Pay women who are drug addicts to be sterilized. Good or bad? What about if men can be sterilized (and paid) too? Would that make a difference? What if committing to long-term contraception was an option – how would you feel then? Does this smack of preserving the ultimate race, keeping quality control of babies, or a smart thing to do? Well, regardless of how you feel about it, it’s already happening in the United States, thanks to Project Prevention. Project Prevention’s mission statement: Project Prevention offers cash incentives to women that are addicted to drugs and/or alcohol to use long-term or permanent birth control. Project Prevention is a national, 501 (C) 3 organization that has paid clients in 39 states and the... [Read more]

Not for kids? Really? Excuse me while I go pull my hair out – I won’t have much left after reading about this new product developed and marketed by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company. What is the product? Dissolvable, flavored tobacco. A smaller company, Star Scientific Inc., is also involved as they have been marketing a similar product for about nine years already. Now, if you go to the Reynold’s website for the product, www.cameldissolvables.com, you will see that you can’t get in without a huge song-and-dance. You either have to have a special code from one of their products, or go through a lengthy inquisition to determine (and prove) that you are over 18 years old. But, seriously, do we really believe that dissolvable,... [Read more]

We may be entering a whole new world of home videos if researchers from Indiana University Hospital in the United States have their way. If you were offered the chance to take home a video of your very own colonoscopy, would you? Would you go as far as to pay for one? The researchers conducted a survey of patients who underwent colonoscopies to see if they would like a video and if they would be willing to pay for one. Currently, videos are done if a procedure is going to be used as a teaching tool, but otherwise, recording is not done. However, since the effectiveness of colonoscopies are one of the tests that depend on the skill of the practitioner, a number of suspicious lesions may be missed during the procedure if it is not recorded. It... [Read more]

And nowwwwwwwww…….it’s winner time here at Healthbolt. On January 11, I posted this piece, Surgery for Hiccups… (and Contest!). I invited people to submit their solution for curing hiccups or to tell a hiccup story. The most common solution offered was to swallow a spoonful of sugar. Interesting – I wonder why that one is so popular? The next most popular one was to be scared by someone. So, we received 260 ideas and I used the system at randomizer.org to come up with number at random. that number was 256, which means the winner of the Amazon.com/.ca or iTunes certificate is Tracey Hoey. Congratulations Tracey! If you don’t receive an email from me within a few days, you can contact me through the site. Sometimes... [Read more]

Getting quality health care can be difficult enough for some people, but if you throw into the mix being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transexual, getting quality health care can be even more difficult. While the actual health issues, such as diabetes, cancer or hypertension, don’t differ from straights, all too often, medical professionals, from doctors and nurses to physiotherapists and nutritionists, don’t understand the cultural issues that affect LGBT patients. In some cases, the professionals may rely on misinformation or myths, or they don’t know where to turn for the information they need. Regardless of the problem, these barriers to adequate healthcare access for their LGBT patients. According to a press release issued... [Read more]