Tag: Medicine

Insights from a Visit to the Civil War Medical Museum | March 10 2026, 15:59

Today a big interesting historical post.

Where I was: Historical Museum of Military (Civil War) Medicine in Frederick, MD. Entry is $9, $15 with a guide. For an hour and a half, we got a very smart guy who gave an interesting lecture, making the provincial museum really very interesting. We even tipped the guy afterward.

A few interesting facts that I didn’t know before. During the Civil War in the USA (1861-1865), there was a monstrous scale of losses – over 600,000 people. One in every ten was mobilized for the war. That is, excluding women, children, and the disabled – yes, someone from almost every family fought.

Apparently, Americans were not very experienced in wars back then, and organizing large groups of people was based on the “fend for yourself” principle. From gastrointestinal diseases alone, nearly four times more people died than from wounds. Soldiers cooked everything themselves – there was no cook or porridge for the platoon. They split into micro-groups of a few people, pooled whatever they had, and fried it on a fire. For some reason they mainly fried, not boiled (which also contributed to diseases). Their main rations were salt pork and hard-tack — crackers as hard as a stone. Fried hard-tacks were called Skillygalee.

Remember, it was not like that in European wars. And all because there were many of them, and they quickly figured out how to make them more effective. Plus, there was also a civil war, poorly organized and spontaneous.

Initially, soldiers were handed money in the field and they sent it to their families as best they could (not all reached its destination). For Southerners, money devalued faster than they could carry it to the tent. Back then, each state issued its own money. They write about 8000 different banknotes at that time. I didn’t quite believe it, started researching, and it turned out that this is still a very conservative estimate. Yes, anyone (state, city, private bank, railway, factory, and even a pharmacy) could print their own paper money. Each bank issued banknotes of its own design for different denominations ($1, $2, $3, $5, etc.). In 1860, there were about 1600 private banks in the USA, and almost each issued its own range of notes. But in the end, greenbacks – federal money prevailed.

They also told us about Dorothea Dix, the head of army nurses for the Union. She introduced an interesting age standard for the nurses. No “young and beautiful.” Only women over 30 years of age, “plain-looking,” no jewelry, fashionable dresses, or crinolines – only strict brown or black dresses. At that time, the appearance of a woman in a male military camp was considered almost indecent. Dorothea wanted the soldiers to see in the nurses strict mothers or aunts, not objects of flirtation.

To join the army, a volunteer was required to have at least two teeth opposing each other. Why? A soldier needed to quickly bite off the tip of a paper cartridge to pour the powder into the barrel. No teeth — you’re useless in battle.

Back then, they shot with Minié balls – made of soft lead. It was huge caliber (thumb-sized) and when it hit the body, it didn’t just pass through, it “burst” and literally turned bone into fine crumble. Repairing such a bone was impossible, so amputation became the only way to save a person from gangrene. At least there was some form of anesthesia (chloroform/ether).

Before the Civil War in the USA, people were buried where they died. But the war generated a demand: affluent Northern families wanted to bring their sons’ bodies home. That’s when embalming flourished. Right behind the front line were tents of “embalming surgeons” who for a decent sum (about $50–$100 for an officer) extracted blood and injected chemicals (arsenic and zinc) into the body. Actually, the museum building included such a place. Lincoln’s body after his assassination was transported across the entire country on a train, and it looked “alive” thanks to this new technology, which became the best advertisement for the new industry.

Overall, Frederick is a very nice city, full of art and nonconformists 🙂 Like our Leesburg, but 20 times bigger.

P.S. It was interesting to study what drove people to go die. Of course, our guide said “patriotism”.

But if you google, it turns out not quite so. Of course, in 1861 no one knew that the war would last 4 years and take 600,000 lives.

Reason #1 – boredom. Life on a farm in the mid-19th century was incredibly monotonous. War seemed like the greatest adventure in life. Guys thought: “I’ll go, see the world, shoot, become a hero, and then return to harvest.”

Reason #2 – naivety. The first volunteers went to the front as if on a picnic. In the first major battle (Bull Run), civilians from Washington even came with picnic baskets to watch the “spectacle,” until they were swept away by the retreating crowd of bloodied soldiers.

