Hi, healers! I have been super busy, especially now that the orientation of my hospice/hospital field placement is over, and I am acquiring my independent case load. My first written up and completed psychosocial assessment at the agency was called "beautiful," so I think I am starting off strong this school year  So far, my tasks are psychosocial assessments, support and counseling for families and patients in the home setting, inpatient setting, and oncology unit, and the facilitating of therapy groups, particularly children’s bereavement at the moment. I am learning so much from my supervisor, who is compassionate with a brilliant mind, and the other social workers on the unit. It is a really an incredible team to be a part of, making the work environment ideal.

Each time I explain to someone that I am working in a hospice/hospital setting, I get the same reaction, which is, "That must be so depressing. I couldn’t do that," when in fact, it is the total opposite. Through disease, I have learned so much about myself in the past six years, and now through death, I am learning so much about life.

To be sitting next to someone who is actively dying and who knows he/she is actively dying (They may have 6 months or two weeks to live.) is a deeply profound and spiritual experience for me. It is where I feel the transitory nature of life and recognize that our bodies are only places to house the soul for a short time. We are not our physical bodies.

Through death, life has become MORE precious and beautiful to me. At 25 years old, through illness, I have been forced to examine aspects of myself, life, and my relation to others, the world around me, and beyond, which most people never do in several lifetimes. Facing death and terminal disease at my placement has allowed me to go deeper into these examinations, creating even more love and appreciation for my time on this earth in THIS body.

As I mentioned above, working in this agency is a deeply profound experience for me, and it has only been a month. I feel my growth will know no bounds by the time I am done next summer. I sense many spiritual awakenings coming, so stay tuned and keep up with my journey. I think you each will benefit from my experiences in your own ways.

As for my physical health, I am doing SO well. Better than I ever imagined. Still not 100%, but I am able to function at the level I need to right now without any pain medications. To give you an idea of where I am, I still can’t "exercise," but I can perform my daily duties without being in excruciating pain or taking any opiates. My field days are extremely demanding (hospitals are HUGE. lots of walking and a long commute), but I continue to defy the odds. You know me! At this rate, I will be in full remission in no time!

I am sending prayers out to all of my healing friends xoxo

Happy Healing!

Source:  Going Down Swinging:  A RSD/CDPS Blog

The legal dispute surrounds a 2007 paper authored by Lacerda and Anders Erikkson, entitled Charlatanry in Forensic Speech Science: A Problem to be Taken Seriously. It was originally published in The International Journal of Speech, Language and the Law, but was taken down from the journal’s website following Nemesysco’s threats. However, the full text is still available on scribd.

To be fair to Nemesysco, you can see why they took offence. The paper is unusually lively for an academic article. Here are some of the best bits

Contrary to the claims of sophistication…the LVA [Nemesysco's "Layered Voice Analysis" system] is a very simple program written in Visual Basic. The entire program code, published in the patent documents, comprises no more than 500 lines of code… there is really nothing in the program that requires any mathematical insights beyond very basic secondary school mathematics… we initially intended to use the code published in the patent documents to make a running copy of the program, but the code is rather messy and not particularly well structured and we decided it would not be worth the time and effort to clean up the code in order to convert it into a running program.

In fact, in parts the thing reads more like a blog post or an op-ed than a scientific paper – no bad thing, of course. Even Lacerda admits that “The article had a journalistic tone and was rather provocatively written. We wanted to prove that the technology behind the lie detector is a scam.” It’s also not entirely clear why Nemesysco, who claim no specific scientific credentials, are a fit subject for an academic journal. (Other voice analysis companies who mis-read scientific papers in support of their claims seem a more obvious target.)

Still, Erikkson and Lacerda make an excellent case against Nemesysco. They point out that, according to the patent documents, Nemesysco’s “LVA” system does nothing more than apply a simplistic analysis to the amplitude waveform of the speech, involving counting the number of “thorns” (sharp peaks or throughs) and “plateaus” (flat bits):

As they point out, the number of these things will depend upon, amongst other factors, the quality of the audio recording and digitizating process: a better sound recording with a higher sampling rate (more “dots” on the graph above) will inevitably have more thorns and plateaus

The number of thorns and plateaus…depends crucially on the sampling rate, amplitude resolution, and the threshold values defined in the program

Even setting aside these issues, the fundamental point is that there is absolutely no reason to think that the number of thorns and plateaus in the speech waveform has any relation to whether someone is lying, under emotional stress, or whatever. This makes the LVA system even less plausible than the older “Voice Stress Analysis” (VSA) method of vocal lie detection, which Erikkson and Lacerda also discuss. There is at least some theoretical basis in physiology for that system, although a very very shaky one. LVA doesn’t even have that – or at least none has been provided – so when Nemesysco claim that

The SENSE technology can detect the following emotional and cognitive states:

Excitement Level: Each of us becomes excited (or depressed) from time to time. SENSE compares the presence of the Micro-High-frequencies of each sample to the basic profile to measure the excitement level in each vocal segment.

