~Quiz Time~

1. What happens when you are upset or afraid?
a) I often use positive “self-talk” to comfort or calm myself down
b) I often let my emotions take control of me or feel “out of control”

2. What’s your level of confidence?
a) I have a lot of confidence in myself and my ability to handle difficult situations
b) I’m often afraid that I’m not going to be able to handle difficult situations

3. How do you view life?
a) I am optimistic and hopeful about the future
b) I am afraid of what the future holds for me

4. How do you react to change?
a) I embrace change and often welcome it
b) I hate change and often dread it

5. What is your faith like?
a) I have a strong faith in God or a Higher Power
b) I do not believe in God or a Higher Power

6. What is your support network like?
a) I have a lot of friends and family who support me
b) I don’t have much support from others









If you answered b for any of the questions, you may be more vulnerable to stress.




Quiz taken from: http://www.hisprostatecancer.com/stress-3.html

How do we deal with stress?

There are three broad methods you can follow to treat stress, they include self-help, self management, and medication. Self help for treating stress ·         Exercise more often as exercise has been proven to have a beneficial effect on your mental and physical state. ·         Cut down on consuming alcohol and drugs and if your consumption of coffee and other drinks which contain caffeine is high, cut down on it too ·         Eat plenty of fruit and vegetables as that you will have a healthy and balanced diet ·         Make sure you have time every day to relax for a while by yourself to calm down ·         Every day, try to do a few breathing exercises to slow down your system and help you relax ·         Express your thoughts or worries to your family or friends ·         Mediation, massage or yoga have been known to help people with stress ·         If your stress gets very bad, you should go and consult a doctor so he can advise you on what to do   Stress management techniques Stress management can help you to... ü  remove or change the source of the stress ü  alter the way you view stressful events ü   lower the impact that stress might have on your body ü  teach you alternative ways of coping with stress You can find out some stress management techniques when you read self-help books or attend a stress management course. You can also seek the help of a counselor or psychotherapist for therapy sessions. Many therapies which help you relax, such as aromatherapy or reflexology, may have beneficial effects.   Medicines Doctors will not usually prescribe medications for coping with stress, unless you have an underlying illness (eg. depression or some type of anxiety). Remember that there is a risk that all the medication will do is mask the stress, and not help you deal and cope with it. Source: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/145855.php

Why do we feel stressed???

What is stress?

Stress is a physical response to situations that would make you feel threatened or upset your balance. When you sense danger, be it real or imagined, a process known as stress response kicks in.

The stress response is the body’s way of protecting you. When it works properly, it can help you stay focused, energetic and alert. In emergency situations, stress can save your life by giving you extra strength to defend yourself or gives you the impulse to slam on the brakes of your car to avoid an accident.

The stress response also helps you rise to meet challenges. Stress is what keeps you on your feet during a presentation at work or keeps you going when you are studying for an exam and you feel like watching television.

Despite of the benefits of stress, beyond a certain point, it stops being helpful and starts causing great damage to your health, mood, productivity, relationships and quality of life.

The Body’s Stress Response

When you sense a threat, your nervous system responds by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol. These hormones 'wake' the body for emergency action.
Your heart will pound faster, your muscles will tighten, your blood pressure will rise, your breath will quicken and your senses will become sharper. These physical changes increase your strength and stamina, speed your reaction time, and enhance your focus.


Source: http://www.helpguide.org/mental/stress_signs.htm

Pain~

Here is a video about what happens in your body when you feel pain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Source: YouTube

Why do we feel pain?

Here are some questions that you may ask when you experience pain:

    Þ            Why do people feel physical pain?

     Þ            How does it even work?

     Þ            Does everybody feel pain the same way?

 As much as we hate the feeling of pain, it actually does play an important role in our lives.

 
Without it, we would not be able to sense an injury, and we would be in danger of harming ourselves even further.

Here is a more detailed explanation about pain, why we feel it and why and how our body reacts to it.

 

Pain is an evolved defence mechanism that alerts us to an injury, hence allowing us to protect our bodies and not damage ourselves any further.

 

Anyone who has accidently put their hand on a hot stove knows that the instinct to pull away from the hot stove is as overwhelming as it is quick. This is known as your pain reflex.