Reason #3 – “honor.” In the 19th century, “honor” was not an empty word. If you were a healthy guy and didn’t go to the army, you became an outcast in your own town. It’s written that girls often refused to go out with those who didn’t wear a uniform.

Reason #4 – “regimental solidarity.” As I already said, regiments were formed from neighbors. Not going to war meant betraying your friends, brothers, and father. Shame before neighbors was stronger than the fear of death.

What did they fight for?

Here the goals of the North and South radically differed:

For the North, the main idea was “Integrity of the Union.” For them, the USA was a great experiment in democracy that could not be allowed to fail. The slogan “Save the Union” was more powerful than “Free the Slaves.” At first, not everyone was ready to die for abolition of slavery.

For the South (Confederacy), the main motivation was “Defending their homes.” Most Southern soldiers did not own slaves (slavery was too expensive a luxury for ordinary farmers). But they were convinced that the “Yankee northerners” were coming to seize their land, burn their homes, and impose their rules. They saw themselves as heirs of Washington, fighting against “tyrant” Lincoln.

Reason #5 – bounties

When initial enthusiasm faded (by 1863), pure calculation played its part. States and the federal government started paying huge “enlistment bounties.” A sum of $500–$1000 was equivalent to a few years’ earnings for a laborer. For a poor immigrant (Irish or German) just off the boat in New York, it was a chance to provide for a family or buy a farm after the war.

In 1862-63, both sides introduced the draft, as volunteers were running out. This exposed social injustice.

In the North, you could officially avoid the army by paying $300 (huge money for a poor man, but manageable for the middle class) or find a “substitute” (a person who would fight in your place for money).

In the South, there was the “Twenty Negro Law.” Owning 20 or more slaves exempted you from service, as you were “needed in the rear for production control.”

This caused fierce resentment among ordinary soldiers. The famous “Draft Riots” in New York (1863) were sparked precisely by this sense of injustice.

So there you have it 🙂

Understanding Fever: A Physiological Defense Mechanism | February 17 2026, 09:00

I’ve only slightly (hopefully) gotten sick here and realized during the process that many people around me take pills for a minor onset of fever, considering it normal.

I’m sharing my understanding of the process, which should be very close to scientific. When an infection penetrates the body, foreign bacteria or viruses enter the bloodstream, which the immune system attacks. During the attack, signaling molecules are produced, the purpose of which is to declare a general alert throughout the body. Specifically, cytokines are produced, which also inform the brain (hypothalamus) that action is needed. Pyrogens (fever-inducing agents) include cytokines and external pathogens. The hypothalamus activates a fever through the synthesis of prostaglandins. Why: at a temperature of 38.5°C, the immune system becomes more active, antibodies are produced in larger amounts, microbial reproduction slows down, and some viruses do not reproduce.

If you consume, for example, Ibuprofen, it blocks the enzyme (COX) that creates these prostaglandins. Meaning, the pyrogens are still in the blood, but the brain “can’t hear” them and doesn’t raise the temperature.

There are only two cases when you should reduce fever: if you truly feel awful, have a severe headache, vomiting, etc. Unnecessary stress does not help the body. And if the temperature exceeds 39°C. At that point, the harm from high temperature outweighs the benefits. Even then, there are so many “buts” that a doctor should make the decision. For example, if the heart is problematic, these are special cases.

Oh, here’s something else interesting. Why when the temperature is high you feel “cold” and want to cover up. In the hypothalamus itself, there’s something like a thermostat, normally set to 36.6°C. When pyrogens arrive, it raises the temperature through prostaglandins, but since it’s the brain, it immediately cranks up its own “normal temperature” in its thermostat to, say, 38.5°C. As a result, a body temperature of 37°C suddenly feels low, and it feels like “it’s cold around, need to cover up.” Covering up is passive thermal insulation, and generally, it helps to more quickly raise the temperature to the target level. Later, when the temperature reaches 38.5°C, the chills may disappear (unless the hypothalamus further raises its thermostat). And when the temperature plateaus, around 38.5°C, covering up is harmful.

