Curio Cabinet

Did you lose your senses during the pandemic? Many people who came down with COVID-19 in recent years are still struggling with the loss of their sense of smell, but a new treatment from Jefferson Health in Philadelphia might be able to bring their smellers into tip-top shape again. Although most people walk away from a bout of COVID without long-term effects, some unlucky folks suffer from post-COVID parosmia. Parosmia is a distorted sense of smell caused by malfunctioning smell receptors in the nose. These receptors fail to send the proper chemical signals to the brain. In some cases, parosmia can cause the sufferer to perceive pleasant smells as unpleasant, in others, it can reduce their ability to smell in general. The condition can be caused by a variety of issues, including chronic sinusitis and, of course, upper respiratory infections.
 
But there's hope for those suffering post-COVID parosmia: a treatment called a stellate ganglion block. The procedure is non-invasive and takes only 10 minutes or so. It’s performed by injecting an anesthetic into the stellate ganglia, located on the sides of the neck. Previously, the treatment had been used to thwart cluster headaches, phantom limb pain, and irregular heartbeats. When testing its effectiveness against post-COVID parosmia, researchers added a corticosteroid to deal with any remaining COVID virus that they suspected might be responsible for the long-term condition. When they injected the cocktail of drugs into patients’ necks, the results were surprisingly effective. Of the 58 patients who underwent the procedure, 37 followed up with the researchers. Of those, 22 said they experienced an improvement within a week, and most of the 22 saw significant improvements over the first month. A second injection led to further improvement in those who responded to the first shot, but did nothing for those who didn’t respond the first time around. Still, if you still have a busted nose, it’s worth a shot (or two).

 
[Image description: An illustration of a colorless person smelling a pink flower while blindfolded against a black background.] Credit & copyright: CDD20, Pixabay

As Americans collectively tuck into our Thanksgiving leftovers today, one side dish stands out as the most Thanksgiving-y of all: stuffing. Though it’s rarely enjoyed outside of Turkey Day, stuffing is an undeniably beloved holiday staple. Its history is surprisingly long, predating the concept of Thanksgiving by thousands of years.
 
There are many different kinds of stuffing, but the most popular variety, in modern America, consists of bread chunks, herbs like sage, spices, and finely chopped vegetables like celery and onion. Traditionally, stuffing was used to “stuff” or “fill” the inner cavity of roasted meat dishes, like chicken or turkey. The earliest written stuffing recipe dates all the way back to the first century C.E., to an ancient Roman cookbook titled Apicius de re Coquinaria. This stuffing included vegetables, herbs, and spices, just like our modern version, as well as a grain called spelt, which provided starchiness in place of bread chunks. However, ancient Roman stuffing might not suit modern palettes, as it also included many organ meats like liver and brain. It was also used to stuff some pretty unusual fare, including rabbits, squid, and even rodents called dormice.
 
It wasn’t long before stuffing spread throughout Europe, where it remained popular for centuries and went by many names, like cockentrice, forcemeat, and dressing. When European colonists made their way to North America, they brought their stuffing with them. As colonists in what is now the U.S. moved from sea to shining sea, regional stuffing variations naturally began to pop up, and many still endure today. Many Southern recipes call for cornbread in place of the usual bread chunks, while rice-based recipes are more common in the Midwest. Some coastal variations even call for chopped oysters. As for how it became so heavily associated with Thanksgiving, it could be that stuffing just got swept up in the pomp of it all. After Thanksgiving became a national holiday in 1863, turkeys, which had been a common food in much of the U.S., came to be seen as a more holiday-specific food. A fancy, stuffing-filled Thanksgiving turkey became a sought-after holiday centerpiece, and the idea that it was a food reserved only for holidays seems to have taken hold. Don’t let that stop you, though; stuffing can still be enjoyed any time of year. Maybe hold the dormice, though.

 
[Image description: A white casserole dish full of stuffing.] Credit & copyright: LAWJR, Pixabay

You’ve heard of the gender pay gap, but in the U.S. there’s another, even grimmer gender-based gap. The country’s average life expectancy is the lowest it’s been in decades, having dropped from 78.8 years to 76.1 years between 2019 and 2021 alone, and men are getting the short end of the stick on this one. While it’s common knowledge that women live longer than men on average, the gap has widened into a chasm, with men living about six years fewer. As recently as 2010, the gap was just 4.8 years. The numbers have gotten worse for a few reasons, but chief among them is the impact of COVID-19. The virus tends to result in worse health outcomes for men as compared to women. One reason for this is that men have more comorbidities, or simultaneous medical conditions, that make dealing with the virus harder. Men are more prone to heart disease and diabetes, both of which make them more vulnerable to the virus. Men are also more likely to be incarcerated or homeless, making them more likely to be infected and less likely to receive adequate treatment. Lastly, men are more likely to work in jobs that expose them to the virus, and are less likely to get vaccinated against it. Beyond the virus, there are other factors to consider. Men, it seems, are more likely to die “deaths of despair” from things like suicide and drug or alcohol overdoses. In fact, men are two to three times more likely to die from overdoses than women. Heart disease, which men are more susceptible to, also increases the likelihood of death by overdose. Some potential solutions are already underway, like attempting to improve mental healthcare for men and creating public health campaigns encouraging them to get vaccinated. These things take time, but hopefully not too long; we need to build a bridge over this gap as soon as possible.

 
[Image description: A digital illustration of a heart monitor line with a red, cartoon heart against an orange background.] Credit & copyright: JanBaby, Pixabay