Hey guys, welcome to another Paragraph of Responding to Comments. Only casual, am I the sole male viewer of this channel? No, you're not, actually let's do this right now, I'm gonna do this live. I'm going to My Analytics and I'm gonna find out in the last 28 days what the, it's 59% female and 41% male, but the reason why you may think that is because males are probably less likely to engage in the comments. Why does Advil not work for me but Tylenol does? Diane, I have no idea. I do tell my patients to experiment with both, if they're both acceptable, so if one works better than the other. Sarah Amaladoss, what are some good ways to clear soft ears? Like when you're on the plane and your ears get clogged? Something that I do that's very simple is chew on a piece of gum. That motion of your jaw can open up your Eustachian tube and that can allow free flowing of air, which allows your ears to feel less clogged, I think that's a great way of doing that. Also drinking some water for an extended period of time so like slow chugs can also open up the Eustachian tube as well. Should I be worried and see a doctor if at random times, different limbs start to go numb every so often? It happens especially when I'm laying down in bed. Monica, that sounds like a very unique symptom. When things are going numb in your body, two things are happening. Most likely something's happening with the nerves. So is there pressure being put on the nerves that's causing them to malfunction and causing you to feel numbness? Also it could be a lack of blood flow, for example, if you cut off the circulation to your fingers, your fingers can go numb. Which one of those two things can be happening to you is an important question. It can be answered only through a thorough history, a thorough physical exam and again, maybe some tests or labs that need to be ordered. Go see your doctor. Nate Davis it's not safe to wear two watches. Sometimes I wear a Fitbit and a watch. I know the Fitbit tells the time, but I'm old school, I like to wear a classic watch. I know this isn't an example of a classic watch and guess what it is safe to wear two watches. Doctor approved. I wonder if I can get sued for that. What is your opinion on pre workout supplements. Noremac, great question. When I was in the beginning of my weightlifting journey, I was very passionate about it, I was taking Creatine, I was taking protein, I was monitoring my intake of carbs, I actually got to the point where I was like 218 pounds, but very low body fat. I was in really good shape. As far as pre workouts go, I am not a fan. And it's really for two reasons. There's a ton of caffeine in these things. Caffeine and sugar, usually those are the two ingredients that I don't like in there. If you're gonna have something to boost your energy level, might as well have a cup of coffee. Why have artificial caffeine put into this chemical blend of God knows what? You and I hopefully both now know that supplements are not regulated by the FDA. All of these blends that you see in the ingredients labels, you have no idea what that blend is. It's all sorts of chemicals. If you want an energy boost, drink some green tea, have a cup of coffee, no need to go for a chemical mixture of a pre workout. Kaylor Andrews hey doctor Mike, I was wondering what are the white dots on fingernails, I've heard lots of different reasons as to why. Leukonychia, specifically punctate Leukonychia is white dots on nails and specifically white dots that when you press on your nail bed they don't disappear. A lot of times this happens as a result of trauma, like you bang your nail and you get a little white spot on it. If you have a lot of these and on multiple fingers, even if as far as you find lines on your nails, that's something you should bring up to your doctor, especially if they're new or enlarging or increasing in number, because the state of your nails tell a great story about the status of your health. Those who have immune problems, pulmonary problems, cardiac problems, we see certain signs inside fingernails that can give us and point us as to where we should look inside their body. Every good doctor looks at patients' nails when we're doing a physical exam. I love coffee, I've been drinking a cup a day since high school, but recently I've been getting anxious and my heart gets shaky. Could that be from coffee consumption? If so, why has it never affected me before? Thanks. Alyssa, great question, I generally discourage those in high school from ingesting caffeine, just cause like you have so much energy as is, taking more through caffeine is just not great, you're gonna build up a tolerance early on. Shakiness and anxious, could that be as a result of your caffeine intake? It's possible, could there be something else happening in your body? I'll use an example and I'm not saying this is happening to you. If your body is producing too much tyroid hormone and your drinking coffee, now you have two things that are increasing your heart's output which makes it feel like your heart's racing, it can increase your anxiety, all sorts of symptoms, but the only