HYPONATREMIA ETC!

摘要

And what, you may ask, is hyponatremia? It is medical speak for a low sodium level in the blood. I happen to know because I was recently diagnosed with it and spent a week in hospital while the medics used their skills to raise my blood sodium level. It was a side effect of some blood pressure pills which I had been prescribed. In hospital I had time to reflect and meditate. You have an ailment, which might clear up of its own accord if left alone. But you see your doctor, who gives you pills. Just read the leaflet which accompanies the pills to see what they can do to you; it curdles your blood to find out. They have potential side effects, which if you get one or more require more pills to overcome, which in turn make you worse. It's just one damn thing after another. And if your doctor refers you to a hospital clinic, as doctors, being overworked increasingly do these days, the situation is compounded because every time you attend a clinic you see a different consultant who prescribe, a different remedy from what has been prescribed before. I am moved to reflect on this because it seems to me that the situation I have just described is paralleled by the effusions of people, either supposed experts or media hacks, who give advice in the area of food and health in the media. Nearly every day you read in the press or hear on TV that "latest research" turns upside down or disproves a long held belief that such-and-such a food is good or bad for you. The latest focus is on obesity. But there are welcome signs that people are less gullible than they used to be.