![]() Your immune system decides that pollen, for example, is dreadful and must be eliminated at all costs and mounts an attack that leaves you with puffy eyes, a runny nose and a bad case of the sneezies. In some cases, it gets confused and decides that something totally harmless is worthy of note and launches a counteroffensive – this is what happens with most allergies. It doesn’t always work the way it is supposed to. ![]() Your immune system is an amazingly choreographed and intricate machine with dozens of types of cells and hundreds of chemical messengers that allow it to determine what’s you, what’s not you, and what’s potentially trying to kill you. Your immune system stands a post, grabs a gun and keeps all these hazards at bay so you can spend another day looking for just the right pair of jeggings at the Gap. Every minute of every day, viruses are trying to enter your sinuses, bacteria want to creep into your blood stream, and even your own cells decide what the heck – let’s mutate and try and cause cancer. Your immune system keeps you safe and protected from all the zillions of things that try to kill you every day. ![]() ![]() This disease is immune-mediated hemolytic anemia, or IMHA, and I will give you a little insight into its nefarious workings right now. But there is one disease that almost always sends heads spinning and puts a look of blank incomprehension on the faces of pet owners. Most of the diseases that we see and treat in the ER can be pretty easily comprehended by non-medical folks: trauma, infection, cancer – all of these seem to make sense to pet owners when we discuss them. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |