Psoriasis Itch Causing Marital Tension?
By: News Canada
'Scratchless' Tips
Q: I have had psoriasis on my scalp for 8 years. My wife has always been very supportive, even helping massage my treatments into my scalp. But, in the past few months, she has started complaining about my constant scratching. Although she knows the scratching relieves the itch, she seems to tolerate it much less than before. The tension is mounting and I'm afraid this can lead to more problems down the road.
A: Psoriasis can be difficult on both spouses. Constant itching (or pruritus) can be 'irritating' to both the patient and their spouse - it is not an easy condition to live with. Keep the lines of communication open and try some of the following tips:
* Keep your scalp cool; warmth tends to make pruritus worse; Ice packs may also provide some relief
* Keep your scalp moisturized with a light emollient, such as Sarna-P an effective anti-itch cream, as dry skin tends to be more pruritic
* Physicians have been using tar for decades to treat psoriasis. For more effective penetration, make sure you leave the shampoo in contact with your scalp for 5 minutes and then rinse thoroughly. A nice-smelling, all-in-one preparation such as Polytar AF contains soothing menthol to relieve itching, salicylic acid to dissolve scales, and hair conditioners to leave hair soft and manageable.
Although scratching relieves the itch, it is important to avoid any scratching or scraping as this can lead to infection. To make matters worse, aggressive scratching can trigger the formation of new psoriatic plaques while worsening the existing lesion.
If the pruritus continues to be a source of tension, this should be discussed with your physician or your pharmacist.
Guide To Choosing Educational Toys For Children
by: Eugen Lisov
Educational toys for children
In the last few years, parents started getting more and more interested in choosing all sorts of educational toys for their children. Because a parent wishes the best for his child, a toy that is labeled as educational is very likely to be bought easier than others.
But what is an educational child toy?
Well, there is no definition of the term "educational toy" from what I know. However, what I do know is that an educational toy is a toy that helps a child learn something good, something that will help in the future. Play is the most important activity of any child. Learning thru play is a reality; it can and it is done unknowingly every time your child plays. The parent must however control the play so that it remains on an educational course.
There are also toys that aren't exactly educational for children … Toy guns and other such toys that somehow tend to violence and other bad behaviors are not recommended. You must avoid such toys. Although these toys may be a good source of fun for youngsters, on the long term they will only do harm.
How do educational child toys and games work?
A I said above, play is a child‘s main activity. During the play, a child learns many new things. Toys and games must be integrated into the play to make their job. This is not hard, because play consists of several games that require using toys. Any toy can be educational, as long as it does not develop a bad behavior, and it is used in your child's play. A toy must be used in order to be educational for a child.
To be clearer about how educational child toys and games work, I will take one example: Hide and seek.
Let's take a look at Hide and Seek. You do remember this game, right? Can you remember the rules? Ok, I will still list them here, and comment on them and explain its educational side.
The first rule is that every player must obey the rules. I know, I know it's obvious, but if players would not respect the rules, would there be any point for the rules to exist? Every child must learn and obey them, or else they are not allowed to play the game. The educational part of this is that the child learns to accept the fact that he cannot do everything he wants, that there are some limits and he must not pass them in order to keep his privileges.
One of the children in the group is chosen to count to 100 at the home tree (this helps young children learn the numbers in a pleasurable way, not like in school), without peeking (this educated the child to use fair play in all areas of the life). Meanwhile, the others must find a good hiding place, one that is both hard to discover and close to the home tree. This stimulates the child to think fast to the best solution to a given task.
After he finished counting to 100, the child says "Ready or not, here I come" and then he must search for the other players. He must be very careful. Once he finds a player hiding, he must run back to the home tree and shout his name. He must be vigilant so that he can hear any sound that might indicate the position of the other players.
The players who are already spotted must not tell where the others are hiding. This too educates children to use fair play.
The first player spotted is the next one to count to 100.
You'd never think that hide and seek, one of the most common games in childhood, could be so educational, right? Yes, it is a very educational game. And it's not the only one. Pick any game you liked playing when you were a child, and analyze its rules, as I did above. You'll be amazed.
Hide and Seek is oriented mainly towards developing fair play and physical skills.