Confusion Level: Is your subject sure about what he or she is saying? SENSE technology measures and compares the tiny delays in your subject’s voice to assess how certain he or she is.

Stress Level: Stress is physiologically defined as the body’s reaction to a threat, either by fighting the threat, or by fleeing. However, during a spoken conversation neither option may be available. The conflict caused by this dissonance affects the micro-low-frequencies in the voice during speech.

Thinking Level: How much is your subject trying to find answers? Might he or she be “inventing” stories?

S.O.S: (Say Or Stop) – Is your subject hesitating to tell you something?

Concentration Level: Extreme concentration might indicate deception.

Anticipation Level: Is your subject anticipating your responses according to what he or she is telling you?

Embarrassment Level: Is your subject feeling comfortable, or does he feel some level of embarrassment regarding what he or she is saying?

Arousal Level: What triggers arousal in the subject? Is he or she interested in you? Aroused by certain visuals? This new detection can be used both for personal use for issues of romance, or professionally for therapy relating to sex-offenders.

Deep Emotions: What long-standing emotions does your subject experience? Is he or she “excited” or “uncertain” in general?

SENSE’s “Deep” Technology: Is your subject thinking about a single topic when speaking, or are there several layers (i.e., background issues, something that may be bothering him or her, planning, etc.) SENSE technology can detect brain activity operating at a pre-conscious level.

and yet nowhere on their website is there any hint of evidence for any of this, skepticism is justified. Amongst many other things, it’s unlikely that even if we each have a vocal pattern associated with, say, arousal, (not implausible), the same pattern would be present in the voice of men, women, people of different ages, and so forth. People just aren’t that alike, as any psychologist or neuroscientist knows. Even direct measures of brain activity during very simple cognitive tasks vary greatly between individuals. The chance that any kind of analysis of the voice could reveal such complex information about an individual without their compliance is remote.

Almost certainly, Nemesysco’s analysis provides no useful information about the speaker as such, but as Erikkson and Lacerda suggest, it probably “works” through two psychological mechanisms. Firstly, the fact that if someone believes that their voice is being analyzed, they may tend to be more truthful because they think that lies will be detected. Secondly, the fact that the voice analysis user is able to interpret the output – e.g. “speaker stressed, concentrating hard” – in terms of what they already know about the speaker. Anyone might be stressed and concentrating hard during almost any conversation, so it always “fits”.

Still, if you don’t believe me, and you want to try out LVA for yourself, you can – and you don’t have to be a cop or a spy. Nemesysco are now marketing their technology directly to consumers in the form of the Love Detector. The Love Detector is available as a Skype plug-in for just $29, and it allows you to know whether the object of your affections feels the same way about you, all from the sound of their voice.

Love Detector was originally designed with young singles in mind, or anyone searching for “the ONE”. If you are currently looking for love, starting to date someone, or just have that unmistakable feeling, and you want to make sure it’s mutual, Love Detector is the tool for you. If you are in a long-term relationship or even married, this version of Love Detector offers a “Relationship Selector” option designed to meet your needs as well.

There is even, apparantly, a free online version. If the mood strikes, maybe I’ll try it out. Watch this space. And lock up your daughters (or at least unplug their microphones…)

[BPSDB]

Anders Eriksson, Francisco Lacerda (2008). Charlatanry in forensic speech science: A problem to be taken seriously International Journal of Speech Language and the Law, 14 (2) DOI: 10.1558/ijsll.2007.14.2.169

ABC, NBC Won’t Air Ad Critical of Obama’s Health Care Plan

The refusal by ABC and NBC to run a national ad critical of President Obama’s health care reform plan is raising questions from the group behind the spot — particularly in light of ABC’s health care special aired in prime time last June hosted at the White House

The refusal by ABC and NBC to run a national ad critical of President Obama’s health care reform plan is raising questions from the group behind the spot — particularly in light of ABC’s health care special aired in prime time last June and hosted at the White House.