When the temperature starts to drop back, the internal thermostat switches to 36.6°C, and to cool down faster, the body produces sweat. So, if you’re sweating, it’s a sign of recovery.

(Well, what else is there to do at four in the morning, when because of all this, I can’t sleep)

Metchnikoff: Beyond Science and Survival | November 13 2025, 04:53

I was reading Metchnikoff’s biography (don’t ask why I ended up there) and thought about how much can fit into one life. He wasn’t just a scientist, but rather like a saga:

His elder brother Ivan was the prototype for Leo Tolstoy’s “The Death of Ivan Ilyich.” Another brother, Lev, was a prominent anarchist, sociologist and fought in Italy alongside Garibaldi. Metchnikoff himself tried to end his life twice: the first time after the death of his first wife (who, sick with tuberculosis, was carried to the church on a chair). He took morphine but survived. The second time was when his second wife Olga fell critically ill with typhus. He deliberately inoculated himself with relapsing fever. Fortunately, both survived. However, the Grim Reaper with his scythe only came after his third consecutive heart attack.

The dude graduated from university at 19 as an external student. I.M. Sechenov himself recommended him for a professorship. But Metchnikoff was “blackballed” (rejected) by one vote. In protest, Sechenov resigned along with him.

He founded the first bacteriological station in the country at that time in Odessa. But due to an employee mistake (they spoiled the anthrax vaccine) an entire flock of sheep died. After this scandal, he left Russia. The station — on Leo Tolstoy Street.

In Paris, he was immediately taken under the wing of Louis Pasteur (the father of pasteurized milk), who supported his theory and gave him a lab in his institute. There, Metchnikoff worked for 28 years, becoming the deputy director.

While studying cholera at the Pasteur Institute, Metchnikoff proposed a theory that not everyone who comes into contact with the pathogen gets sick. He suggested that it’s all about… (of course) the gut flora. To prove it, he deliberately drank a culture with cholera vibrios. Nothing happened (it would have surely happened to you, Metchnikoff thought)

In the end, he received the Nobel Prize for the discovery of phagocytosis (cellular immunity). He is also “the father of gerontology” — Metchnikoff was the one who proposed the theory that to achieve longevity, one must combat bad bacteria in the gut with probiotics. Now, they say, gerontologists around the world drink sour milk on May 15th remembering Metchnikoff.

He died in Paris, and his ashes are kept in the library of the Pasteur Institute.

Also, in the English Wikipedia he’s Élie Metchnikoff. Not easy to guess.

In the photo, Metchnikoff and Leo Tolstoy are discussing immunology.

From Opera to Oblivion: The Fascinating Journey of Lorenzo Da Ponte | September 22 2025, 18:53

We just finished watching Le Nozze di Figaro with Nadezhda in a serialized mode and today we’ll continue with Don Giovanni, also in a serialized mode, because no one has the time. So, both of these operas were written by an American 🙂 I mean the librettos. Turns out, Lorenzo Da Ponte, an Italian librettist, emigrated, naturalized in the U.S., lived here 33 years, taught Italian literature at Columbia University in New York, founded an opera theater in the USA, which became the precursor to the New York Academy of Music and the New York Metropolitan Opera. Really an interesting dude. His real name was Emanuel Conegliano. A Jew by birth, who became a Catholic priest, a friend of Casanova, and a supporter of Rousseau’s ideas. Before moving to the U.S., Da Ponte successfully juggled teaching and a small business, earning not so much from lectures as from owning a brothel for aristocrats which he maintained. In the U.S., he kept a grocery store in New Jersey and tried selling medicines in Pennsylvania. Lorenzo Da Ponte died on August 17, 1838, in humiliating poverty, a few blocks away from the boarded-up building of his theater. His grave in one of the New York cemeteries, which was not marked, eventually got lost. Essentially, the same post-mortem fate befell his friend Mozart.

