ABSTRACT
Arsenic tops the list of priority list of hazardous substances 2022. People are frequently exposed to the environmental pollutant metalloid arsenic through their food, water, air, and soil. Arsenic is famous for its toxic effects. However, arsenicals have recently gained attention due to promising clinical trials for the treatment of acute myeloid leukemia. Presently numerous studies on arsenic's anticancer effects have been done. So a review was conducted on the use of arsenicals as poison and medicine. Arsenical was used as a powerful medicine in the BC era. But arsenical became famous as "the King's Poison" and "the Poison of the King" due to its use as poison. But the development of Marsh’s Test in the 18th century led to a decrease in the use of arsenicals as poison. In the 18th century, arsenicals were used as medicine to treat a variety of diseases such as fever, rheumatism, psoriasis, and syphilis. The development of antibiotics, new, safer chemotherapeutic agents, and radiotherapy halted its use as medicine. The dose and form of arsenicals make them medicine or poison. Many literary works reveal that arsenic's journey as “medicine” and “poison” is still ongoing in the twenty-first century.
ABSTRACT
Background: Sleep is an important process of our body and a good sleep will lead to a healthy lifestyle. In medical field, students have sleep patterns changing due to heavy academic workload. This may have ill effects on their health. Though most factors that affect sleep are modifiable and treatment for them exists still there are can be many factors that affect sleep which should be explored. The thermal model of human body is a theoretical model that accounts for thermal effects of electromagnetic waves on a given point in human body. This could be easily affect brain as it has highest electrical activity in body and may lead to sleep related disorders.Methods: This study is conducted on medical and dental students to analyse the amount of electromagnetic field they get exposed to and any changes in sleep patterns associated with it. The findings of medical and dental students are compared to see if changes in sleep patterns are due to professional course pursued. Any other confounding factors affecting this study are screened by self-rated Pacific Sleep Questionnaire.Results: There were significant changes seen in the time taken to fall asleep and total sleep period but the time taken to wake up from sleep remained unaffected. The sleeping habits of medical and dental students showed no significant changes.Conclusions: Static electromagnetic fields have significant impact on sleep onset and sleep duration. This is regardless of academic background.
ABSTRACT
Background: Many medical students are dealing with day to day stress in their lives and they need to be both physically and mentally active to counter and overcome their daily problems. In such scenario, a non-pharmacological adjunct could prove useful to counter all of it so that they can work more efficiently. Many universities do recommend the use of peppermints and chewing gums. This study is conducted to see if any of these items actually have an influence on cognitive and physical abilities.Methods: A non-randomized controlled trial was performed on the undergraduate medical students of N.K.P. Salve Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre belonging to the age group of 18-21 years. They were given normal flavoured gum, mint flavoured gum and peppermint. A series of cognitive and physiological tests in both stressful and stress free environments were performed.Results: Consumption of peppermint in a stressful environment showed increase in attention span of the subjects and it increased the intelligence Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-R (WAIS-R) in both stress free and stressful environments. As compared to normal gum, peppermint and peppermint gum proved to be more effective. There was no significant change observed in alertness, reaction time, arithmetic ability, short term memory and fatigue index in any of the subjects.Conclusions: Peppermint has caused increase in the attention span and intelligence of medical students in a stressful work scenario. Peppermint gum was found to be more beneficial than normal gum.