Pain comes in all shapes and sizes — and intensities.

 

What are the different forms of pain?

 
The most common form of pain is what's called nociceptive pain. It is typically the result of a physical injury. When you stub your toe, burn yourself or experience a cut, you are activating the nociceptive pain receptors.

Another classification of pain is neuropathic pain. It is caused by damage to any part of the nervous system. It is due to this sort of injury that you experience sensations like tingling, electrical shocks or pins and needles. It is also the same pain you feel when you hit your funny bone.

In addition to these two forms of pain, other forms of pain include psychosomatic pain, breakthrough pain, incident pain, pain asymbolia and insensitivity.

 

How does pain work?

There are essentially four mechanisms that make pain work: Our nerve fibres, pain receptors, the spinal column and the brain.

Our bodies are equipped with different sensory nerve fibres that can respond to different physical stimuli like a person's touch or running water. Depending on the extent of the physical contact, our nerve fibres will produce different chemical responses that will influence how the sensations are interpreted.

When we physically hurt ourselves, we activate nociceptive pain receptors. These nerve fibres' only function is to set the alarm for the pain receptors. The nociceptive pain receptors are engaged, for example, when we accidentally kick a table leg.

Once engaged, the nociceptive pain receptors send impulses through the nerve into the spinal cord. After this, the signals make their way to the brain. This all happens within less than a second. These impulses move through our bodies at a rate of about one meter per second.

"Once the pain signal reaches the brain it heads directly for the thalamus, which in turn dispatches it to other areas for ongoing neurological and conscious interpretation. For example, the cortex is responsible for figuring out where the pain came from, and how it compares to other kinds of pain. The thalamus, in addition to acting as a messenger, also facilitates an emotional response — which can result in anger, frustration — or even crying."

 

How you feel pain can be influenced by a number of circumstances, including mood, fears, expectations, past experiences, etc.

 

For more information, you can check out these websites below:

http://pain.about.com/od/whatischronicpain/a/feeling_pain.htm

 

http://www.thepaincenter.com/why-do-we-feel-pain-and-why-does-our-body-react-to-it.html

 

http://kidshealth.org/kid/talk/qa/pain.html

 

 

 

Source: http://io9.com/5946522/why-do-we-experience-physical-pain

When we touch something hot or cold

When you touch a hot object: what will you most likely do? You would probably drop it immediately or move your hand away from the source. What if it was something cold? That would probably send some chills down your spine. 

This is, again, because of your nervous system. You react so fast, that you don't even think about it happening. The nerve sends a impulse from the burning area to the burning spine. The sensory neurons enter the dorsal part of the spinal cord cell via the dorsal root of the spinal nerve. The cell bodies of these sensory neurons are located in a dorsal-root ganglion that lies just outside the spinal cord near its dorsal side. The axons of the sensory neurons then enter the spinal cord and synapse with inter neurons within the gray matter of the spinal cord. The inter neurons in turn synapse with motor neurons, the axons of which exit the cord ventrally via the ventral root, and conduct information to the muscles. In this reflex, a strong signal from the appropriate sensory cells both fires the flexor muscles and inhibits the motor neurons to the extensor muscles, and the hand is pulled back.. This crucial motor response is well under way before the signals responsible for the conscious sensation of pain (which exit the reflex pathway in the spinal cord) ever reach the brain.

Here's a tip when you touch something hot:

You know the feeling - you accidentally or unwittingly touch something which is very hot and the tip of your finger 'lights up' with an intense stinging pain. The moment you get burned, touch the tip of the offended finger to your ear-lobe. You will find that if you do this quickly enough, the stinging will go away almost instantaneously and there'll be no lasting pain or damage!

When your finger tip touches something hot, kinetic energy is transferred to your finger tip which is poorly conductive. It will, therefore, linger there for a few moments and the immediate pain you feel is that energy firing off pain receptors.

