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In Health

What Is Multiple Sclerosis?

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Multiple sclerosis (otherwise referred to as MS) is very much a condition that many people recognise the name of, but fail to understand the meaning of, particularly when it comes to the symptoms and sufferers. In essence, multiple sclerosis involves the sufferer’s own nervous system affecting the way that their nerve impulses work, creating a wide assortment of conditions related to the brain, spinal cord and optic nerves. It is a very complex disease, however, so in this article we take a look at what multiple sclerosis can mean for those experiencing it.

Multiple sclerosis basics

Considering how different a case ca differ from one person to the next, it’s easy to see how the question “what does MS mean” is so difficult to answer in a simple and concise way. This inconsistency is due to each person with multiple sclerosis developing different symptoms due to MS-related scars occurring in different places around the body, and the differences in these locations yield inconsistent and diverse results. In Australia, multiple sclerosis currently affects over 25,600 people, and it is estimated that over two million have currently been diagnosed with the disease worldwide. Multiple sclerosis does affect some people more than others, however, with approximately three times as many women developing multiple sclerosis as compared to men, and most people being diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 40 (despite there still being potential for younger or older people to be diagnosed). For these people there is no cure for multiple sclerosis, but a variety of treatment options can make living with the disease much easier than it otherwise would be and these options also serve to slow the progression of the disease.

The symptoms associated with MS

As we mentioned previously, the symptoms related to multiple sclerosis can be highly variable, and even when a sufferer experiences a set of symptoms, this may eventually change in some capacity. This is due to the lesions that develop on the brain and spinal cord dictating what is affected, with issues ranging from physical to neurological. Some of the most common symptoms that those with multiple sclerosis experience include issues with motor control (such as muscular spasms, weakness and affected balance and coordination), fatigue and heat sensitivity, pins and needles, incontinence and a variety of mental health issues, such as depression and memory loss. As well as there being a wide range of symptom associated with multiple sclerosis, there are also many treatment options available. Depending on the case, these might include therapies that modify the workings of the immune system to slow down attacks, steroid medication and immune suppressants. These will not all be prescribed to anyone who has multiple sclerosis, and will instead be addressed on a case by case basis.

Approaching multiple sclerosis treatments

Because multiple sclerosis can be so variable, it is often the case that some patients react quite differently to some medications than others might. This, in addition to certain lifestyle factors, invariably means that people diagnosed with multiple sclerosis will rely heavily on healthcare professionals to determine what the best course of action is for their treatment. With this in mind, anecdotal stories of superior treatment options should not prioritise tailored treatment and care options.

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In Finance

Types of Insurance Policies Everyone Should Have

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In India, there are different types of insurance policies that serve different purposes. So, read on to know the must-have insurance policies that can help you secure your finances.

Insurance policies provide financial protection against life uncertainties such as sudden death, accident loss of property, serious illness, etc. However, insurance comes with a cost. And, while you cannot insure everything, there are certain things that you must get covered, especially those that will have a high financial impact on your life and the lives of your dependent family members.

In India, the insurance sector, over the years, has evolved significantly. Today, there are different types of insurance policies that you can consider buying. Right from protecting your home to getting protection against travel mishaps, there is a policy for everyone. So, if you are not sure what insurance to buy? The following types of policies are a must-have for all.

Health Insurance

Life in a city has become extremely stressful, and the pollution levels have increased beyond the safety levels. Also, there has been a steep rise in medical costs. In such a scenario, a health insurance policy is a must-have. It helps you get financial protection against medical emergencies in the family. With a robust healthcare plan, you can have peace of mind knowing that you can provide the best medical care to your beloved without worrying about the high treatment cost.

Experts recommend buying good health insurance with an adequate sum assured to have sufficient coverage for various hospitalisation-related expenses. As there is a myriad of plans available in the market, ensure that you compare the policies carefully and choose the one that offers maximum protection and suits your requirements.

Life Insurance Policy

While a health insurance policy covers the treatment expenses, a life insurance policy helps you secure your family’s financial future in your absence. Today, there are different types of life insurance policies that offer several benefits. There are some plans like the Unit Linked Insurance Plan that gives you the dual advantage of insurance protection and investment.

If you are looking for a simple life insurance policy that provides maximum protection at an affordable cost, it is best to invest in a term life insurance policy. Under this policy, the insurance company pays a lump sum amount to the family in the event of your unfortunate demise before the end of the policy term.