Echoes of Anthrax: The Amerithrax Investigation Unveiled | September 02 2025, 13:33

From the museum of the day before yesterday. Probably, some of you remember the notorious case in 2001: shortly after the 9/11 attacks, the USA experienced a series of bioterror attacks: someone mailed letters containing powder with anthrax spores (Bacillus anthracis). This led to the deaths of 5 people and infected 17, but it could have ended much worse for the entire planet. The investigation, known as “Amerithrax,” was conducted by the FBI in collaboration with other agencies and became one of the most complex in history.

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For those who might not know — the inhalational form of anthrax has a mortality rate of 85–90% without treatment. Symptoms appear after 6 days, by which time dozens will be infected. It can’t be destroyed — spores remain viable for decades in the soil. For example, on the Scottish island of Gruinard, they lingered for nearly 50 years after wartime testing. Only after 50 years had passed and after 280 tons of formaldehyde solution had been sprayed across all 196 hectares of the island, and the most contaminated topsoil around the dispersal site had been removed, did the island become relatively safe. Thus, anthrax could easily be more terrifying than a global nuclear war.

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So, returning to the subject. Initially, suspicions fell on various individuals, including Iraq or Al-Qaeda, but no evidence was found.

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The key breakthrough was scientific examination. Scientists analyzed the anthrax strain from the letters — it was the Ames strain used in American laboratories. Using microbial forensics (genetic analysis), they identified unique mutations in the spores that narrowed the source down to flask RMR-1029 in the USAMRIID (United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases) laboratory at Fort Detrick, Maryland.

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In other words, every living being has names and genealogy from birth, it’s just a matter of willingness to dig into the genealogy. Apparently, controlled substances have their own registry office, so to speak.

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Bruce Ivins, a microbiologist who worked there, was the custodian of this flask and had direct access (although more than 100 others did as well).

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Later, investigators gathered circumstantial evidence. Ivins had been working late at the lab just before the mailings in September and October 2001, which was inconsistent with his usual schedule. He could not convincingly explain these hours. Moreover, in early September 2001, he was vaccinated against anthrax, which seemed suspicious. The FBI also accused him of attempting to mislead the investigation: he allegedly provided false anthrax samples to divert suspicion and attempted to frame colleagues. In 2001, Ivins sent an email to colleagues offering the Ames strain for analysis, which might have been an attempt to cover his tracks.

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Behavioral signs also played a role. Ivins suffered from depression and suicidal thoughts, especially after another suspect (Steven Hatfill) was cleared in 2008. In June 2008, he was hospitalized in a psychiatric clinic, where during therapy, he made statements that the FBI interpreted as “denials without denial” — for example, that he “had no heart for killing” and did not remember participating in the attacks.

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By 2008, the investigation had narrowed down to Ivins. When he learned that charges were being prepared against him, on July 29, 2008, he took a lethal dose of Tylenol (acetaminophen). Formal charges were never brought. In 2010, the FBI officially closed the case, declaring Ivins the sole perpetrator.

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However, the conclusions remain controversial: the US National Academy of Sciences noted in 2011 that the genetic examination was not convincing enough for a definitive conclusion, and some microbiologists, victims’ families, and politicians demanded further investigation. As of now, no new discoveries have been made, and the case is considered closed.

From Miniare to Miniature: The Evolution of Book Illustration | August 14 2025, 14:52

How interesting, the word “Miniature” turns out not to derive from minimus (Latin), meaning “smallest”, but from miniare, meaning “to color with cinnabar or red lead”.

The word is connected to the practice of book illustration in the Middle Ages. You have probably seen images of medieval manuscripts with dense black text and a large, decorated initial letter. In the earliest bound books, they were not so ornate—just a big letter, colored red to stand out. In Italy, the verb miniare referred to the stage of painting red initials, usually left until last, and the art of illustration itself was called miniatura.

Over time, these initial decorations became increasingly complex, evolving into fully developed scenes with little figures, animals, and buildings. But, of course, since the scenes had to fit into the corner of a page, they were very small. And therefore, because a miniature in a book was like a tiny painting, the meaning of the word expanded—it came to denote any small version of something larger.