The 33-second ad by the League of American Voters, which features a neurosurgeon who warns that a government-run health care system will lead to the rationing of procedures and medicine, began airing two weeks ago on local affiliates of ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS. On a national level, however, ABC and NBC have refused to run the spot in its present form.

“It’s a powerful ad,” said Bob Adams, executive director of the League of American Voters, a national nonprofit group with 15,000 members who advocate individual liberty and government accountability. “It tells the truth and it really highlights one of the biggest vulnerabilities and problems with this proposed legislation, which is it rations health care and disproportionately will decimate the quality of health care for seniors.”

Adams said the advertisement is running on local network affiliates in states like Louisiana, Arkansas, Maine and Pennsylvania. But although CBS has approved the ad for national distribution and talks are ongoing with FOX, NBC has questioned some of the ad’s facts while ABC has labeled it “partisan.”

“The ABC Television Network has a long-standing policy that we do not sell time for advertising that presents a partisan position on a controversial public issue,” spokeswoman Susan Sewell said in a written statement. “Just to be clear, this is a policy for the entire network, not just ABC News.”

NBC, meanwhile, said it has not turned down the ad and will reconsider it with some revisions.

“We have not rejected the ad,” spokeswoman Liz Fischer told FOXNews.com. “We have communicated with the media agency about some factual claims that require additional substantiation. As always, we are happy to reconsider the ad once these issues are addressed.”

Adams objects to ABC’s assertion that his group’s position is partisan.

“It’s a position that we would argue a vast majority of Americans stand behind,” he said. “Obviously, it’s a message that ABC and the Obama administration haven’t received yet.”

Dick Morris, a FOX News political analyst and the League of American Voters’ chief strategist, conceptualized the advertisement and said its purpose was to “refocus” the debate on health care reform.

“I feel the whole debate on health care reform needed to be refocused on the issue of Medicare,” he told FOXNews.com. “Most of the debate had been on issues of socialized medicine and cost. I felt that the impact of the legislation in cutting the Medicare program and enforcing rationing needed to be addressed.”

Morris, a onetime advisor to former President Bill Clinton, said he was particularly troubled by ABC’s decision not to air the spot.

“It’s the ultimate act of chutzpah because ABC is the network that turned itself over completely to Obama for a daylong propaganda fest about health care reform,” he said. “For them to be pious and say they will not accept advertising on health care shuts their viewers out from any possible understanding of both sides of this issue.”

By Joshua Rhett Miller – FOXNews.com

Posted: True Health Is True Wealth

Related Resources:

• ObamaCare and me – Doctor Zane F. Pollard, MD
• Prescription for Truth – Daniel Hannan From England: HealthCare Worse for Elderly
• Unease in Britain Following Assisted Suicides
• Overhauling health-care system tops agenda at annual meeting of Canada’s doctors
• Healthcare: Does Canada Do It Better?
• Canadian Health Officials: Our Universal Health Care Is ‘Sick,’ Private Insurance Should Be Welcomed
• Outcry Over Vets’ ‘End of Life Care’
• Click here to read the “Your Life, Your Choices” guide.
• Woman in Oregon Told Healthcare Would Not Pay for Cancer Treatment But Would Pay for Assisted Suicide… Welcome to Government Controlled Healthcare
• Video: Oregon says no to chemotherapy, offers assisted suicide instead
• Dr. & Rep Tom Price: Americans Need Patient-Centered Reform, Not Democrats’ Costly Government Takeover of Health Care
• Senator Lieberman: Postpone Universal Healthcare
• Rep. Tom Price (former physician) Admonishes Government Takeover of Healthcare
• Kristol: Kill It, And Start Over
• Obamacare: Beware the Rhetoric
• No Turning Back from Obamacare
• Catastrophe

Local Produce

Because it has not been shipped long distances, local produce in season is usually fresher and less expensive than what is available in grocery stores. Fruits and vegetables should account for more than half of your diet, so build meals around local produce. Schedule a weekly trip to the farmers’ market to shop for foods in season or join a community supported agriculture (CSA) group for weekly deliveries of local harvest.

When organic foods don’t fit your budget, avoid the “dirty dozen” most contaminated fruits and vegetables: peaches, apples, bell peppers, celery, nectarines, strawberries, cherries, kale, lettuce, imported grapes, carrot and pear.

Instead, shop seasonally for the “clean 15” least contaminated fruits and vegetables: onions, avocadoes, sweet corn, pineapple, mango, asparagus, sweet peas, kiwi, cabbage, eggplant, papaya, watermelon, broccoli, tomatoes and sweet potatoes.

