Men are morons when it comes to matters of health. I didn't say it. I heard it from a radio show host this morning while trekking on my treadmill.

Seems men ignore serious medical symptoms and postpone trips to the ER when they're watching sports, according to an ER doctor who reviewed case numbers over three years at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore. It all came down to this decision in the heads of men who were wrapped up in a game at the time something medical occurred: Do I need to go to the hospital now or can I finish the game first?

The lesson for all your partners of sports fans out there: When you see you man fall, faint, grab his chest, or otherwise indicate something is seriously wrong, do call 911 -- before the game nears its end.

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Some readers may recall the case last year of Edith Rodriguez who was virtually ignored while dying on the floor of an emergency room in LA. It brought to light the distress some people may be overwhelmed with while visiting hospitals in seek of help. Thankfully not all medical establishments operate this way, but what are you supposed to avoid doing if faced with such a situation?

This CNN article enumerates five things not to do in the ER. For starters, don't forget to call your regular doctor in transit. If you or someone you know is in need of medical help, reach out to someone familiar. They can spur a quicker response at the emergency room. Don't call for an ambulance unless it's totally necessary. That means if you can walk, you probably don't need it. Why? Because they may ask you to wait with the other sick people when you get there -- an ambulance doesn't fast track anyone through the emergency room.

Don't sit there quietly. Be heard if nobody is helping you. Ask to talk with someone in charge if a nurse isn't providing adequate acknowledgment. This leads to another important point: Don't lie. Overly exaggerating symptoms can leave a person in worse shape than when they got there. And if all else fails, pick up a phone located in the ER and dial zero. Connect with a hospital administrator and get the ball rolling!

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Are you surprised at all when I tell you American obesity rates are soaring? Probably not. I wasn't when my husband told me about this weighty article he'd read. It revealed that not one state showed a decline in obesity during the year 2006. Mississippi was the first state to crack the 30 percent barrier for obese adults. West Virginia and Alabama were just slightly behind. Colorado was the leanest state with a 17.6 percent rate. This year's report, looking at overweight children for the first time, has the District of Columbia topping the charts with heavy kids and Utah boasting the lowest rates for little ones.

Obesity is becoming an epidemic. And we need to treat it as an emergency. First step: determine where you stand. My hubby located this body mass index (BMI) calculator. I share it with you today so you can chart your own measurement. Just enter your height and weight and then calculate your BMI with one click of your mouse. If you come up with the number 30 or higher, you fit the definition of obese. If you find yourself in this predicament, you're in the right place. That's Fit offers an abundance of health and fitness tricks that can help you whittle away at your digits. If you are below the 30 mark, pat yourself on the back. And keep on truckin' in the direction of health, fitness, and wellness.

There's just one way to fix our nation's obesity problem -- plain old hard work. Each and every one of us must eat right, exercise right, and minimize our health risks. Only then can we watch our obesity statistics, like our BMIs, melt away to more perfect numbers.

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Hello Kitty is cute enough, but I really don't get the whole phenomenon of Hello Kitty everything. And now we have the ultimate in "probably wouldn't expect to see that" type gadgets: the Hello Kitty emergency rescue device. One guy unfortunate enough to own one calls it a high tech version of the Swiss Army Knife for the next generation. It comes equipped with a flashlight, USB cell phone recharger, AM/FM radio, hazard siren (not a toy for your kids!), and a compass. Handy in an emergency? Absolutely. Am I going to go rush out and buy one? Not so much.


Via Engadget

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Emergency rooms, despite their name or intended purpose, do not generally have a reputation of being an "in and out" kind of place. Long waits and slow care seem to be more common than not, for all kinds of different reasons. A study recently looked into how long it takes patients to get the care they need in ER settings nationwide and ranked all 50 states in terms of who had the fastest service.

Iowa came out on top with an average ER check-in to check-out time of 2 hours 18 minutes, which is well below the national average of 3 hours 42 minutes. Nebraska, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wisconsin round out the top 5, with Arizona, Maryland, Utah, New York, and Florida bringing up the rear of the list with the longest times -- having an emergency in Florida could take almost 4 hours!

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The paramedics team and potential patients in Calgary, Alberta Canada have a new tool at their disposal to make emergency responses and treatment even better: a specialized ambulance for extremely obese patients. Designed to make it safer for both the patients and the paramedics, the "bariatric response team" will be reserved for patients weighing between 400 and 1000 pounds. Equipped with special gear like a hydraulic lift and fancy air mattress to make positioning large patients easier, this new ambulance will mean some patients who used to be unable to transport in an emergency vehicle at all can now do so safely and with dignity.

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So the idea is that you call 911 in an emergency, hoping to get rushed to the hospital. But what happens when the hospital calls 911?

Believe it or not, it happens fairly often. I get that sometimes stabilizing a patient and calling for "Flight for Life" to take them somewhere with more advanced equipment or specialized staff is necessary, but a hospital calling 911? No way, that's like a doctor calling himself...

Well apparently "hospital" doesn't always mean "doctor." In over 140 small hospitals around the country there isn't always a doctor in the facility around the clock, and so when patients suffer severe complications like breathing problems or medication reactions the nurses resort to dialing 911 to get the patient rushed to a bigger hospital with an MD on site.

It sounds like there are a whole lot of politics surrounding these small hospitals that specialize in procedures like heart surgery and knee replacements, but as far as I'm concerned it's pretty simple: if you want to use the name "hospital" you should be required to have a doctor -- at all times.

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