Random Fact #60

Conjunctivitis caused by a chlamydia infection is the leading cause of preventable blindness in the world.

Random Fact #59

Children urinate three to four times the volume of an adult per kilogram of body weight.

Random Fact #58

A ruptured Achilles tendon can sometimes be painless and only present with marked planter flexion weakness.  One Dr. told a story of a patient coming in complaining of a sprained ankle when in fact he had a torn Achilles.

Doesn't look painless to me!

Random fact #57

Thomas Edison's assistant died of x-ray burns caused while Edison experimented with over 1800 fluorescent materials for use in x-ray imaging.

Random Fact #56

A headache is determined as a migraine only if the pain:

-Is unilateral focusing in the frontal/temporal area of the head.

-Has a throbbing characteristic with each pulse.

-Gets worse with exercise or exposure to light and or sound.

Random Fact #55

Sperm containing the X chromosome create a female and Y male.  It is theorized that there are more males born because the Y chromosome sperm is smaller and and can swim faster.  That's right guys are the result of faster swimmers.

Random Fact #54

Symptoms of syphilis go through 3 stages.  The symptoms sometimes go untreated and the third stage can cause serious neurological impairment.  It is thought that mental hospitals at one time had many third stage syphilis patients.  Al Capone went crazy with it.

Random Fact #53

                        There are approx 1.2 billion people worldwide infected with the roundworm parasite.

                         

Random Fact # 52

Every year there are 25,000 babies born with a heart defect.
Trav you aren't that special.

Random Fact #51

It is estimated that 1/4 pregnancies end in miscarriage.  Most of these pregnancies end in the first few days after conception and most are due to chromosomal defects.

Random Fact # 50

There are 300 trillion neuronal connections in the cortex of the brain. Counting one connection per second it would take you 30 million years to finish. 

Random Fact #49

Parasitic infection causes an immune response in the body to help combat the invader. In Canada and the US parasite infection are very rare and therefore we do not have the heightened immune response.  It is thought that some diseases like irritable bowel syndrome and some food allergies are because we do not have this immune memory, caused by fighting the parasite.  This is now opening the idea to purposefully infect a person with a weakened parasite in hope that the body will kill the parasite and up their own immune response.

Random Fact #48

80% of humans are left brain dominant for language.  This means that if an injury occurs on the right side of the brain, in which the language area is damaged, only 20% of people will be unable to speak.  There is also a language comprehension area that is located on the dominant side, at the back of the brain.  So potentially, the language are could be damaged but the comprehension area is fine (they have different blood supplies).  If this is the case the person will be able to understand what is said but be unable to communicate a response.

Random Fact #47

There are an estimated 250 trillion nerve connections in the human brain.

Random Fact #46

In the auditory association areas of the brain, there are thought to be single nerves that correspond a single word. For instance, there would be one nerve for the word no, one nerve for more, and one nerve for shopping. The way certain people process that information, however, is greatly different.

Random Fact #45

It is much nicer to open up the stomach and small intestine when there is no food in it.  Thanks Helen for not eating for 12 hours before you died.

Random Fact #44

In the United States, the cost of a quadruple bypass surgery costs approx $100,000.

Random Fact #43

A mothers and babies blood never mix during pregnancy.  At the placenta, the nutrients diffuse out of moms blood vessels and into the babies.  It works similarly to a heat exchanger.

Random Fact #42

Alfred Nobel spent a great majority of his life trying to turn the very volatile substance nitrogylceride into a stable form.  He finally created dynamite and earned a fortune from it (from which he started the Nobel prizes).  The irony is that he developed a heart disease and the doctor prescribed him nitrogylcerine (when used in small doses it acts as a vasodilator) the very substance he tried for years to convert to a stable form.

Random Fact #41

10% of sperm are deformed.  The most common deformities are two heads or two tails.