Word: spinal
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...many illnesses are unpredictable, and these can be disastrous. Construction Worker Roland Snyder, 36, a bachelor who lives with his mother in Maryland Heights, Mo., thought that his weight loss and headaches were the result merely of overwork until doctors hospitalized him and learned that he had tuberculous spinal meningitis. The first 13 weeks of treatment cost $13,000. After another five months in a free public hospital, he was moved to a nursing home. His and his mother's insurance benefits were soon exhausted, along with their savings of $1,500. Snyder is now home once more...
Compression fractures are often accompanied by ruptured spinal discs and torn muscles. Victims may spend as long as five months in a torso cast or in traction. Some face a lifetime of continuing pain or disability...
...Just as I finished M* A* S* H, my wife was arrested [on charges involving her support of the Panthers] and now I can't go out of the country, because we have no passport. I had spinal meningitis then. My head was really freaked out. Wasn't at all together...
...last pair of swimmerets on the male are hard, pointed, and hairless). She tells you how to kill them humanely. ("Using a sharp knife or lobster shears, cut straight down 1/2 inch into the back of the lobster, at the point where tail and chest join, thus severing the spinal cord and killing the lobster instantly.") For all who think that that's all there is to it, she adds disconcertingly, "To paralyze all muscle spasms, plunge the lobster head first into ... very hot water for 5 minutes, or until lobster is limp...
...generations, members of Ken Swier's family have discovered in their mid-20s that they were doomed by a lethal legacy. Spinal cerebellar degeneration attacks the central nervous system, first affecting balance and coordination, then impairing speech and finally breathing. The process lasts about 15 years, usually ending in death with pneumonia. The best doctors can do is to prolong the victim's life. They cannot even diagnose the disease before it appears-generally at an age when the patient has already had children. The disease can be passed on only by those actively afflicted; half of their...