Sunday, August 9, 2015

ALS & Advice For Funeral Directors, With Stuart Millheiser

By Jason McDonald


Certain jobs entail higher levels of risk than others. Those who perform manual labor, on a daily basis, are more likely to experience discomfort or injuries than those who take up office jobs with little physical activity to account for. Anyone who has been involved in medical practice or awareness, like Stuart Millheiser, can attest to this. With that said, I think that it would be wise to go over the work of funeral directors, and the connection that it may have to ALS.

According to an article on TIME, it would seem as though funeral directors are at higher risk of developing ALS. The main reason for this is the exposure that these workers have to formaldehyde, which is a natural chemical compound that has a number of uses. These include - but are not limited to - space heaters and smoke for cigarettes. As one can imagine, this compound is quite frequent in the work of funeral directing, according to Stuart Millheiser.

The Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery & Psychiatry published that went into extensive detail about deaths tied to ALS, in tandem with formaldehyde exposure. There was a study that sampled a total of 1.5 million Americans with individual jobs. Of course, you may already imagine that exposure will vary from person to person, since not everyone possesses the same type of employment. Regardless, the results of said study were shown and they were, for lack of a better term, surprising.

The study detailed that funeral directors, who were mostly male, were 4.5 times more likely to pass away due to ALS, than those who worked jobs where formaldehyde exposure was anywhere from low to nonexistent. The reason why most of these deaths involved men was because they found themselves involved in embalming, where various elements were present. Women, in this field, seemed to work at the front desk where interaction was more prevalent. This is useful information, and I am sure that names like Stuart Millheiser can say the same.

It's easy to see that information like this can draw intrigue. After all, ALS has entailed tremendous amount of research, and it is still going to this day. People want to know what makes this condition tick, from the people it impacts to the potential causes which bring it to the surface to begin with. Suffice it to say, details like these are nothing short of informative. The more research that is done, in the long term, the more that we will ultimately learn about ALS.




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