Measles or rubeola as it is also known is one of the leading causes of children s death around the world. This viral infection is communicable through the air and spreads through contact with infected saliva and mucus. Thus sharing cutlery or glassware with an infected person can increase a person s risk of suffering from this disease. Thankfully measles can be prevented through vaccination known as MMR. This vaccination is given to infants and also protects them against mumps, rubella and chickenpox. The first dose of MMR vaccination is given when the child is about 1 year old and a booster dose is repeated when the child is 4-6 years old.

One of the most characteristic symptoms of measles is a reddish rash that begins inside the mouth and later erupts all over the body. This is usually preceded by a high fever, cold, cough, sore throat and swelling of the lymph nodes. Fatigue, diarrhoea and redness of the eyes are other symptoms of this disease. Measles symptoms are not apparent the moment a person is exposed to the virus. It can take 7 to 18 days for symptoms to become visible after catching the infection, this is known as the incubation period. Measles affects adults is a more severe way than children.

Children and adults with a weak immune system are highly susceptible to complications associated with measles. In some cases, it can lead to life threatening conditions, such as pneumonia and encephalitis or inflammation of the brain. Other complications associated with measles include ear infections, bronchitis, blindness and a sharp fall in platelet count. A pregnant woman suffering from measles also has a high risk of miscarrying the baby or preterm labour.

There is no definitive form of treating measles and doctors typically address the symptoms while prescribing medication. In most cases, the symptoms and the virus should disappear in two to three weeks. Some of the common forms of medicine prescribed to deal with measles are:

Medication to relieve fever
Antibiotics to prevent or treat accompanying bacterial infections
Vitamin A supplements to reduce the severity of measles symptoms
Pain relievers to deal with muscle pains
In addition, the patient needs plenty of rest and fluids to strengthen the immune system. The use of a humidifier can also help treat a sore throat and cough. Bright lights can aggravate headaches and irritation and hence should be avoided. Hence, avoid watching television and activities like reading.

Measles - How They Affect You? + Treatment

If your child has become increasingly addicted to sweets and other sugary items, this addiction can lead to certain behavioral problems (like mood swings, irritability, anger, etc) in children. Moreover, a high sugar intake can lead to your child falling prey to serious diseases and conditions, including diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular diseases. 

Here's what you can do to break your child's indulgent habits and wean him from ill-health causing culprits like cakes, ice creams, candies, chocolates and rich and creamy desserts etc.

1. Practice what you preach -
In order to develop healthy eating habits in your child, it is imperative for you as a parent to lead by example. When it comes to weaning your child from sugary foods and sweets, you yourself should limit your intake. So, if you tell your child to avoid sweets but love sweets yourself, you'd be setting a bad example by eating them yourself and not letting your child have them. The best thing to do is to be a role model to your child as children learn everything from their parents. 

2. Curb consumption of sugar by deferring intake to a later date -
Instead of depriving your child completely, it would prove to be more useful to tell them that they could have sweets on some other day. This is because if you deny him his indulgence, your child would invariably go on an eating spree the moment an opportunity arises. A study on a group of restrained eaters and non-diet individuals revealed that restrained eaters were found to consume more food than the non-dieting individuals. Not knowing when they could have their favourite foods again, they went on an eating spree.
Make frequent yet small offerings of sweets while explaining to him the importance of moderation and why he/she shouldn't overindulge but space out sugar intake.

3. Try the 90/10 rule - 
Teaching older children the 90/10 principle is another sure-shot way of breaking your child?'s addiction to sweets. The rule calls for 90% of the diet to be made up of healthy food with the remaining 10% being devoted to foods your child wants to indulge in such as junk food, sweets or foods with high sugar content. The total calorie intake that arises from consumption of about 10% or 1-2 fun foods is only about 100-200 calories everyday. 

4. Present your child with healthy alternatives to sugary items -
The next time your child wants to indulge in his sugar craving, instead of giving a processed sugary food, give healthier sweet foods like dates, honey or a fresh sweet fruit. 



4 Excellent Ways to Break Your Child's Addiction to Sweets

Your mother has often yelled at you for playing video games for long hours but obviously you haven t paid heed to it. Such is the obsession with video games that they don t let you rest unless you have championed all the levels in the virtual interface. Here is the source of all problems. Studies have revealed that video games have a direct relation to neurological disorders. As a result, many health experts across the world consider video game as a kind of health abuse.

People who play action-oriented video games are at higher risks. The more you indulge in these kinds of games, the more they are going to affect the hippocampus section of your brain. It is that part of the brain which is considered to be the centre of your nervous system, memory, and emotion. This has a detrimental effect on your overall brain health.

