Michael Carlston, M.D. - Family Practice & Complementary Medicine

Carlston, M.D.
Family Practice and Complementary Medicine

www.carlstonmd.com

April 17, 2009

Dear Patients,

I have just a couple of quick notes for your consideration in this newsletter.

Those of you living in Sonoma County should know of a new service provided by the Volunteer Center of Sonoma County. Dialing 211 or going to http://www.211wc.org/search.aspx will lead you to help in finding nonemergency community services. 211 is also intended to function as an information number in the event of natural disaster.

Best,
Michael Carlston, MD
www.carlstonmd.com

Oxygen and Autism
Art Therapy and Breast Cancer
Hand Washing

Oxygen and Autism

An intriguing study suggests that oxygen might help autistic children. English researchers gave a small group of autistic children 40 hours of hyperbaric oxygen therapy over a month. For the therapy the children were in a room with an increased level of oxygen at an air pressure 30% above that at sea level. Roughly one third of the children were rated as “much” or “very much “ improved by evaluating physicians, compared to 8% in the control group (who were exposed to slightly increased air pressure). Those children who improved showed better cognitive awareness and social interaction, especially eye contact. These are sentinel symptoms of autism, so the findings of this study, while quite preliminary, are quite encouraging.

Hyperbaric chambers are extremely expensive, and so not a realistic “in-home” option. However, hyperbaric chambers are scattered about the country should these effects turn out to be lasting. I also wonder if exercise might be helpful, as some of the same physiologic changes occur in that setting. Although it would be more practical, getting many autistic children to exercise vigorously would be an extremely difficult challenge.

Art Therapy and Breast Cancer

A Swedish study found that breast cancer patients receiving radiation therapy reported broad and lasting health improvements after receiving only 5 sessions of art therapy. This group of women had five sessions over five weeks, lasting an hour each time. They were encouraged to relax and express themselves artistically. After six months, the women in the therapy groups experienced improvements in their physical, mental and emotional well being, reporting improved quality of life, body image and a more positive view of their own future.

Hand Washing

Some of you know that there is a clip of me in a TV infomercial for a book on a broad range of health topics sold by Bottom Line. When I sat down in my waiting room to film that piece two years ago I was shocked to learn that I was supposed to talk for 30-60 seconds without disclosing what I was talking about. I was supposed to interest the viewer without revealing what my article was about. That was a very strange and somewhat stressful experience (possibly why I looked so pained in the infomercial).

I will reveal to you (drum roll here) that the subject of my contribution was hand washing and the evidence that plain soap and water were as effective and safer than antibacterial soaps and other fancy hand washes. Another new study has confirmed this simple fact.

In the new study, researchers contaminated the hands of 20 health care workers with flu virus, and instructed them to wash their hands in different ways. Using water alone and air-drying their hands, 14 of 20 still had virus-contaminated hands. The three alcohol-based hand rubs worked better than plain water, but on the top of the heap, the combination of soap and water was triumphant.

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