| When good burps go bad
It's totally freaky, but if you always thought heartburn was just heartburn, you may be in for a surprise. Most of the time it is, but for some folks it's really gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), a really annoying condition that can potentially lead to other scary illnesses like asthma, lung infection, inflammation of the esophagus and even cancer. GERD is caused by the reflux of stomach contents back into the esophagus, and when those are high in acid it becomes a more serious problem. Once you get GERD, many say, it usually becomes a lifelong problem, meaning you will need treatment for the rest of your life. Is that so? .
Second straight record for Dow
Stocks jumped Friday, sending the Dow to its second straight record close after a rally in technology and commodity shares. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (up 41.10 to 12,556.08, Charts) gained 0.3 percent, closing at an all-time high for the second session in a row. .
Managed Care Experts, American Pharmacist Association, Prilosec ...
CINCINNATI, Jan. 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- As Medicare Part D enters its second year, Medicare experts have come together to develop a program to help seniors avoid the coverage gap -- the point at which Medicare stops paying for any portion of prescription medications and patients have to pay 100 percent of the medication costs out-of-pocket. In 2006, an estimated four million seniors fell into this gap, and many of them were caught off guard as they simply were not aware that the gap even existed. "While there is information out there about Medicare Part D, it's not always easy to understand or decipher," said Dr. Timothy Covington, professor and Director of the Managed Care Institute at the McWorter School of Pharmacy at Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama and co-author of the program's materials.
Pushing pills
In a single evening, you can see 15 or more advertisements for prescription drugs. Over the course of a year, you'll see about 16 hours of drug ads - far more time than you're likely to spend with your primary care doctor. The ads will help you decide whether your difficulty concentrating arises from insomnia, depression, restless leg syndrome, allergies, erectile dysfunction, acid reflux, irritable bowel syndrome, high cholesterol, toenail fungus or social anxiety disorder. If you're like many people, you'll see something in one of those commercials that vaguely matches the way you sometimes feel. More important, you'll want to get your hands on the pill that makes you look and feel like the people at the end of the commercial: happy, successful, lucky, well-rested and free of horrifying mustard-colored lice-like creatures tearing up the tender skin underneath your toenails.
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