What happens when you touch your ear lobe? Well, have you ever noticed that your ear lobes always feel slightly cooler than the rest of you? That's because the fatty tissue and cartilage in there is a particularly good conductor of heat. So good in fact that if you can manage to make your reflexive response to the pain in your finger tip be to quickly touch that finger to your lobe, the laws of thermo dynamics mean that the heat will be conducted away very quickly, due to the conductivity differential between finger tip and ear lobe, stopping those pain receptors from firing, and even preventing the destruction of healthy cells by heat which would have otherwise lingered in your poorly conductive finger tip for several moments longer!

So, the next time you catch a finger in a flame, touch a hot pan on the stove, you know what to do - just whip that finger STRAIGHT to your ear lobe!

Sources: http://www.biog1105-1106.org/demos/105/unit9/media/reflexarc.pdf

             http://www.tipking.co.uk/tip/6016.html

How does your brain contribute in your nervous system?

How nervous system diseases can impact you

The nervous system is a very important system in your body and plays a huge part in your life. Your nervous system helps you to walk, talk, read, breath, digest food, pump blood and perspire. The nervous system makes this all happen. This system controls all of the different adaptations people need to make in response to their environment, such as sweating on a hot day or concentrating attention during a particularly difficult lecture. "Without the nervous system and its conductor, the brain, people would not experience joy at seeing an old friend or automatically pull their hand away from a hot stove."

Here are some of the common nervous system diseases and how they will affect you.

Bell's Palsy

This disease will lead to the paralysis of the facial nerve, weakness of the muscles of one side of the face and may also result in inability to close your eyes. In some cases, your hearing may also be affected and this will lead to you hearing sounds which seem to be abnormally loud. The loss of taste sensation may also occur.

 

Cerebral Palsy

This disease will affect your sensation, leading to a lack of balance and intelligence, posture and speech are frequently weakened. "Contractures of the limbs may cause fixed abnormalities. Other associated features include epilepsy, visual impairment, squint, reduced hearing and behavioural problems."

 

Motor Neurone Disease

This disease mainly affects the cells of the front horn of the spinal cord, "the motor nuclei in the brainstem, and the corticospinal fibres."

 

Multiple Sclerosis

This disease affects different parts of the brain and spinal cord, resulting in scattered symptoms.

These can include:

·      Ataxia, which leads to unsteady walk and shaky movement of the limbs

·      Nystagmus, which leads to rapid uncontrolled movements of the eyes

·      Dysarthria, which leads to deficiency in speech pronunciation

·      Inflammation of the optic nerve

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME)

This disease can lead to extreme disabling fatigue that can last for at least six months and can be made worse by physical or mental exertion. This cannot be resolved with bed rest.

The fatigue is accompanied by at least some of the following: muscle pain or weakness, poor co-ordination, joint pain, sore throat, slight fever, painful lymph nodes in the neck and armpit, depression or the inability to concentrate.

Neuralgia

This disease may lead to a severe burning or stabbing pain.

 

Neuritis

This disease can lead to inflammation of the nerves, which can be very painful.

 

Parkinson's Disease

Parkinson's disease is a disorder of the brain. Nerve cells use a brain chemical called dopamine to help control muscle movement. Parkinson's disease occurs when the nerve cells in the brain that make dopamine are slowly destroyed. This disease will result in tremor, rigidity and poverty of impulsive movements. The most common symptom is tremor, which often affects your hand, spreading, first, to the leg on the same side and then to the other limbs. It is most profound in resting limbs, which interferes with actions such as holding a cup. The person affected will have an expressionless face, an monotone voice, an increasing tendency to bend forward and a shuffling walk.

 

Sciatica

This disease may cause pain which can be felt down the back and outer side of the thigh, leg and foot. Your back may also feel stiff and painful. There may also be numbness and weakness in your leg.

 

Alzheimer’s

 

Alzheimer’s disease is an irreversible, progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and thinking skills, and eventually even the ability to carry out the simplest tasks. The first symptoms are often mistakenly attributed to ageing or stress. Memory problems are typically one of the first warning signs of cognitive loss, possibly due to the development of Alzheimer’s disease. As the disease spreads, symptoms like taking longer to complete normal daily tasks, using poor judgment, and having some mood and personality changes will appear. If the spreading of the disease continues, the person may be in bed most or all of the time as the body shuts down.