Homeowners Insurance

A home is one of the most valuable assets you may own, and you would surely want to keep it protected from unexpected events like damage due to natural catastrophe, theft, burglary, etc. So, as a homeowner, you must invest in a home insurance policy. It helps you get protection against the damage to the house and the personal belongings you may have inside the home. Additionally, if you wish to avail of a home loan, the lender may require you to purchase a home owner’s insurance before approving the loan.

Cancer Insurance 

Although most health insurance policies will cover the cancer treatment expenses as per the terms and conditions, in most cases, the coverage may not be enough to cover the full cost. Typically, the cancer treatment can go up to 5 lakhs or more, and in such a situation, a standalone cancer policy will be useful to cover the full cost. Typically, in cancer insurance, the insurers pay a lump sum amount as soon as you are diagnosed with the disease. You can use the amount to cover the treatment cost as well as to meet your other expenses.

Motor Insurance

If you own a car or bike, it is mandatory to own a car or bike insurance as per law. Driving without valid insurance can attract a hefty penalty. Apart from complying with the legal requirement, motor insurance is crucial to get protection against the financial losses you may incur if you get involved in an accident. Typically, the insurers in India offer two types of motor insurance – third-party insurance and comprehensive insurance. Make sure that you assess your requirements well and choose the right kind of policy.

Now that you know the must-have insurance policies make sure that you invest in one and get full financial protection against liabilities.

 

 

 

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In Finance

 What is Bluechip fund in Mutual Fund Investments?

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Mutual funds are investment vehicle that are known to offer capital appreciation over the long term. Asset Management companies owning mutual funds collect money from investors sharing a common investment objective and invest this pool of funds across a diversified portfolio of securities and money market instruments. Market regulator SEBI (Securities and Exchange Board of India) describes mutual funds as “a mechanism for pooling the resources by issuing units to the investors and investing funds in securities in accordance with objectives as disclosed in the offer document. Investments in securities are spread across a wide cross-section of industries and sectors and thus the risk is reduced. Diversification reduces the risk because all stocks may not move in the same direction in the same proportion at the same time. Mutual fund issues units to the investors in accordance with the quantum of money invested by them. Investors of mutual funds are known as unitholders“

Some of the major mutual fund categories include equity, debt, solution oriented, hybrid, index, gold, ETF, banking and PSU etc. These are just categories which have been further subcategorized by SEBI for investors to be able to take an informed investment decision. Large cap funds are those mutual funds that predominantly invest in stocks of companies with large market capitalization. These funds are famous among other equity funds because they invest in companies that have a reputation for being financially well established. Large cap funds are also known as bluechip funds. 

The reason several people invest in bluechip funds is because there is very less chance for these funds to underperform even in volatile markets. The fund manager picks stocks that only belong to large cap companies, thus bringing in less volatility to the fund’s overall portfolio. Bluechip funds are professionally managed funds owned by reputed Asset Management Companies. These are actively managed funds that aim to offer capital appreciation to investors over the long term. If you have a short term investment horizon then you should reconsider investing in bluechip funds. Since these are equity oriented schemes, bluechip funds tend to get affected by the daily market vagaries. There is a good chance that your bluechip portfolio may incur losses over the short term. Historically, equity mutual funds have offered decent capital appreciation as compared to other traditional financial instruments. Also, since bluechip funds only invest in stocks of companies with large market capitalization, the investor’s portfolio is less likely to face volatility due to the inclusion of bluechip funds.

If you are seeking long term capital appreciation through investments in bluechip funds, then you can consider starting a SIP. Systematic Investment Plan, abbreviated as SIP, is an easy and hassle-free way to invest in bluechip funds. If you have lumpsum cash at your disposal then you can make a onetime payment towards your bluechip funds. However, with lumpsum investment you end up exposing your entire investment amount to the vagaries of market volatility. If you do not have lumpsum amount at your disposal then you can start a SIP in bluechip funds. With SIP, all you need is to be a KYC compliant individual following which every month on a fixed date a predetermined amount is debited from your savings account and electronically transferred to the bluechip fund. If you are unsure about how much you need to invest at regular intervals to achieve your life’s ultimate goals, then you can refer to an online SIP calculator. SIP also gives investments an opportunity to benefit from power of compounding. Your small investment amounts can multiply and turn into a decent corpus in the long run.

If you are unsure about investing in mutual funds, then it is better to consult a financial advisor.

