Camels

Bits and pieces

I came across this blog which compiles funny photos, vids, stories, qoutes etc. URL: http://bitsandpieces1.blogspot.com/ Examples:

Is this a problem?


Hunting:

A father and son went hunting together for the first time.

The father said, "Stay here and be very QUIET. I'll be across the field." A few minutes later, the father heard a blood curdling scream and ran back to his son.

"What's wrong?" the father asked. "I told you to be quiet."

The son answered, "Look, I was quiet when the snake slithered across my feet. I was quiet when the bear breathed down my neck.

But when the two squirrels crawled up my pant legs and said, 'Should we eat them here or take them with us?'

"I guess I just panicked...."

Supersize me

A fortnight ago, I watched this Academy Award-nominated documentary, SuperSize Me, in which a healthy 32-year old man went on a 30-day McDonald binge to see if such diet would be detrimental to health. The documentary was largely inspired by a lawsuit from 2 obese teenage girls against McDonald for causing their obesity problem. More info at IMDB and wikipedia. The movie got me wondering about the prevalence of obesity and cardiovascular (CVS) disease in Malaysia. Here is what I found:

1. In 2005, CVS disease is the 4th (7.07%, 130,965 cases) most common reason for hospitalisation. It is 2nd (14.31%, 5668 cases) most common cause of death in hospitals. [1]
2. An observational study published in 2007 found that overall national prevalence of obesity among Malaysians aged 15 years old and above was 11.7% (95% CI = 11.1 - 12.4%). The prevalence of obesity was significantly higher in females (13.8%) as compared to 9.6% in males (p<>= 18 years old has markedly increased by 280% since the last National Health and Morbidity Survey in 1996. [2]
3. A review in 2002 found that the prevalence of obesity was clearly greater in women than in men. In women, obesity rates were higher in Indian and Malay women than in Chinese women, while in men the Chinese recorded the highest obesity prevalence followed by the Malay and Indians. Studies on normal healthy subjects indicated that the energy intake of Indians was significantly lower than that of other ethnic groups. In women, Malays recorded a significantly higher energy intake than the other groups. Urban male subjects consumed significantly more energy than their rural counterparts, but this was not the case in women. In both men and women, fat intakes (%) were significantly higher in Chinese and urban subjects. Men were moderately active with the exception of the Dayaks. Chinese women were considerably less active than Chinese men. Chinese and Dayak women were less active than Malay and Indian women. The escalation of obesity, once thought to be an urban phenomenon, has now spread to the rural population at an alarming rate. [3]

There's more papers out there but I couldn't be bothered reading more. Conclusion: Obesity and CVS is a problem in Malaysia. Duh.

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[1] MOH (2006) Health Facts 2005 pamphlet
[2]Rampal L, Rampal S, Khor GL et al (2007) A national study on the prevalence of obesity among 16,127 Malaysians Asia Pac J Clin Nutr 2007;16(3):561-3
[3] Ismail MN, Chee SS, Nawawi H, Yusoff K, Lim TO, James WP (2002) Obesity in Malaysia Obes Rev 2002 Aug ;3(3):203-8

no idea for a topic

Its midnight right now in Christchurch and I am winding down to go to sleep, waiting for my electric toothbrush to be recharged. Tomorrow, OSCE, 2nd last for the year, yippee and this one will make or break my year so everyone pray for my success..please. And on Friday, I have this case presentation but here I am with no case. My house surgeon decided to do the topic I was planning to present. curse her..ahahaha...its about malignant meningitis anyway. Presented with excruciating headache and neck pain associated with sweating during attacks. MRI and MRA of the head and neck showed no abnormalities and so my team were quite puzzled by the presentation. Lumbar puncture were performed and was subsequently found to have neoplastic cells. Subsequent CT was made and showed a subtle oesophageal carcinoma. The man deteriorated fast, and after 10 days since he presented with the headache, he passed away and became the 2nd person to die while under management of the doctors I am attached with.

just taking a breather from studying and I thought of experimenting putting a youtube vid here.


so it works. its a nice song i used to like ages ago and stumbled upon just a few day ago. "Everybody's Free (to wear suncsreen)" by Baz Luhrmman. It did reach #1 in the UK charts back in '99. More info

Blunders?

Paying through the nose for tools

So on the news today was the revelation of how the Ministry of Youth and Sports paid RM 8.39mil more than the market price for equipments. One of the items were screwdrivers, which retailed at RM 40 was brought for RM 225! Other mishaps identified:
1. There was no evidence that any effort in reducing the prices were made.
2. Unauthorised person managed to approve funding
3. A supplier managed to get an extra RM 1.25mil compared to another supplier for supplying identical equipments.

More news:

Spend, Spend and Overspend

Ahh, so Ministry of Youth and Sports weren't alone in this. In fact, I could safely say this sort of corruptions blunders have happened in the past. Yet it continue to be perpetrated. Why? Some say attitudes/immorality - that some government officials up there were not at all concerned that this money belong the taxpayers. Its not their money, so what eh. Just spend it. We can make our friends rich while we are at it.
Others may point out to lack of accountability. Will there be any repercussions, ie someone get the sack or better jail. Past experience teach me there won't but then again the time is close to election so I hope the government get cracking and clean up their acts like they usually do once every 4-5 years. :D

PDA

It seems like my blog is turning to be a private diary of some sort, not close to what I envisage it to be, a medium to share my knowledge with some good well researched discussion on matters that mattered. And so, this entry is hoped to be the first of many that will follow...

Those rare few who have followed this blog might remembered my PDA-phone review. So after several months of usage, I have came across several PDA software that was and still is useful for me as a medical students:

1. iSilo: an e-book reader with useful functions such as search capability and hyperlinks jump. Puts your thick humongous textbook in your palm. This is easy to use and read once u get the hang of reading from small LCD screen and lots and lots of scrolling. Those drawbacks are its main con I guess but it is very handy when you need to check your facts when on the wards and no computer in the vicinity. It is not free though but cheap at 12 USD. I have found various e-books out there in the Internet, the best remains Harrison Principle of Med 16th Ed found on torrent.

2. Skyscape: Is not a software but a company who develops medical software for PDA. I've tried '5-minute consult' which one of the function helps list your DDx. I haven't had a full go at this software, since I have not actually found a working cracked version yet :D. But the software put out by this company is getting rave reviews in forums so I'm guessing it's worth a try. I will try this software again next holiday.

3. C4PDA: Not a software but website. just add www. and .com as prefix and suffix respectively for the URL. I won't say much about this website because its ...

holiday

A much needed break is coming to an end. Managed to squeeze in a day of snowboarding and sightseeing in Akaroa in an otherwise an unremarkable 1 week of holiday. I need to study anyway after months of slacking off and get that Maori assignment out of the way. For years I was the diligent type, studying consistently through out the year, churning out good results when exams come. But in recent 2 years, I thought, screw that. Friends and classmates around me has managed to get as good result as me just by 'last minute cramming' and I adopted that approach. Year 2 was fine. Year 3 was fine too. Then, this year came and finally I felt the repercussion of the 2 years of slacking. I was behind in group discussion and had to struggle to keep in pace with my classmates and assignments. Long has it been since I felt this way. Maybe never perhaps..And so it dawns on me, I am cursed to be the diligent type in order to succeed. Success has it price, so cliche yet so true.
Is the photo cool or what? See the reflection on my goggle..