Sparks & Favor PC

As some of my patients know, I began my professional life as a registered pharmacist. Caring for women in my ob-gyn practice, I still answer many questions about substances available without a prescription that some people believe are medicines. Have you heard about these dietary supplements?

Acidophilus
Echinacea
Ginger
Glucosamine and/or Chonodroitin Sulphate
Omega-3 Fatty Acids  (from fish oil)
St. John’s Wort
Saw Palmetto

They are a few of the many that Americans buy and consume trying to stay healthy. In fact, the National Center for Health Statistics tells us that more than half of us…

Perhaps you have heard about a new medical technology commonly called robotic surgery.  Maybe you saw the strange machine with its mechanical arms on Good Morning America or elsewhere in the media. Did you wonder whether robotic surgery is really a surgical breakthrough or just the latest expensive gadget driving up healthcare cost? Let me say that in over three decades of providing surgery for gynecologic problems, I have not witnessed such an improvement in what we can offer our patients…

2012 has been the worst year for whooping cough (also called pertussis) in the U.S. since the mid-1950s. The illness is especially dangerous for babies and young children and can even cause death, especially in infants under 1 year. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), about half of infants under 1 year who get whooping cough will need to be hospitalized…

You may have heard in recent news celebrity Sharon Osbourne’s discussion of her breast cancer risk and her decision to undergo surgery. How did she and her doctor come to this decision?  Ms. Osbourne, judge on America’s Got Talent and wife of Ozzy Osbourne, announced that she carries a gene that is known to significantly increase her breast and ovarian cancer risk.

Although most breast and ovarian cancers are sporadic—meaning they do not appear to be hereditary—women who carry genes known as BRCA1 and BRCA2 have a much greater risk of developing these cancers…