Blood cells travel through the circulatory system suspended in a yellowish fluid called plasma. Plasma is 90% water and contains nutrients, proteins, hormones, and waste products. Whole blood is a mixture of blood cells and plasma.

Situs inversus is a condition in which the arrangement of the internal organs is a mirror image of normal anatomy. It can occur alone (isolated, with no other abnormalities or conditions) or it can occur as part of a syndrome with various other defects. Congenital heart defects are present in about 5-10% of affected people. The underlying cause and genetics of situs inversus are complex. Familial cases have been reported.[1][2]

There's only one group of people who really know what happens when you die: the dead. And since the dead won't be revealing their secrets anytime soon, it's up to scientists to explain what happens when a person dies. Death, just like life, is a process, scientists say. The first stage of this process is known as clinical death. It lasts from four to six minutes, beginning when a person stops breathing and the heart stops pumping blood. During this time, there may be enough oxygen in the brain that no permanent brain damage occurs. Other organs, such as the kidneys and eyes, also remain alive throughout clinical death.

Vitamin E is an antioxidant. It may help protect your cells from damage. This essential nutrient occurs naturally in many foods. It’s also available as a dietary supplement. Sometimes, it’s in processed foods. Vitamin E is fat-soluble. This means your body stores and uses it as needed. The term “vitamin E” describes eight different compounds. Alpha-tocopherol is the most active one in humans

Function. Vitamin A helps form and maintain healthy skin, teeth, skeletal and soft tissue, mucus membranes, and skin. It is also known as retinol because it produces the pigments in the retina of the eye. Vitamin A promotes good vision, especially in low light. Vitamin deficiency anemia occurs when your body doesn't have enough of the vitamins needed to produce adequate numbers of healthy red blood cells. Red blood cells carry oxygen from your lungs throughout your body. If your diet is lacking in certain vitamins, vitamin deficiency anemia can develop.

Zinc deficiency symptoms include growth and development problems, hair loss, diarrhea, impotence, eye and skin conditions, and loss of appetite. Other symptoms may include weight loss, delayed wound healing, taste changes, and mental slowness.

Amyloidosis (am-uh-loi-DO-sis) is a rare disease that occurs when a substance called amyloid builds up in your organs. Amyloid is an abnormal protein that is usually produced in your bone marrow and can be deposited in any tissue or organ. Amyloidosis can affect different organs in different people, and there are different types of amyloid. Amyloidosis frequently affects the heart, kidneys, liver, spleen, nervous system and digestive tract. Severe amyloidosis can lead to life-threatening organ failure.

Adult stem cells are cells from your own body that can renew themselves and turn into other cells (differentiate). They live inside all of us in various tissues, poised to leap into action to repair damage as it occurs. As we age or have big injuries, we may not be able to recruit enough of these cells to the site to fully repair the area. Regenexx Stem Cell Procedures help overcome this problem by extracting stem cells from an area of high volume, then concentrating the cells and reinjecting them into the damaged area to help the body heal naturally.

Stem-cell therapy is the use of stem cells to treat or prevent a disease or condition. Bone marrow transplant is the most widely used stem-cell therapy, but some therapies derived from umbilical cord blood are also in use...

What is myositis? Myositis means muscle inflammation, and can be caused by infection, injury, certain medicines, exercise, and chronic disease. Some of the chronic, or persistent, forms are idiopathic inflammatory myopathies, and those are the diseases we discuss here. "Idiopathic" means that the cause is unknown.

Scleroderma (skleer-oh-DUR-muh) is a group of rare diseases that involve the hardening and tightening of the skin and connective tissues — the fibers that provide the framework and support for your body. In some people, scleroderma affects only the skin. But in many people, scleroderma also harms structures beyond the skin — such as blood vessels, internal organs and the digestive tract. Signs and symptoms vary, depending on which structures are affected. Scleroderma affects women more often than men and most commonly occurs between the ages of 30 and 50. While there is no cure for scleroderma, a variety of treatments can ease symptoms and improve quality of life.