way we can figure out if it's the tyroid that's happening, if it's something else, if it's just the caffeine is to rule it out by asking you questions. When does it happen, how often does it happen, what other associated symptoms are going on? Then doing a physical exam, listening to your heart, seeing if there is a murmur, seeing if your heart's beating normally, go see your doctor, find out if it's just the caffeine, if you need to reduce the amount that you're having. Generally we say below 400 milligrams, you shouldn't be having too many side effects with caffeine. Nowadays, with Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts loading up the caffeine content. I've seen some patients drink a large coffee with three espressos in it that equals like six, 700 milligrams of caffeine on one drink. Everyday when I wake up my throat hurts. So what do I do? I have cough drops and I take them but the pain comes back every morning. By the way, I'm not sick and I'm not catching a cold. This has been happening every morning for about a year now. Emma, I can't diagnose people through the YouTube channel because I need to ask questions I need to do a physical exam I may need to order lab work, maybe do some kind of culture, to see what bacteria's around, but I'll talk about my past experiences. I've had a lot of patients come in with the misconception that they have some sort of bug, whether that's viral or bacterial, it doesn't matter for this explanation. The reason they think that is cause they have a sore throat just like you're saying for an extended period of time. So I ask a bunch of questions and what we end up finding out is that they have post-nasal drip, which means that you have excess mucus production from the posterior part of your nose that at night, especially when you're lying down drips onto the back of your throat, your pharynx and it causes soreness, because that mucus is irritating the back of your throat. Another thing that could be going on is something called LPR, laryngopharyngeal reflux. I know that's a mouthful, but all that is is it's traditional heartburn acid reflux, the acid from your stomach going up, but it's not causing you burning here. To cause burning here it takes a substantial amount of acid but now if a small amount of acid touches the back of your throat that can cause damage that can last many weeks and if you're eating citrusy foods or you're consistently getting this acid in there, you're causing repetitive damage and that can cause a chronic sore throat. Every once in a great while I feel a sharp pain in my chest or my side when I breath in which causes shortness of breath for like two minutes. Is this normal? Jaybirdie, this doesn't sound normal. Any time you're feeling symptoms in your chest or your lungs that induce shortness of breath, that should be checked out. I don't know your age, but odds are you're probably young and you don't have heart disease, but even though something has a lower likelihood of occurring in your age group, if that one thing can be very dangerous to your health, like a heart attach, you wanna catch early. My thoughts if I had to venture and guess and this is not a medical opinion, my medical opinion is that you should see your doctor, but somethings that could be going on is that you can have a muscle cramp within the inner coastal muscles, which is the muscles in between your ribs and when you get that sort of spasm in there it can make it heard to breathe 'cause you can't take a deep breath and maybe that's what you're feeling. Also I've heard of people having a diaphragm cramp which is that large muscle immediately below your lungs that you can also have a cramp or some kind of pain in and that can also make it difficult for you to breathe. In the past few months I've gotten this annoying headache on the lower back left side of my head. The pain stays there but also radiates down my neck sometimes. I also get headaches frequently all over my forehead and back of my head, should I go to the doctor to have this checked out? Riley to answer your question very simply, yes. A headache that's that severe or that chronic, meaning it's going on for a long period of time should be evaluated by a doctor. Does that mean that there's something worrisome going on? Not necessarily. There are some red flags that we look for in patients who have headaches and don't panic if you have some of these. These are just some red flags. A, you wake up with a headache. B, you have a headache with physical exertion or sexual activity. C, you get headaches after you eat food. D, you have a headache that causes neurological symptoms. Numbness of your face, bad vision and this can happen with migraines, but it is a red flag that we look at. The final one I guess would be that you have a headache that's very severe that's been ongoing for an extended period of time. Now I now that's not complete, I know I only gave you some red flags, but I think I answered your question, go see your doctor. Please keep it going, smash the like button, hit the subscribe button and the notification bell As always, stay happy and healthy.
