t a match for them, but which did match with someone else in need of a kidney along the chain.
Transplant chains can measurably reduce the waiting list in short order, but the longer term hope lies with continued development of genetically edited pig-to-human transplants. Three experimental surgeries have already been successfully performed.
Body of knowledge
The length of a finger dictates how fast the fingernail grows. On average, fingernails grow 3.47 millimeters per month. (The average grain of short rice, by comparison, is 5.5 mm.) Longer fingers grow nails faster.
A number of other factors affect fingernail growth rates. Nails on your dominant hand are believed to grow faster because you expose your dominant hand to more trauma risk, such as cuts or bruises. In response, your body more often is sending additional nutrients to make repairs.
The nails of younger people grow faster than old, perhaps due to diminishing blood circulation. Hormones can affect the growth rate. Pregnant women and pubescent teens experience faster nail growth.
Stories for the waiting room
COVID-19 is still taking a toll on those with the long version of the disease. A study out of the University of Georgia’s School of Public and International Affairs and its College of Public Health reports that the lingering symptoms of long COVID results in negative economic effects, regardless of socioeconomic status.
Sufferers struggle to pay bills, buy groceries and keep their utilities on.
Almost 18 million Americans are living with long COVID. It’s a chronic condition triggered by the COVID-19 virus that can leave people suffering from extreme fatigue, memory problems and a variety of other unpleasant and sometimes incapacitating symptoms for months to years on end.
Doc talk
Classic migraine — A migraine headache preceded by visual disturbances; also known as a migraine with aura. Not to be confused with “common migraines,” which have no visual symptoms beforehand. Also called a migraine without aura.
Mania of the week
Plutomania — an obsession with obtaining vast amounts of wealth, the odds of which for most people are about as remote as the chances of visiting the dwarf planet and finding it occupied by Disney dogs.
Best medicine
Doctor: “You’re losing a lot of blood and need an infusion. What’s your blood type?!”
Patient: “B positive.”
Doctor: “I’m trying, but you’ve lost a lot of blood.”
Observation
“I consider exercise vulgar. It makes people smell.”
— Artist Alec Yuill-Thornton (1917-1986)
Medical history
This week in 1958, The Boston Herald printed a letter from Olga Owens Huckins attacking DDT pesticide as dangerous. Huckins also sent a personal letter to her friend, Rachel Carson, which ultimately prompted the writing of Carson’s book “Silent Spring.”
Carson collected research and data. She concluded that organo-pesticides built up in crops and sprayed crops, transferred to birds and other animals and was responsible for the poisoning of the surrounding fauna.
“Silent Spring” asked important questions about balancing industrial and agricultural needs, progress, the protection of the environment and the quality of life. Her persuasive writings were an early anthem for modern environmentalism, though it would require 14 more years before DDT was banned.
Self-exam
True or false: Adults need more sugar to experience the same level of sweetness as children.
Answer: It’s the opposite. Researchers have found that when children are given a sugary drink, they need a higher sugar concentration than adults to detect a sweet taste, writes The New York Times.
Scientists have also discovered that the cells in the tongue that sense sweet, salty, bitter, sour and umami tastes are spaced out across the tongue; some people are genetically more predisposed to liking sweets than others; and children tend to prefer the taste of sour candies more than adults do.
LaFee is vice president of communications for the Sanford Burnham Prebys research institute.
