Why pay someone to edit your work?

You’ve put your blood, sweat, and tears into your research (often literally), and you wouldn’t be doing it if it weren’t important and exciting. If your article or grant application is well written, readers and reviewers are more likely to understand your research and why it’s important. That can lead to more publications, citations, and funding. So, working with an experienced editor to improve the language and “readability” of your manuscript or grant application is a smart investment!

Moreover, an experienced editor with a strong background in scientific research knows the science lingo and can help you communicate your research results accurately to many different audiences. A writer with a scientific background also understands how much of your life has gone into this research and exactly how important it is to communicate the information effectively and accurately every time. Please continue reading to find out how I can help you communicate your research accurately and effectively.

Editing Services for Grant Applications

In addition to editing grant applications for basic grammar and “readability,” I strive to ensure that each one meets the NIH requirements for rigor and reproducibility. By applying the scientific knowledge I gained through my own time at the bench, as well as information culled from reviewer’s responses over the past several years, I can also provide feedback regarding content and organization.

Editing Services for Manuscripts

I will edit your manuscript to ensure clarity and to meet the style of the journal to which you are submitting.

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To submit an order, or for questions about services or rates, please contact me by email:

info@erinthackerwriting.com

July 31, 2012August 1, 2012

Don’t lick the band-aid!

(Part I in a series investigating the purported health benefits of honey)

For most of us, “don’t lick the band-aid” is not a phrase Mom had to repeat often–but it may be in the future. Yep, “real” science supports Hippocrates and Aristotle–honey is good for treating boo-boos. In fact, honey is a powerful germ slayer, capable of killing over 60 types of bacteria and many types of yeast and viruses!

Although full trials are still lacking, several* research studies have evaluated honey’s healing powers in specific types of wounds, and it seems to be effective at healing malignant wounds in cancer patients, leg ulcers (often in diabetics), bed sores, and superficial and partial-thickness burns (partial-thickness burns fall between superficial and 3rd degree burns). An article from 2006 describes the use of honey to successfully treat multiple wounds, some infected with drug-resistant bacteria, in hospitalized pediatric cancer patients.

These studies used medical grade honey, which is gamma-irradiated to make sure there’s no chance of infection from the botulism spores sometimes found in honey. When eaten, these spores are a concern only for infants and immunocompromised patients, but putting these spores in a wound is asking for trouble.

These results were so fantastic that the scientist in me had to test it with my own hands. So, I ordered a tube of medical grade honey on Amazon. Luckily, I didn’t have to wait long before I sliced my thumb and had the chance to use it. The cut was borderline in need of a stitch or two, but I’m lazy. Instead of going to the ER, I treated it daily with the honey for just over a week. Sure enough, it healed nicely-without a scar. Sadly, I neglected to document the evidence, but there will certainly be another chance in this family.

There are also studies I’m willing to accept without testing myself. Perhaps the most exciting of these studies are the ones showing that medical grade honey can heal wounds infected with multi-drug resistant bacteria! The overuse and misuse of antibiotics are thought to have created these strains that are so difficult to kill, and the mad race to find new antibiotics to treat them has had only limited success. But these studies with honey suggest there is a simple treatment available already. Better yet, bacteria don’t become resistant to honey in lab tests.

I found that the honey stings like hydrogen peroxide at first, and my kids have since corroborated this–loudly! This sting might be expected since some of honey’s germ-fighting superpowers come from hydrogen peroxide^#.

Even more superpowers come from the acidity and sugar content of honey. Much like my kids, the germs just can’t handle too much sugar!

Honey also has other ingredients that help our body make new tissue and blood vessels to replace what was damaged, allowing the wound to heal fully. Anti-inflammatory ingredients in honey, like polyphenols, even help prevent scarring.

Given all these promising reports, I’ve been thinking that I should invest in companies that make medical grade honey!

Just for fun, I asked a doctor at the UAB Burn Center if they’ve ever tried honey as a treatment. After he finished laughing, he said, “Can you imagine what our patients would say if we told them we were going to spread honey all over them?”

Right…so it might be a while before that investment pays off.

But, he did explain that most of the burns at the trauma center are so severe, and the tissue so damaged, that it’s extremely difficult to promote healing anyhow. So, I guess we’ll have to wait to see whether honey can perform miracles, too.

In the meantime, I’m sure our kids will continue to provide ample opportunity for a more thorough analysis of medical grade honey for wound healing. I just hope our analysis is limited to minor cuts and scrapes!

Have you used honey to fix a boo-boo? Share your experience below!

Next up: have the benefits of honey for allergies been confirmed by “real” scientists?

*There are many research articles that report similar results.

#The concentration of hydrogen peroxide in honey is lower than what we typically use on boo-boos, and it seems to be optimized to kill germs but leave our immune cells intact–obviously, better for healing.

January 11, 2012January 24, 2012

Just a spoonful of honey

Our friends recently told us they harvested their first batch of honey from their own honeybees—3 gallons! Pretty soon, everyone around us was discussing what they could do with THREE gallons of honey.

One person said local honey is good for treating seasonal allergies. Another person recommended it for treating burns or skin boo-boos. Intrigued, I came home and did a Google search for medicinal uses of honey. The suggestions for what honey can treat amazed me (no, I did NOT click on all the sites!):

• Seasonal allergies
• Colds
• Skin wounds, infections and problems of ALL kinds
• Cancer
• Impotence/infertility
• Menopause
• Insomnia
• Diabetes
• Insert disease of your choice

The list goes on and on–no wonder Pooh is always so cheerful!

It turns out that ancient societies (Greeks, Romans and Chinese) regularly used honey to treat wounds and prevent infections–Hippocrates and Aristotle even touted the benefits of honey. In fact, your parents or grandparents may have given you honey to treat colds.

Then came our love-affair with pharmaceuticals. Don’t get me wrong, pharmaceuticals have improved and saved many lives, but as we know now, they may sometimes be expensive and unnecessary.

While honey is still used in “non-industrialized” nations, the use of honey as a medicine came to a screeching halt in the U.S. after the development of antibiotics. But, honey does have potent antimicrobial (anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, and anti-viral) and antioxidant characteristics, and its therapeutic potential is now being investigated by “real” scientists (especially in light of the drug-resistant microbes popping up)!

The next few blogs will focus on the results of these scientific re-investigations. Sadly, I haven’t found published research investigating ALL the proclaimed benefits of honey, but some of the ones I will discuss are:

• Allergies
• Colds
• Skin wounds and other skin problems
• Cancer
• Menopause
• Cardiovascular problems
• Infectious agents

So, tune in ~two weeks from now for some of the answers! I’ll give you a hint—the type of honey influences the medical value, and you can buy medical grade honey on Amazon.

In the meantime, have you used honey for any of these problems? Do you harvest your own honey? Share your honey stories below!