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In Business

How To Write More Consistent Copy Across Your Brand

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If you’re already well-versed with the world of marketing, there’s a good chance that you already have worked with a bit of written content already. Written content is not only the way you get people in the door, it’s what gets them to stay, which is why important content is so helpful for businesses. the problem that many brands face then is that the content across their website is quite different at best and wildly inconsistent at worst – and this is something customers pick up on very quickly. In this article, we offer some tips to help you better manage this content consistency to help you look as professional as possible

Getting started with more consistent copy

If you’re not interested in hiring any digital marketing companies in Australia and have instead decided to commit to your own content strategy ideas, you’ve probably found out that it isn’t as easy as it looks. Consistency in copy is perhaps one of the most difficult things to manage because it’s so simply to overlook, which is why you have to commit today to remedying this. The best place to start is by going over your brand guidelines, and if you don’t have any brand guidelines set up, now is definitely the time to do that. Your brand guidelines will detail a lot of important information about your brand, such as your audience, tone of voice and similar information. This information is extremely important when you have other people write content on behalf of you – rather than vaguely explain what you need, offering your brand guidelines will instead ensure that what you need is crystal clear. If you’re yet to create your brand guidelines, the best thing to ask yourself is what your customers will likely expect your brand voice to sound like – are you a fun and cheeky brand, or a serious and straight to the point one? By working this out early, you’ll be able to carry this tone of voice across everything you do.

Matching your copy up

After you have some idea about what the voice of your brand is, it’s time to apply this to all of the content that is already on your website so that you can use it in all future content as well. This doesn’t mean you should go for an incredibly drastic rehaul of your entire website, as you should have already had some idea of what your brand sounds like. Ideally, creating your new copy should lean somewhat on what you already have as you’ll open yourself up to to many reworks otherwise, and this is absolutely not in the best interest of your brand (unless you got it really wrong the first time.

Get that copy consistent today

Even if you get people in the door, their trust won’t last long if they find that the copy around your website has obviously been written by a few different people. Ensuring that copy is consistent across the board is crucial to ensuring you look tech professional and retain all of your hard-earned clients now and into the future. In any case, if you don’t have a brand guideline set up, perhaps now is the time to do it!

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In Health

At What Age Should You Get A Breast Lift?

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In the world of cosmetic surgery, it can sometimes feel like you should be a certain age or look a certain way before you commit to a procedure. While it isn’t at all recommended that you regularly undergo procedures for the sake of it, you should know that you don’t need to be in your fifties to consider going under the knife. One of the most common procedures that has people confused is the breast lift, so in this article we take a look at the procedure to determine if there’s any particular age that best suits this fantastic form of cosmetic surgery.

Breast lifts and your circumstances

If you’ve been holding off on getting some form of breast augmentation before you get to a certain age, it might be a good time to ask yourself – why? It’s important to know that humans slowly stop producing collagen after the age of 20, and as collagen is an important component of supple, youthful skin, the drooping of skin can actually happen at any time after this age. It will obviously happen for some faster than for others, but your own genetics alongside external factors such as pregnancy and weight fluctuation (whether it be loss or gain) can influence this drooping to a significant degree. It’s thus important to note that it’s less about age and more about how your own personal circumstances have caused your body to change. The first and most obvious thing to consider is your overall health – you should ensure you’re in excellent overall health before a procedure like a breast lift, and your cosmetic surgeon will absolutely take the time to double check that you are. For example, this could mean you might be required to lose a bit of weight to ensure that your safety is preserved as a result of the procedure.

Determining the condition of your body

It’s not just physical weight that acts as a determining factor in relation to a breast lift – there are lots of personal circumstances that can cause excess or loose skin around their breasts, with things like breastfeeding, a significant degree of weight loss and the aging process playing large parts in this. It’s important to then consider that all of these things can occur well before a woman approaches her fifties or even forties, making a breast lift a much more approachable consideration. It could even be something much more natural and out of your control that is causing you to consider a breast lift – some women with asymmetrical breasts look to breast lifts as a way to make their breasts much more symmetrical than they otherwise would be, meaning that a woman at any age could consider a breast life for this purpose!

Considering a breast lift?

Breast lifts are an excellent way to rejuvenate a woman’s figure, so it’s no surprise that the procedure is as popular as it is. It should be clear that there are a lot of personal and lifestyle circumstances that can cause enough concern for a woman at any age to get a breast lift. It’s therefore more about your needs and your ideal body that will factor into your decision, but just know that whatever your age, firmer and perkier breasts are very much within your grasp!

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