The Environmental Working Group determined that replacing the dirty dozen with the clean 15 reduces exposure to pesticides on produce by almost 90 percent. When you can’t eat organic, this is the next best thing. Download the Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides and take it with you to the market.

Canned Goods

Fresh fruits and vegetables are usually better than their canned counterparts, but exceptions exist. Canned goods contain minimal additives and come pre-cooked.

Compared to fresh tomatoes, canned varieties contain up to nine times more lycopene, a carotenoid and powerful antioxidant currently being studied for its protective role against cancer. Use canned tomatoes in soups, stews and sauces.

Canned beans – cannellini, garbanzo, kidney, black, pinto – are inexpensive and nutritious staples. Use canned beans and black-eyed peas to add protein, fiber, iron, B vitamins, folate, potassium, magnesium and antioxidants to any diet. They are versatile enough to be used in soups, salads, sauces, dips and spreads.

Canned coconut milk contains healthy fats and is suitable for vegan and vegetarian individuals. It makes a creamy addition to soups, sauces and smoothies.

Canned fish – wild salmon, herring, sardines, anchovies – are much less expensive than fresh fish and just as nutritious. They are an excellent source of essential omega-3 fatty acids DHA and EPA, calcium (when consumed with the bones) and protein. Avoid canned tuna, however cheap, because it may contain harmful contaminants like mercury and other industrial pollutants.

Dry Foods

Many dried foods are inexpensive and some are available in bulk for an even better deal. This includes whole grains (rice, quinoa, millet, oats, amaranth) and legumes (beans, lentils and peas).

Dried beans require more preparation than canned beans because they have to be soaked overnight and cooked slowly, so they are usually even less expensive than canned varieties.

Raw nuts and seeds can commonly be found in bulk as well, but their fragile omega-3 fats easily oxidize, causing production of harmful free radicals. Ensure they are fresh before buying in bulk.

Other dried foods like herbs, ginger, chili peppers, mushrooms and seaweed are also affordable and nutritious staples.

Some ingredients – like dried shiitake mushrooms, seaweed and coconut milk – can be expensive in regular markets but better deals are often found in groceries that specialize in Asian foods.

Animal Products

When buying animal products, don’t cut corners too closely. Choose meats, eggs and dairy products that are wild or have been raised without hormones, antibiotics and pesticides, even if it means eating smaller portions or buying these foods less often.

Meat can be used to flavor dishes – like soups, salads, risotto, stir-fry and sandwiches – rather than making it the main component of meals.

Buy bone-in cuts or the whole animal. Reserve any bones to make stock for soups and sauces.

The Catch

Making meals from scratch can save money but it requires more time spent shopping and cooking. If your schedule is as tight as your budget, get organized, plan meals in advance and schedule time for shopping and food preparation.

It’s already known that in males, winning competitions – achieving “dominance” – causes a rapid rise in testosterone release, whilst losing does the opposite. That’s true in humans, as well as in other mammals. The authors wondered whether the same thing happens when men “win” vicariously – i.e. when someone we identify with triumphs.

What better way of testing this than the U.S. Presidential Election? The authors took 163 American voters, and got them to provide saliva samples before, during and after the results came in on the night of the 4th November. Here’s what happened -

In Obama supporters (the blue line, natch), salivary testosterone levels stayed flat throughout the crucial hours. But supporters of John McCain or Libertarian candidate Bob Barr, suffered a testosterone crash after Obama’s victory became apparent. That was only true in men, though; in women, there was no change.

Heh. Of course, we hardly needed biology to tell us that people often identify strongly with their preferred political parties, and the fact that social events cause hormonal changes shouldn’t surprise anyone – the brain controls the secretion of most hormones.

The gender difference is interesting, though. Does this mean that men identify closer with politicians? Or maybe only with male ones – what would have happened if Hilary had won… or Palin? It could be that the testosterone surge accompanying success is strictly a man thing, although it’s been shown to occur in women in some studies, but not consistently.

Finally, I should mention that this paper contains some excellent quotes, such as “…Robert Barr, who arguably did not have a chance of winning…”, “In retrospective reports of their affective state upon the announcement of Obama as the president-elect, McCain and Barr voters felt significantly more unhappy” and my favourite, “men who voted for John McCain or Bob Barr (losers)”. That last one may be taken slightly out of context.

