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There has been a lot of attention recently about the amount of radiation to which patients are exposed by medical x-rays. As with most medical procedures, x-rays are safe when used with care — especially because, in most cases, as little radiation as possible is used to obtain the needed results.

I’m often asked by patients how much water they needs to drink each day. The Institute of Medicine has calculated that men need about 13 cups or 3 quarts of liquids and women need about 9 cups or 2 quarts of liquids daily. We also ingest approximately 2 ½ cups, or 20% of our daily intake of liquids from food, especially fruits and vegetables. In addition, beverages that we commonly drink such as coffee, juice, milk and soda are composed mostly of water.

The weather has been oddly cold this summer, and it has caused local grape growers to wait longer than usual to harvest their grapes. Santa Cruz County grapes will most likely be harvested about three weeks behind schedule. If the weather stays good, that won’t be a problem. But there is one guaranteed problem: the European wine moth.

There are some people you meet in life who you know are special right away. Florence Kuo, a registered nurse, was one of these people. I met Kuo many years ago at La Madrona Athletic Club. Not

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In my most recent column, I discussed the topic of rabies, especially what one should do if bitten by a possibly rabid animal. Now, I would like to describe animal bites in general.

The first large northwest swell rolled through Monterey Bay with a vengeance. The buoys were reading 14 feet, and when the swells hit the beaches and local reefs, things got rolled up.

Can we take a moment to talk about the pain in motherhood that some of you may feel?  You might not think of it as pain in the traditional sense.  It’s not the pain of childbirth or of a slow recovery, but it is pain nonetheless.  It’s awful, but it’s also completely unnecessary. 

In Poland, you greet someone by saying “dzien dobry,” which means hello or good day. You hear it at every restaurant and market, and even high on a mountain trail. I had a hard time trying to pronounce the Slavic words with so many consonants, but I used this phrase daily. So began my adventures to visit the gardens and natural landscapes in Poland earlier this month.