 

Encephalitis

Encephalitis is an inflammation of the brain. It is usually caused by a foreign substance or a viral infection. When most people catch the viral encephalitis have either no symptoms or mild flu-like symptoms, such as headaches, fever, aches in muscles or joints and fatigue or weakness. Exposure to the viruses may have occurred through breathing in respiratory droplets from an infected person, contaminated food or drink, mosquito, tick, and other insect bites or skin contact. Permanent brain damage may occur in severe cases of encephalitis. It can affect hearing, memory, muscle control, sensation, speech and vision.

Meningitis

Meningitis is an inflammation of the meninges (membranes) of the brain and spinal cord. It is most often caused by a bacterial or viral infection. Fever, vomiting, and a stiff neck are all symptoms of meningitis. Most people who get meningitis survive, often without any after effects, but sometimes these diseases cause a range of disabilities and problems that can alter people's lives. After effects may be temporary or permanent, physical or emotional. The after effects are memory loss, co-ordination problems, residual headaches, deafness, learning difficulties, seizures, paralysis or spasms of part of body, speech problems, loss of sight.

 

Some of the common symptoms of nervous system diseases are... 

 

Hearing loss or ringing in your ears

Vision loss or vision side effects

Speech difficulties

Changes in taste and smell

Problems with balance, dizziness, vertigo and nausea

Problems with coordination and movement

General weakness that causes an overall lack of strength

Paralysis of different parts of the body

Seizures

Changes in the functioning of organs

Sources:
http://www.humanillnesses.com/Behavioral-Health-A-Br/The-Brain-and-Nervous-System.html
http://www.ivy-rose.co.uk/HumanBody/Nerves/Nervous_Disorders.php
http://www.cancer.net/all-about-cancer/treating-cancer/managing-side-effects/nervous-system-side-effects

How does the Nervous System work?

TRANSMISSION OF NERVE IMPULSES

The human nervous system contains billions of nerve cells and about 86 billion of them are found in the brain alone. Each neuron has a cell body, from where numerous branch-like projections emerge, which are known as dendrites. The dendrites usually look like the branches of a tree. At the opposite end of the cell body, a long, slender projection can be found, which is known as axon. The dendrites pick up impulses in the form of electrical signals from other neurons, which are then passed down the axon to another neuron or cell.

The axons of most of the neurons are covered by a myelin sheath, which insulates the nerve cells and speeds up the transmission of nerve impulses. Some axons can travel up to one meter or more in human body, before branching off at the end. The branches arising from an axon are slightly swollen at the tip, and these swollen tips are known as, synaptic knobs or terminal button. For transmitting impulses, neurons form a specialized structure called synapse, with other neurons and cells of the body. A synapse typically serves as the junction, where impulses or information can flow from one neuron to another.

There are three elements of a synapse, a presynaptic membrane of the signal-passing neuron (which can be usually found in the synaptic knob of an axon), the postsynaptic membrane located in a dendrite or a target cell, and a synaptic cleft, which is the space between the presynaptic and the post synaptic membranes. There are primarily two types of synapses, chemical synapses and electrical synapses, and both of them vary in the way they send impulses from one neuron to another.

Chemical Synapse:

In a chemical synapse, the transmission of nerve impulses takes place with the help of neurotransmitters. In its resting state, a neuron maintains a small voltage difference across its membrane. The inside of the membrane is negatively charged, while the electrical charge outside the membrane is positive, when the neuron is not stimulated by any impulse. This difference in electrical potential or voltage, between the inside and outside of a cell is known as, membrane potential.

When an impulse reaches the synapse of a presynaptic neuron, it changes the membrane potential of the neuron, which causes calcium channels in the presynaptic membrane to open. The opening of these channels allows calcium ions to enter through the presynaptic membrane and thus, increase the concentration of these ions in the cytoplasm. This induces the synaptic vesicles to fuse with the plasma membrane of the presynaptic neuron, and release neurotransmitter molecules into the synaptic cleft. The neurotransmitter molecules then diffuse and float across the synaptic cleft, to bind to the receptors embedded in the plasma membrane of the postsynaptic cell or neuron.

