Seeking medical treatment in-time is of essence in all medical emergencies. And, of course, emergencies are detected by the qualified staff available at the hospital. Never delay seeking medical opinion. As they say, a stitch in time …

Lack of most basic healthcare awareness is a major factor contributing to increased morbidity (or at least partial incapacitation) amongst patients afflicted with various diseases, especially the more commonly occurring ‘lifestyle-associated’ maladies like obesity, hypertension, coronary artery disease and diabetes. Countless diabetics die every year just because they are too apprehensive to accept regular insulin jabs when their oral drug therapy has failed in maintaining their blood glucose levels within normal limits. Yet, they don’t mind pricking their finger several times a day for monitoring their blood glucose profiles. Education is lacking here. And, the much harried physician simply doesn’t have the time to force the issue with them. Hypertensive patients often fail to maintain their safe BP levels as their easy-to-handle BP-monitoring digital apparatus has been lying in a corner for want of rundown batteries. The very same BP patients stop taking their medication just as their BP is found to be OK in just one of two check-ups. A patient on blood-thinning drugs visits a dentists for a tooth extraction. The dentist, too harried to ask him the pertinent question about his medical history, pulls the tooth out, and the patient collapses in his chair owing to blood loss. Basic healthcare & medicare education is needed in all such scenarios – sometimes even for the doctors concerned ! It is so common to note patients and normal healthy persons ignoring common symptoms that may lead to an early diagnosis & treatment of an underlying disease. I have heard narratives of patients taking their routine diabetic drugs (and landing in the ER) even when they are fasting or dieting, just because the physician has instructed them ‘never to miss a dose. Basic education is needed again – both for the patient, and the rather unscrupulous physicians. The problem is compounded several folds in an overpopulated country like India, already the diabetes capital of the world perhaps, where all the licensed physicians haven’t had complete medical training in approved medical colleges. They are still considered as registered medical practitioners – RMPs, as they are known to the public. A consultation with them can be much cheaper than with MBBS doctors of the urban medical centers, and the poor public just flocks to them. It is not uncommon to see such inexpensive RMPs prescribing steroids to their patients for a quicker (though merely transient) resolution of their aggravated symptoms. I have seen people gulping drug ‘capsules’ with rather hot beverages, and of course it is far too common to see people pop-in a painkiller/anti-inflammatory drug with just plain water on an empty stomach. When the patients are not educated about such basic medicare aspects as listed above, there is just no way that they will ever have any idea of the subject of ‘drug’-interaction’, howsoever critical it may indeed be for controlling their disease, or saving their life itself. Yes, the imperative need for public education is spelt again and again in the context of basic healthcare issues.

“Basic Healthcare for All” is an easily comprehensible exposition of matters that lets us understand our various health issues, especially the ones that are lifestyle-related. The information being provided in these pages must not be treated as any formal or informal medical advice. Please do seek proper medical consultation of any/all of your ailments, and use the information provided herein only for a proper comprehension of your stated health issues and their course of treatment in a proper perspective. The diseases that may afflict us during our lifetime may either be congenital (present since birth), or the acquired ones. The congenital conditions are different from inherited/genetic disorders. Of the acquired ones, the infectious diseases and the ‘lifestyles-governed’ ones are the main that hit us at any point of time in our life. Of course, as and when we are struck with one, we naturally seek a medical remedy if the seriousness of the malady warrants so. We do seek either prophylactic or therapeutic (or both) treatments to counter these disease for our continued well-being.

True that most drugs do have side effects. But your doctor apparently knows the best for you, and will prescribe a drug regimen only when benefits far outweigh the risks involved, if any.

The primary purpose of this web site is to provide an online nodal resource base to the visitors about the very many medical issues (diseases, routine drugs and specialized treatments) that they almost routinely come across in their life. The entire medical/clinical description is being provided in an easily-comprehensible, simple one-page format, avoiding all the technical jargon. Please keep visiting us for regular updates.

If you are serious about your healthcare, you must :

Be at least moderately active physically.
Keep a good control of your weight.
Maintain your blood pressure and blood sugar level within permissible limits using well-calibrated home-monitoring equipment.
Keep yourself well hydrated.
Get at least one annual medical check-up done if you have reached the age of 45 years, and an essential biannual check-up if you’re +60 years.
Everyone having any one or more of these conditions – asthma, allergy, gout, renal disease (particularly those under dialysis treatment), chronic bronchitis, COPD, CAD, arthritis, AIDS, compromised immune status, and/or have been an organ-transplant receiver, please be in regular touch with your physician to keep ascertaining the medical therapy being administered to you – it may need to be changed, or the dosages altered, or some additional tests advised as per individual requirement.

Seek information on any of the following subjects that interest you as per your current medical status. Please do return to this page, we are continually adding more healthcare issues to our online archives on weekly basis. In this very first edition of our site we are providing basic information about certain major lifestyle diseases that afflict millions globally. Thanks for your visit.