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Home
and Family
Your Medical Questions Answered!
by Joseph B. Leibman, MD
Director, Emergency Services, Bikur Cholim Hospital
Medicine changes daily. I personally read about 100 medical
articles a month, and condense them into a monthly periodical
that I distribute called the Emergency Medicine Update (EMU).
The information is presented in a practical and easy to read
fashion. Your doctor can receive it free of charge by writing
to me at jbleibmd@yahoo.com. EMU accepts no advertising, so
you can depend on the contents to be free of bias.
Acromegaly is a disease wherein there is a sudden growth of
excess hormone. These folks find their hats suddenly do not
fit and their foreheads and jaws begin to jut out more. They
have thickened skin, especially lips. The disease is due to a
cyst in the pituitary gland. Treatment usually consists of
surgery or radiation. The cysts are generally not
cancerous.
It is possible to have too much of other hormones in the body
as well. The most common case, of course, is hyperthyroidism,
where there is too much thyroid hormone in the body. This can
be due to a thyroid cyst. These people have temperature
intolerance, fast heart rate, perhaps weight loss, and may
have atrial fibrillation. The treatment is blockage of the
hormones in the acute stage, and then radioactive Iodine or
surgery to cool off the thyroid. Write me in care of the
Yated.
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