Your body's immune system protects you from disease and infection. But if you have an autoimmune disease, your immune system attacks healthy cells in your body by mistake. Autoimmune diseases can affect many parts of the body. No one is sure what causes autoimmune diseases. They do tend to run in families. Women - particularly African-American, Hispanic-American, and Native-American women - have a higher risk for some autoimmune diseases. There are more than 80 types of autoimmune diseases, and some have similar symptoms. This makes it hard for your health care provider to know if you really have one of these diseases, and if so, which one. Getting a diagnosis can be frustrating and stressful. Often, the first symptoms are fatigue, muscle aches and a low fever. The classic sign of an autoimmune disease is inflammation, which can cause redness, heat, pain and swelling. The diseases may also have flare-ups, when they get worse, and remissions, when symptoms get better or disappear. Treatment depends on the disease, but in most cases one important goal is to reduce inflammation. Sometimes doctors prescribe corticosteroids or other drugs that reduce your immune response.

HIV stands for human immunodeficiency virus. If left untreated, HIV can lead to the disease AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome). Unlike some other viruses, the human body can’t get rid of HIV completely. So once you have HIV, you have it for life. HIV attacks the body’s immune system, specifically the CD4 cells (T cells), which help the immune system fight off infections. If left untreated, HIV reduces the number of CD4 cells (T cells) in the body, making the person more likely to get infections or infection-related cancers. Over time, HIV can destroy so many of these cells that the body can’t fight off infections and disease. These opportunistic infections or cancers take advantage of a very weak immune system and signal that the person has AIDS, the last state of HIV infection. No effective cure for HIV currently exists, but with proper treatment and medical care, HIV can be controlled. The medicine used to treat HIV is called antiretroviral therapy or ART. If taken the right way, every day, this medicine can dramatically prolong the lives of many people with HIV, keep them healthy, and greatly lower their chance of transmitting the virus to others. Today, a person who is diagnosed with HIV, treated before the disease is far advanced, and stays on treatment can live a nearly as long as someone who does not have HIV.

If You Eat 2 Bananas Per Day For A Month, This Is What Happens To Your Body

Overweight does not necessarily equal unhealthy. There are actually plenty of overweight people who are in excellent health (1). Conversely, many normal weight people have the metabolic problems associated with obesity (2). That’s because the fat under the skin is actually not that big of a problem (at least not from a health standpoint, it’s more of a cosmetic problem). It’s the fat in the abdominal cavity, the belly fat, that causes the biggest issues (3). If you have a lot of excess fat around your waistline, even if you’re not very heavy, then you should take some steps to get rid of it. Belly fat is usually estimated by measuring the circumference around your waist. This can easily be done at home with a simple tape measure. Anything above 40 inches (102 cm) in men and 35 inches (88 cm) in women, is known as abdominal obesity. There are actually a few proven strategies that have been shown to target the fat in the belly area more than other areas of the body.

New flu vaccines are released every year to keep up with rapidly adapting flu viruses. Because flu viruses evolve so quickly, last year's vaccine may not protect you from this year's viruses. After vaccination, your immune system produces antibodies that will protect you from the vaccine viruses.

There are currently 2 types of pneumococcal vaccines: pneumococcal conjugate vaccine (PCV13 or Prevnar 13®) and pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccine (PPSV23 or Pneumovax®). PCV13 is recommended for all children younger than 5 years old, all adults 65 years or older, and people 6 years or older with certain risk factors.

Valvular stenosis occurs when one or more heart valves are narrowed, stiffened, thickened or blocked. A variety of treatment options are available for this disorder. Learn more about the treatments on: bit.ly/2g6Mh8f

Varicose veins are caused by weakened valves and veins in your legs. Normally, one-way valves in your veins keep blood flowing from your legs up toward your heart. When these valves do not work as they should, blood collects in your legs, and pressure builds up. The veins become weak, large, and twisted.

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