Let us see some of the signs which may indicate the onset of certain complications arising from an over indulgence in these games.
1. You spend hours on the computer or related gaming devices and devote lesser hours for your family and friends.
2. You get agitated when someone stops you midway through the game
3. You become socially isolated and show signs of occasional mood swings
4. You are unable to keep a track of time once you start playing
5. You repeatedly neglect your studies, resulting in a dip in performance at school

Why does this happen?
All of the above signs indicate that sooner or later you might develop neurological problems. When you spend an excessive number of hours on playing and navigating through the games, the  hippocampus  portion of your brain shows signs of decreased gray matter. As a result, the volume of the hippocampus shrinks, causing severe nerve related disorders such as schizophrenia, Alzheimer s disease, dementia, depression, and overall general stress.

One of the biggest reasons behind this is a lack of self-control. Most of the video games will encourage you to steal cars, run away after a theft and kill your enemies. Moreover, if you succeed, you are rewarded. This naturally unleashes a blatant urge for the gratification of all these awkward desires in your real life too. Hence, once you are encountered with the reality, you tend to show violent behavior.

Video Games and Neurological Problems Associated with Them

Choosing a career is a serious concern for students soon after completing 10th standard when one is required to make a choice of subjects for 11th grade. While still very young, many of us hardly know what is good for us and which field is best. For most of us, choosing a career is not a serious affair until 12th grade. However, once a student is done with 12th, he rethinks -  Did I make the right choice of subjects in class XIth?  I had always wanted to go in this field after school, but nobody guided me about subjects required for it in class XIth and XIIth. So, after completing school one feels very sad and frustrated that interest lay in A field but wasted 2 school years doing B-Field, a totally different course of study.

Therefore, when selecting subjects in XIth, it is very necessary to have a career goal in place keeping the market in mind. In addition to this, selecting the right education institution in XIth is equally important. Eg.  I am interested in Fine Arts but my school offers only Science and Commerce.  So, the child takes one of these only and loses track of what he wants, sowing the seeds for future distress in the field thrust upon him. Unfortunately, not many students are able to discover their potentials and interests at this stage and end up making wrong choices.

In this scenario, seeking the help of an experienced and qualified career counselor becomes absolutely necessary who can assist in discovering your potential and aptitude and accordingly suggest the right course. Career counselor usually employs testing of three factors   aptitude, interest and personality. These aspects help the counselors in deciding the right career path for a student. With an increase in the number of opportunities in the market, the importance of career counseling has also increased manifold. People have begun to realize the fact that not all can become engineers or doctors and started exploring other fields depending on their talent and interest in alternate domains.

Sound guidance will depend on the qualifications, training and experience of the professional. It is always a good idea to first know about the professional expertise of the counsellor/psychologist on whom you depend for making a life-long career choice. Generally speaking, school counsellors are post-graduates with about 9 months diploma in counselling and guidance with a focus on school children. They may or may not have done M.Phil, or Ph.D to qualify as a doctor. Similarly, anybody with just a graduation degree in Psychology can self-proclaim as a Counsellor/Psychologist and offer guidance and counselling, charging much less a fees. For any professional you choose, the higher the educational qualifications, more the number of practical trainings from reputed institutes, and the greater the professional experience, more dependable will be the advice given by them.

Vocational guidance for students and adults is one of the best ways to choose the right career path. With a plethora of career choices out there, sound career counselling plays a pivotal role in ensuring that right career choices are made. This is rewarding, considering that an individual can choose the right career path as per the strengths and talents he possesses. Right counselling not only helps the person to grow in the job quickly but gives ample room to learn in his desired field.

Here is a list of some major benefits of vocational guidance and career counselling:

Right assessment of weakness and strength: Career counselling is typically conducted by expert professionals with years of experience behind their back. They assess a candidate based on various aptitude tests. The test results rightly portray the strength and weaknesses of a candidate. This information plays a key role in determining the right career choice for a candidate. A person can ensure that he refrain from choosing a wrong career that leads to frustration and low work satisfaction.
Right goal setting leads to better choice: A counsellor can help a candidate choose the right goal and help him to outline the process of achieving it. Furthermore, an experienced counsellor can help a candidate lay down a plan to reach the goal. A step by step blueprint of reaching the goal in a realistic manner helps a candidate to achieve his dream career faster. With right goal setting, a person can attend career success over a very short period of time.
Explore various career choices: There are vast career choices that a person can explore that are available within the scope of a person s expertise. A career counsellor can throw light on these choices and help a person focus on the right option. This ensures that a person saves a lot of time and energy while figuring out the best possible career choice that is out there. This is particularly true in cases where a person is trying to make a mid-career switch. 
The right guidance and support: An experienced career counsellor can guide a candidate to get hold of the right set of skills and expertise that may be required to achieve a particular career. This ensures that a candidate is adequately prepared before the big opportunity knocks on the door. Right guidance not only cut down the preparation time, it increases the chances of success as well. 
Search Support: While the job search is on, a good counsellor can help a candidate prepare in terms of resume preparation, cover letter, video introduction etc. They can also help a candidate with the right kind of networking to land that dream job.
To conclude, the crux of career counselling is to get the necessary guidance from a qualified professional that would help the student/adult in making the right choice regarding his career. If you wish to discuss about any specific problem, you can consult a Psychologist.

