Author: Emma Yasinski

Seamus Finley has had a clogged feeling in his ears for most of his life. He couldn’t wear earbuds because they’d get dirty and don’t fit correctly in his ears. But it wasn’t until he woke up one morning unable to hear out of one ear, that he considered having a healthcare professional take a look.  A provider at a nearby urgent care center removed a buildup of earwax. Then, he says, the doctor told him, “you’ve got to keep up on this or it’s going to keep doing this.”  In hopes of preventing another buildup, he now uses cotton…

Usually, our immune systems protect us from all kinds of outside invaders like the bacteria that causes strep throat and the virus that causes COVID, but what happens when our immune system’s highly-specialized antibodies, white blood cells, and inflammatory molecules glitch and turn against us, attacking our body’s own tissues and organs? We get autoimmune diseases.  There are 80 types of autoimmune diseases, and they’re often difficult to diagnose. The symptoms of autoimmune diseases can vary widely based on the parts of the body that are affected. Often, the symptoms of autoimmune diseases, like painful swelling and inflammation, change from…

Olivia Walker was diagnosed with Lupus when she was just 6 years old. Over the past 25 years, she’s been prescribed “nearly everything on the market.”  For the most part, that consists of over the counter painkillers, corticosteroids, and hydroxychloroquine (yes, the one that some thought could help treat COVID early in the pandemic.) Just recently, she started taking Benlysta (belimumab), a drug approved in 2011 specifically for lupus.  “It has been my favorite of the treatments I’ve taken over the last 25-plus years,” she says. “I find myself having more energy and fewer symptoms.”  But Walker is Black, and…

Morgan’s parents weren’t too concerned in August of 2021, when her daughter had a fever. After all, she’d recovered from COVID-19 just a few weeks before. Her parents figured it was just a cold. But within a few days, the 8-year-old was admitted to the hospital with a high fever, rash, aches, and stomach pain. Her heart rate skyrocketed while her blood pressure dropped. She stayed in the hospital for about two weeks, where doctors gave her corticosteroids to ease the inflammation rioting through her body.    Her COVID-19 infection weeks before had triggered an immune response that went haywire and…

We’ve created the MedShadow Vaccine Tracker, the only tracker focused on side effects and adverse events of COVID-19 Vaccines in progress.

People on dialysis for kidney disease are 100 time more likely than others to get dangerous staph infections in their blood. Nearly 15,000 dialysis patients got blood stream infections in 2020, a third of which were staph (infections of a bacteria called Staphylococcus aureus). While the number of infections has decreased since 2014, the risk remains, and disparities are prevalent. Black and Hispanic patients are more likely than their white counterparts on dialysis to get a staph in their bloodstream, according to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report published February 6, 2023. You’ve been admitted to the…

After her first surgery for endometriosis, writer Kristina Kasparian learned that during surgery, surgeons had filled her abdomen with gas to make it easier to see her organs. But the gas didn’t escape her body right away, meaning that as she was recovering, the trapped gas caused her “tremendous discomfort, radiating into the ribs, and up to the collarbone.”  She was also surprised to find that anesthesia can continue affecting you for several days after the surgery, making you extra groggy.  Since then, Kasparian has had three more surgeries for endometriosis. The first was the most challenging to recover from,…

Do you ever have acid reflux and wonder if it’s really a heart attack? Do you see headlines every winter warning of the dangers of “Holiday Heart Syndrome” and find yourself wondering if the stress and indulgence of the holidays can actually cause a specific heart disease? MedShadow explains everything you need to know about the conditions, their treatments, and the side effects of drugs used to treat heart disease. How the Heart Organ Works What Is Heart Disease? Heart disease is any condition that affects the way your heart functions. Heart disease can be structural, for example, a birth…

Most of PrEP’s side effects are relatively mild and dissipate within a few months. However, these drugs can come with rare but serious risks.

Last year, Ankit set sail on a cruise to Alaska. He boarded the boat full of excitement and spent the first afternoon and evening playing volleyball, gorging on dinner, and playing trivia at the bar. The next morning, however, he hardly made it out of the room.  Traveling through the Pacific Ocean, the ship had hit some rough water. He could barely sit up, let alone walk down the hallway for food or recreation. Dramamine couldn’t stop his nausea. After hours of shifting, he found the one and only way he felt better was if he laid across the bed,…