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Weekend Doctor: Type 2 diabetes and physical activity

By Jay Salyer, APRN-CNP
Endocrinology & Diabetes Specialists of Northwest Ohio

Type 2 diabetes is an illness that interferes with the way in which your body utilizes blood sugar. The human body is made of trillions of cells (brain cells, muscle cells, skin cells, hair cells, etc.) and all of those cells need sugar to function properly. Sugar is transported to body cells with the help of the hormone insulin. If your body stops making insulin (type 1 diabetes) or stops responding to insulin appropriately (type 2 diabetes), sugar can elevate in the bloodstream rather than getting to the cells where it belongs. Insulin resistance, a major contributor to the development of type 2 diabetes, can be improved through regular physical activity, which dramatically improves diabetic control by reducing the amount of medication needed to treat the disease.

Benefits of activity 

Regular physical activity helps to prevent and/or improve a variety of chronic illnesses including heart disease, osteoporosis, various cancers, depression, anxiety, as well as type 2 diabetes. With a focus on diabetes, activity increases the effect of insulin within the body. Medications used to treat the disease are also more effective with regular activity. These improvements are not only witnessed during activity itself, but last for several hours following exercise completion. Additionally, long-standing increase in insulin sensitivity happens from increased muscle mass, reduction in fat tissues, and changes within the liver all of which, in turn, significantly improves blood sugar control.

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Letter: Medicaid and the end of the public health emergency

Letter to the Icon from William Kose, MD, JD, Vice President of Special Projects, Blanchard Valley Health System

Those of you who receive health insurance through Medicaid, or food through Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, will be affected by some changes happening soon.

While these changes are happening at the federal level, and affect multiple agencies, we here at Blanchard Valley Health System want to help make sure everyone has the information they need.

Both Medicaid and SNAP have been operating under different regulations ever since public health declared a federal emergency on Jan. 31, 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. States could not remove the insured from their Medicaid rolls as long as the public health emergency was in effect. 

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Weekend Doctor: Three types of pain

By Heather Auxier, APRN-CNP
Certified Nurse Practitioner, Blanchard Valley Pain Management

What is chronic pain? This is an unfavorable, unpleasant sensory and emotional experience that is persistent lasting weeks to years. 

The three types of musculoskeletal pain include nociceptive, neuropathic and nociplastic.

Nociceptive pain can be associated with tissue damage or injury. Examples of this kind of pain would include spraining your ankle or touching a hot stove. 

Burning, stabbing, shooting and prickling are often descriptive words for neuropathic pain.  

Often, people will say this pain travels or is radicular in nature. Other diagnoses for this kind of pain include trigeminal neuralgia, diabetic neuropathy and sciatica. 

Lastly, nociplastic pain is a pain that arises from altered nociception despite no clear evidence for disease or actual threatened tissue damage, causing an activation of peripheral nociceptors or evidence for disease or lesion of the somatosensory system causing the pain. The net result of this pain is usually widespread and amplified. Fibromyalgia is considered a nociplastic type of pain. 

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Chicken Run

By Karen Kier
Pharmacist on behalf of the ONU HealthWise team

In 2000, the highest grossing stop-motion animated film in history was released titled Chicken Run, bringing in 227 million dollars. When my daughter was in elementary school, she loved this movie and we watched it over and over again!

The movie was directed and written by Peter Lord and Nick Park. A stop-motion film requires the moviemakers to physically manipulate the characters in small increments between the photograph frames so they appear in motion. 

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Weekend Doctor: Temper tantrums?

By Michael Flores, PhD
Big Lots Outpatient Behavioral Health
Nationwide Children’s Hospital

*Through a collaboration between Blanchard Valley Health System and Nationwide Children’s Hospital, the content of this article was provided courtesy of Nationwide’s 700 Children’s® blog by pediatric experts.

Defiant behavior among toddlers and young children (commonly known as “the terrible twos”) is a normal phase of child development. Children might throw temper tantrums or have rapid mood changes. They want to do things by themselves. Their favorite word is “no.” Similar developmentally appropriate behavior often shows up again during the teen years. Teens may rebel against household rules or act frustrated or angry. Some of this behavior stems from hormonal changes associated with puberty, as their bodies and minds develop.

Temper tantrums are usually triggered when a child is frustrated, tired or hungry. As children learn more appropriate ways to communicate their wants and needs, and when clear limits and behavioral expectations are consistently set, these outbursts tend to become less frequent. However, some children continue to struggle with aggressive or impulsive behavior. Sometimes these actions may pose a threat to their safety or the safety of others. For some people, the behaviors can continue through childhood and even into adulthood.

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Don’t Go Breaking My Heart

By Karen Kier, Pharmacist on behalf of the ONU HealthWise team

In 1976, Elton John and Kiki Dee released the duet Don’t Go Breaking My Heart. The song was written by Elton John and Bernie Taupin under the pseudonyms of Ann Orson and Carte Blanche. The single was never on an original Elton John album, but appeared on the 1994 release Duets.

Elton John sang the same duet with Miss Piggy on The Muppet Show. He performed the duet again with Kiki Dee for the Live Aid concert, but has done performances with RuPaul, Minnie Mouse and the Spice Girls.

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