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Show Removal of Gall Bladder By DR. JAMES W. BARTON Dell Syndicate. WNU Sorvlc. A PROMINENT lawyer was going down hill physically, physi-cally, lie was seventy years of age but had always been able to look after his legal work despite attacks of indigestion indi-gestion and an irritation which caused painful and frequent fre-quent emptying of the urine. The Indigestion gave him loss of appetite, sour taste In the mouth. !" f ' . 1 a bloated feeling, gas on the stomach and In the Intestine, fullness after eating, and either constipation constipa-tion or diarrhoea. He didn't want to go to a doctor as he was afraid that an operation, perhaps two op erations, might be necessary, and at seventy years of age he was "taking "tak-ing no chances." Dr. Barton The symptoms, however terrific attacks at-tacks of Indigestion, and the frequent fre-quent desire to pass urine made him decide that life wasn't worth the living with this pain and distress dis-tress so he consulted his physician. Some months later friends meeting meet-ing him on the street stopped him and congratulated him on his splendid splen-did appearance good color, brisk walk, calm, serene face. Don't Put Off Operation. To the inquiry as to the cause of the change in his appearance, he quite casually remarked, "Oh, they found some gall stones and removed my gall bladder, and then a little later I had them remove the gland at the neck of the bladder, so with these two annoyances removed I'm feeling young again." The point here is that while operation op-eration can never be treated lightly and operation on one past seventy would seem somewhat of a serjous risk, nevertheless when gall stones are present it is not the age of the patient that matters from the standpoint stand-point of a good recovery after operation, op-eration, but the length of time the patient has allowed the symptoms to be present before undergoing the operation. So if your doctor advises removal of the gall bladder, don't put it off j too long. If it should come out, the sooner the better. Dieting Daughters. One of the unfortunate things about prescribing reducing diets, particularly for women, is that so many young women of normal weight, or even below normal weight, believe that they will have a better appearance, will look "slim," if they follow the general rule of reducing weight, which, after all, is "just to eat less food." Intelligent young women, college and business girls, who would not think of using a drug such as thyroid thy-roid extract to reduce weight, will deliberately "starve" themselves to get the slim boyish figure. "Of all the conditions found on examination of large groups of young women, underweight is about the most universal and likewise the most likely to prove dangerous." I am quoting Jane Foster, R. N., in Hygeia. Miss Foster is assistant director of health, Sarah Lawrence college. "There is then the problem of the girl of eighteen or nineteen consciously con-sciously controlling her own weight at a standard below that for good health. Now the greatest case for death in this age group is tuberculosis, tuber-culosis, the predisposing factor of which is malnutrition underweight, "The greatest cause of illness in college health records is found to be Infections of the nose, throat and chest and these, too, go with pronounced pro-nounced underweight. Other companions com-panions of underweight may be irritable ir-ritable dispositions and a loss of the natural mental ability or alertness. alert-ness. Those who work with this age group are frequently impressed with the large number who complain com-plain of fatigue and general dissatisfaction dissatis-faction with life." Of course the cause of this fatigue, fa-tigue, irritability, dissatisfaction with life, is that these young women, wom-en, who should be eating more food at this age than at any other age in their lifetime, are actually eating less than the body needs just to keep it working, aside from the extra food needed for growth in height and width. And the foods that should be eaten for growth and strength meat, eggs and milk are not included to any extent in the diet of these slim-mad girls. What these girls of normal weight forget is that underweight means undernourishment, and undernourishment undernour-ishment means that a reduction of the "energy reserves" of the body occurs when not enough food is eaten and the body is below normal weight. The energy reserves of the body the reserves needed to promote health and growth, and prevent or lessen the effects of illnesses can only be maintained by a generous all round diet at this important age in a woman's life. |