Vocational Guidance & Career Counseling Benefits For Students & Adults

Children may run around having fun and growing in the process. Some children may be more active than the others and some may be more attentive at school. All children go through some sort of trouble while growing up. This is because of the drastic changes that the bodies of little children constantly go through. One such problem commonly faced by the children is bedwetting. This problem may be a common one, but it should be brought under control as soon as possible so that the children do not have to face social embarrassment as they grow older.

Apart from providing a healthy and happy living to the children, it may be essential to find a way of treatment that may not leave the child affected by the harmful ingredients of the regular allopathic medication. One of the safest and the most effective ways to be able to treat bedwetting is homeopathy. Homeopathy is a branch of medicine and treatment that works on the body of the user with the most natural ways. The medicines in homeopathy are made using basic ingredients from plants and other organic materials.

Homeopathy for children:
The use of homeopathy for problems that affect the children in particular is essential because of the fact that they have growing systems and the growth may get adversely affect with the strong and highly potent allopathic drugs. It is also important to understand the nuances of controlling the bedwetting issue in children and also know what the causes of the problem may be:

    When the children are highly fatigued, they may wet the bed due to the deep sleep that they may be experiencing after a tiring time.
    In times of winter when the cold is uncontrollable or much more than usual, it may be natural for some children to not be able to control their bladder.
    In a lot of cases, the children may also wet the bed when they have had a scary or traumatic experience.

Just as the causes of the problem are varied, it must be realized that the medications are also supposed to be administered according to the issue.

Homepathic medication for betwetting
Homeopathy is a stream of medicine that treats the body in the most delicate manner, which is why it is a safe alternative for children. However, it must also be ensured that proper medical intervention is attained to start a course of homeopathic medication as well, so that bedwetting may be treated within a desired amount of time and the child may feel free from the embarrassment of wetting the bed.

Bedwetting - Can Homeopathy Help in Curing  it?

Bronchial asthma is a medical condition. It happens when the airways of your lungs swell up and become narrow. This limits the amount of air that can pass through the passages and this leads to respiratory distress. Asthma can affect anyone and usually, it starts from childhood.

What are the Symptoms of Bronchial Asthma?
Some common symptoms of bronchial asthma are-

  Wheezing and breathlessness
  Tightness of the chest
  Frequent bouts of coughing which are more common at night or in the early morning, making sleep difficult. 

Bronchial asthma does not go away on its own. It requires treatment.

What is Siddha?
Siddha is a very ancient system of medication and treatment that originated in Tamil Nadu. According to Siddha, the individual is a microcosm of the entire universe. And it is made up of some fundamental elements- earth, air, fire, water and ether as well as three humours- Vata, Pitta and Kapha. An imbalance of these components causes an ailment. So, the chief goal of Siddha is to restore the right balance to root out any illness.

Types of Asthma according to Siddha -
We find mention of asthma in Siddha literature. It is called Eraippu Noi. There are five types of asthma -

  Vazhi Eraippu Noi - Digestive troubles may lead to accumulation of Vata. This is not a grave form of asthma and can easily be cured.

  Iya Eraippu Noi - Exposure to cold climes or freezing winds or being drenched in rain can cause Kapha to build up in the system, which triggers this form of asthma. It is accompanied by symptoms such as the runny nose, nasal congestion, breathing trouble when lying down.

  Iyavazhi Eraippu Noi - Both Vata and Kapha accumulate to trigger this kind of asthma. Its symptoms include breathlessness, bloating, indigestion, disorientation, etc.

  Mukkuttra Eraippu Noi - An imbalance of all three humours- Vata, Pitta and Kapha are the culprits behind mukkuttra Eraippu Noi. A person who has contracted it might experience severe chest pain, constipation and even loss of consciousness.

  Mel nokku Eraippu Noi - This is the gravest form of bronchial asthma and requires extensive treatment.

Treatment of Asthma according to Siddha -

Siddha will first try to understand what kind of imbalance has caused your asthma. The medication depends on the type of asthma. Siddha medicines are made from particular parts of herbs that will induce you to either vomit or defecate to get rid of the excess humour that has accumulated in your body. Thus, the balance of Kapha, Pitta and Vata is restored.

You might also be suggested a few breathing exercises to strengthen your lungs and diaphragm.
Siddha follows a holistic way to curing bronchial asthma and targets it at its source. Unlike allopathic medication, medicines prescribed by Siddha are herbal and have no side effects.

Siddha Approach In Treating Bronchial Asthma!

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