Wed 31 Jan 2007
1.) My dad’s primary care doctor, after examining him, the reports from doctors of the hospital and emergency room, thinks that he may have had a mild stroke triggered by his exertion on the bed post the morning everything happened. How could a hospital have not ruled that out? And if they did, how could a different doctor have thought that’s what it is? My dad said they did some sort of a scan of his brain and they didn’t find anything to warrant further cat scanning. My mom thinks my dad had a reaction to the construction going on inside their house with all the major remodeling, cuz he got dizzy again upon entering their home but was fine in the hospital and at my aunt’s house.
2.) You’ve probably heard of phishing (fishing?), where fraudulent emails are sent to random email lists telling you to fill out personal information to “update” your bank account, credit card account, etc. Then the link leads you to a fake site where, once you put in your information, identity thieves wreak havoc on your credit record or clean out your bank account. One of the most obvious ways to tell if an email’s a fake, despite their having real logos of the financial institution or having a site name that seems real, is by seeing all the spelling and grammar problems in the body of the email. I got this today:
Affirmation Minnie
show details 12:04 am (10 hours ago)
We are going to authorize your cash invitation
Graciously if you could right away you need to write in your last details at the website
http://respiratoryskilfully.essforrgunme.com
I didn’t click on the site, but how stupid do they think people are? “Oh, I don’t remember giving out a cash invitation, or accepting someone’s invitation to cash. Guess I’ll give out my personal information at the ‘respiratory skilfully’ website anyway, cuz it’ll probably invite me to breathe ‘skilfully.’ And give me money to boot!” The authorities should have an email address we can forward this bullshit to so law enforcement can crack down on these assholes.
i hope your dad is ok…
thanks, mel. me, too.
Do they have popcorm ceiling (not sure of the technical term)? If so, breathing that stuff is not good! Maybe they shoudl have someone come out and clear the air ducts and buy some air filters. On line ionic breeze has good deals.
They DID have popcorn ceilings, but that was scraped off during the remodeling! I didn’t know those things had an ill effect! Maybe that’s it. My mom wore a face mask every time she was at home, but my macho dad refused to. NOW they both do. Haha, my parents probably look like 2 surgeons walking around at home, talking to each other all muffled.
There is something in the ceiling (it might be asbestos(sp?)) that when broken up can cause some respiratory problems.
I never click on those silly emails. Apparently they think we are as stupid as they are.
My Aunt recently had one of those mild strokes. The symptoms were very similar. She had to be careful for a few weeks following but is just fine now.
Hope your dad is OK. If it IS a mild stroke there are things he needs to do to make sure it doesn’t come back.
If he did have a TIA (transient ischemic attack) which is basically a ‘mild’ or ‘mini’ stroke.. it is possible NOT to show up on those scans… sometimes those mini strokes are precursors for the big one… so be careful. He should definitely be taking an asprin a day… 81 mg is good. (baby aspirin).
And as far as ER’s go…. unfortunately they miss a lot of things. Not like on ER or Grey’s anatomy where they figure everything out. In real life… a lot slips past them.
Remember when I went out 911 in May? They told me I had a mini stroke.. (uh, I’m in my 30s, but OK)… and felt comfortable leaving that diagnosis on me, which didn’t correlate with the tests they were doing… when I released myself.. yes I told them I was going home, since they had no idea what they were doing… I went somewhere else and THEY gave me the true diagnosis.. which was complicated migraines. (can resemble a stroke.. but does not correlate with testing). Also remember they did a carotid doppler study on my carotid arteries and told me they were 75% blocked!!!! A neck/brain MRI said they were not blocked/occluded at ALL… so there you have it. I’d believe his family physician over an ER doctor… after the stuff I’ve seen.
Having talked to my dad yesterday, it seems his physician got the mild stroke thing from a note written on his emergency room charts. So I don’t know whether it was something the emergency room had ruled out, or whether it was one of the possibilities in the diagnosis (even tho the ER doctor’s diagnosis, as I was there to hear, was viral infection in the middle ear). I think my parents are unreliable for this kind of hearsay cuz they don’t understand a lot of what’s going on.