Stanton, S., Beehner, J., Saini, E., Kuhn, C., & LaBar, K. (2009). Dominance, Politics, and Physiology: Voters’ Testosterone Changes on the Night of the 2008 United States Presidential Election PLoS ONE, 4 (10) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0007543

Flu Vaccine Puts Kids at Risk

Flu vaccine does not help children stricken with influenza stay out of the hospital, but instead, increases their risk of being hospitalized, compared with those who have not had shots, according to a new study.

In fact, the risk triples, according to the study at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minneapolis.  

The new study aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of the flu vaccine (trivalent inactivated flu vaccine, or TIV) in children, especially asthmatic children, study leader Avni Joshi, M.D., told Science Daily.

The relative benefit of the vaccine is of paramount importance in light of the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Academy of Pediatrics to vaccinate all children between 6 months and 18 years every year, a recommendation that the National Asthma Education and Prevention Program endorses.

The Mayo Clinic study spanned eight consecutive flu seasons and involved 263 children ages 6 months to 18 years. All of the children had laboratory-confirmed influenza between 1996 and 2006. Researchers verified which children had or had not received the vaccine, which were asthmatics, and which had to be hospitalized with flu-related illnesses.

The study showed that children who had been vaccinated had three times the risk of hospitalization of children who had not been vaccinated. Asthmatic children who received the vaccine had a “significantly” higher risk of being hospitalized than asthmatic children who had not received it. No other factors, such as the severity of asthma, appeared to have an effect on the risk of being hospitalized.

The findings do not implicate the flu vaccine as the cause of hospitalizations, Joshi said, adding that they do, “raise questions about the efficacy of the vaccine.”

Source: Reuters / NewsMax Online

Elderly May Have Greater Swine Flu Immunity

Older people may have some kind of immunity to swine flu, U.S. health officials said Thursday, as the number of confirmed and suspected cases of H1N1 virus rose again around the country.

More than 64 percent of U.S. infections have occurred among patients between the ages of 5 and 24, with just 1 percent of flu victims 65 or older, according to a study at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

One possible explanation is that “older adults might have been in contact a long time ago with a virus related to the one that we see now,” said Anne Schuchat, interim deputy director for science and public health programs at the CDC.

“Adults might have some degree of pre-existing . . . antibodies to the H1N1 virus, especially older adults over 60 or 65,” she said.

“The presence of pre-existing antibodies may be due to previous exposure to (influenza) infection or vaccination.”

Health authorities around the world have been surprised that, with the number of cases of swine flu now topping 11,000, including 85 deaths, many of those infected have been younger people.

The CDC’s study suggests that children and teens may be particularly vulnerable to contracting the disease — a worrying prospect as officials brace for the possible return in a few months’ time of a more virulent strain of the H1N1 virus.

The flu outbreak is far from over in the United States, where the tally of confirmed or probable cases is now 5,764, Schuchat said.

Schuchat offered a scrap of upbeat news, noting that flu-related visits to doctors and hospitals are dropping across the United States.

Source: AFP

Related Articles and Resources:

• The Great Swine Flu Scare: Here We Go Again 
• Vaccine Madness: Private Profits from Health Hysteria
• Don’t Panic: 7 FACTS About ‘Swine Flu’. . .
• Critical Alert: The Swine Flu Pandemic – Fact or Fiction
• Fight Swine Flu With Mushrooms
• HPV Vaccine Dangers
• Can My Pet Catch Swine Flu?
• 32 Girls Have Died
• The Drug Story
• Western Medicine – Forbidden Cures
• The Neglected Nutritional Research of Dr. Weston Price, DDS
• Big Red Juice
• Sanoviv Medical Center

Posted:  True Health Is True Wealth

Most fMRI studies are done using MRI scanners with a field strength of either 1.5 Tesla or, most commonly nowadays, 3.0 Tesla. However, a few especially forward-thinking, by which I mean wealthy, research centres have started investing in 7 Tesla scanners.

The researchers weighed several factors when determining the “amount of artificial light per night per person,” including a country’s consumption of electricity, density of urban population, and overall socioeconomic status. They then divided countries into three groups according to the average amount of light per person: little exposure, medium exposure, and high exposure.

Countries with low exposure had 66.77 prostate cancer patients per 100,000 people. For countries with medium exposure, the rate increased 30 percent to 87.11 patients per 100,000. Countries with the highest exposure jumped 80 percent to 157 patients per 100,000. The researchers say there is a definite cause and effect between artificial light and prostate cancer, but no one can explain the mechanism, although there are several theories, such as light at night upsetting the body’s biological clock.

In a previous study, the same researchers found a similar link between light at night and breast cancer.