Here's another example of educational child game that helps developing more advanced skills: Monopoly.
I won't bore you with its rules. This game introduces your child into the basics of modern business life. Acquiring high value properties, negotiation, taxes. Yup! This game educates your child to become the biggest businessperson on the Wall Street. Monopoly has rules that are more complex and it requires greater concentration. Specific jargon and names that mean much to the entrepreneurs get your child closer the world of business.
Toys are amongst the first objects a child gets in contact. Understanding how things work is a direct result of solving problems with toys like "Why this fits there?", "Does that fit here?", "How big is that?". Toys help your child learn to grab, pull, push, synchronize the movement of the head with that of the hand.
Toys are indispensable when playing. Playing with a great variety of educational child toys helps your child develop his imagination, understand that different objects have different properties, and learn how to combine them to create other interesting objects.
Read the whole article on choosing educational child toys.
About The Author
Eugen Lisov is the creator of Child-Toys-Guide.com, a site focused on helping parents worldwide to choose the best toys for their children. If you offer your child a bad toy, it's the same as if you don't offer your youngster any toy. Please feel free to browse my site; it will only help you when choosing toys for your child.
Also see the
Gentle Parent website for top-quality educational gifts for all ages
Tech Buzz Today!
by: Greg Richburg
Today’s pop-culture spouts hip-hop, camera phones, 50” Plasma HDTVs, high speed Internet access, web cams and integrated global espionage right there in your living room, office PC or PDA. I have access to more information today than I could have ever dreamed!! Someone call security! Am I being oppressed?!
I want my instantaneous access to information about bombs, adult media and Viagara without a prescription. I want to download music and not pay a dime, not to mention movies and software. I had “The Passion of the Christ” on DVD before it was even in the theatres. I want more popcorn Jiffy on the double. I want my MTV!
What is happening? What is happening to us?
I can’t get a thing done these days without first making sure I’m not going to become a slaughtered lamb. And these days, my life is busy helping people fend off advertisers, hackers, and malicious “malware” programmers that live their meager live just for the sake of twisting society. If I could only get my hands on the creator of the Netsky virus…
“Work smarter not harder.”
Have you ever heard that before? Of course you have. Today, the smart workers come ready. They are careful, especially in an office environment, but even in the home. There are methods to the madness; there are ways to go about your business prepared.
The first rule in American economics… “Why build one when you can build two for twice as much? Huh? Does that make a bit of sense? Actually in a network it does. If one fails, the other takes over. It is that simple.
I walked into a multi-million dollar business the other day as an analyst. I was just there to offer some recommendations, nothing more. A single hard drive failure and their entire operation would be in shambles. I really couldn’t believe it.
With the absurd abilities of a moderately intelligent high school kid, it amazes me that some of our most successful entrepreneurs take unnecessary risks. A simple RAID installation, a hard drive mirror, a backup tape drive, and a professional firewall are all fundamental when planning to secure your future.
If a hard drive crashes in a raid array, one of the other drives in the array can handle the load until the failed drive is replaced. That is the idea! In a hard drive mirror, if the primary drive fails, a simple switch and you are back up and running in no time. Replace the failed drive and recreate the mirror. YES!
What about viruses, file corruption, or accidental deletions?
A tape drive system can quickly backup 40 gigabytes of information on a daily basis. Archive your backups. You lose a file, so what. Restore from backup. Of course, you should always use a solid Anti-Virus system as well.
Are there resolutions to the difficulties presented to our future? If we protect ourselves well enough, I guess we can limit our worries. I am not sure. But some things are still for certain. Death and taxes. Everything else is just a handshake. Make sure you keep your hands washed.
A Rule for the road:
If you are running backups on your network, and you have not tested the restore process, how are you sure that your backups are running successfully? Your disaster recovery plan should include a monthly test of your restore process.
By Greg Richburg
Netricks, Inc.
http://www.netricks.com
About The Author
Greg Richburg a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer and the owner of Netricks, Inc. a network consulting, web design and hosting company in California. Visit Netricks at http://www.netricks.com.
As well, Greg runs a web based distributorship for Ujena swimwear and clothing. Please visit http://www.klickcommerce.com and http://www.webbikinistore.com for details.