The process of binding neurotransmitters to the receptors, triggers an electrical response in the postsynaptic neuron and changes its membrane potential, which carry the impulse forward until it reaches its destination. Some neurotransmitters can excite the postsynaptic neuron, while others can inhibit its activity. The neurotransmitter molecules get removed from the receptors due to thermal shaking. They are either broken down, or reabsorbed by the presynaptic cell.

Electrical Synapse:

In electrical synapses, the impulses are transferred from one neuron to another neuron or cell, through a specialized intercellular connection, known as gap junction. Here, a direct connection is established between the cytoplasm of the two cells, so that various ions and molecules can travel easily from one cell to another. Nerve impulses can also flow from one neuron to another through the gap junction. Basically, the process begins when an impulse travels along the presynaptic cell and causes voltage changes in that cell. This allows the charged ions to travel through the gap junction and induce voltage changes in the postsynaptic cell, and thus, carry the nerve impulses.

Sources:
www.buzzle.com/articles/how-does-the-nervous-system-work.html

science.howstuffworks.com/life/human-biology/nerve.htm

^-^

The Division Of The Nervous System

Video Time!!!

Here is a video which explains some things about your nervous system. Hope you will enjoy it :)

 

 

 

Source: Youtube

Hope you found the information in the last post useful! We will try to post more things up soon :)))

What is the nervous system?

The Nervous System

The nervous system is a complicated network of nerves and cells that carry messages to and for from the brain and spinal cord to all the other parts of the body.

The nervous system includes:

1. Central nervous system --- made up of the brain and spinal cord

2. Peripheral nervous system --- made up of the Somatic and the Autonomic nervous systems

 

The Central Nervous System

The central nervous system is divided into two major parts, the brain and the spinal cord.

The Brain

The brain lies within the skull and is shaped like a mushroom.  The brain consists of four important parts, which are the brain stem, the cerebrum, the cerebellum and the diencephalon.

The brain has nerve cells called the neurons.

The brain also has supporting cells called the glia.

There are two types of matter in the brain:  grey matter and white matter. 

Grey matter receives and stores impulses.  Cell bodies of neurons and neuroglia are in the grey matter. 

White matter in the brain carries impulses to and from grey matter.  It consists of the nerve fibers.

The Spinal Cord

The spinal cord is a long, tube-like structure which extends from the brain downwards. The spinal cord is composed of a series of 31 segments.  A pair of spinal nerves comes out of each segment.  The area of the spinal cord from which a pair of spinal nerves originates is called the spinal segment.  Both motor and sensory nerves are located in the spinal cord.

The spinal cord is about 43 cm long in adult women and 45 cm long in adult men.

It lies within the backbone.

 

The Peripheral Nervous System

The Peripheral nervous system is made up of two parts, the Somatic nervous system and the Autonomic nervous system.

 

Somatic Nervous System

The somatic nervous system consists of peripheral nerve fibres that pick up sensory information or sensations from the peripheral or distant organs and carry them to the central nervous system.

These also consist of motor nerve fibres that come out of the brain and take the messages for movement and necessary action to the skeletal muscles.

For example, when you touch a hot object, the sensory nerves carry information about the heat to the brain, which in turn, through the motor nerves, tells the muscles of the hand to withdraw immediately.

The whole process takes less than a second to happen. The cell body of the neuron that carries the information often lies within the brain or spinal cord and projects directly to a skeletal muscle.

 

Autonomic Nervous System

The autonomic nervous system has three parts, which are the sympathetic nervous system, the parasympathetic nervous system and the enteric nervous system.

This nervous system controls the nerves of the inner organs of the body in which humans have no conscious control. This includes the heartbeat, digestion, breathing, etc. 

The nerves of the autonomic nervous system weaken the smooth involuntary muscles of the internal organs and glands and cause them to function well and secrete their enzymes.

The Enteric nervous system is the third part of the autonomic nervous system. The enteric nervous system is a complex network of nerve fibres that innervate the organs within the abdomen like the gastrointestinal tract, pancreas, gall bladder, etc. It contains nearly 100 million nerves.

 

Source: http://www.news-medical.net/health/What-is-the-Nervous-System.aspx

Introduction

Hey everyone! We created this website to tell you more about the nervous system and how and why we do certain things. Hope you will enjoy all the information. :)