Decade Without Police Sirens: A Personal Observation in Public Safety Trends | August 02 2025, 23:48

Interestingly, I haven’t heard a single car siren in almost ten years, except from medical and fire vehicles. At least around here, it seems even the police don’t use them for their purposes. Apparently, the reason is that a police car with a siren behind is perceived as a command to stop and be ready to show your documents. But fire trucks and ambulances, it seems, always use theirs.

Many people don’t know that what we think of as an ambulance doesn’t really exist here. That is, you can call 911 and request a medical vehicle, and they will come, but it’s usually only done in truly critical situations—like a heart issue or if you’ve fallen from a staircase and can’t get up.

This service, EMS, always sends a bill. The minimum is $550, but typically more than $1000, depending on the type of vehicle sent—which depends on what was said on the phone—and how many miles it is to the hospital.

If transportation to a hospital is necessary, an insurance company, Medicare, or Medicaid initially pays for it. The patient might only need to pay the difference—for example, a co-pay or a deductible. If the person is unable to pay due to financial hardship, CNS will not send the bill to collections nor will they recover the debt.

If you call 911 and report that someone has fallen from a ladder, especially with a suspected head, neck, or back injury, the dispatcher will send a full fire & EMS response. That means, besides the medics, this big red fire truck shows up. It arrives not because there’s a fire, but because it is staffed with EMTs (Emergency Medical Technicians) who can begin assistance even before the ambulance arrives. Additionally, fire stations in the area are positioned such that the nearest fire truck can get there faster than a free ambulance.

In various incidents, if you can get to the hospital on your own, experience shows that it’s often necessary to go if you want results. This is not free either. Every such visit costs me $200 (insurance pays ten times more), but as it turned out later, it was always worth it. You just need to know where to go, and choose large facilities where the queues are shorter.

How Frequent Tick Bites May Reduce Lyme Disease Risk | July 01 2025, 04:38

#science Today I found another tick on me; it didn’t have time to latch on, but did manage to bite. And like before, I suffer from these tick bites being very itchy and taking a long time to heal. A couple of times because of similar symptoms I ended up in Emergency, where I was diagnosed with Lyme based on symptoms and put on doxycycline, but later tests did not confirm Lyme, though I already took the doxycycline. And if there was anything, it’s long dead. Question is, why do ticks love me so much.

I just found an interesting scientific article about this. “Hypersensitivity to Ticks

and Lyme Disease Risk” (link in comments)

The authors say that many people living in areas with a high prevalence of tick-borne diseases such as Lyme develop a more acute reaction to tick bites—redness and severe itching, a dermatological-hypersensitivity reaction—that’s exactly my case. They analyzed 1,500 cases and concluded that the more frequent a person’s itching after a bite (more than 3 times a year), the lower their chance of contracting Lyme disease—the risk was reduced by about 7 times (odds ratio ~ 0.14, p=0.01).

They write that this is linked to the fact that the itching helps to notice the tick sooner, consequently – remove it faster and prevent the infectious agent from entering the body (borrelia is not transmitted immediately, but after 1–2 days). There may also be immune mechanisms that interfere with the tick’s feeding and transmission of borrelia.

Conclusion: Recurring reactions to tick bites (itching + redness) create a kind of “anti-tick” immunity. This reduces the risk of contracting Lyme disease, and likely, could be the basis for developing a vaccine against tick pathogens. Quite intriguing, because such medications exist for dogs (full protection against ticks), but haven’t been invented for humans yet.

Risks of High-Pressure Activities on Eye Health and Hearing | June 28 2025, 23:52

Interesting. I learned, for example, that the human retina is not really attached to the vascular tunic, but is held in place only mechanically by intraocular pressure. Because of this, those who jump from heights or engage in diving, and generally anything that increases intraocular pressure, are at risk of retinal detachment.

(By the way, about pressure, I had a slight barotrauma in my left ear today during airplane landing: after landing there was a lingering feeling of stuffiness and muffled sounds, and while in the air it even hurt a bit. That is, some traces of sensation remained several hours later, but probably, by tomorrow morning I will recover fully).

https://youtu.be/QmX60IgWCGk?si=GrWzDtuZTpFeig-X