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I will be going to Malaysia tonight. I might not be able to update this blog until February and I have list down my favourite post. Hopefully these posts will be beneficial to you.

2004
The people of the boxes
Kisah semut
Kisah Adik
Pantun raya
The stranger in the dark
Predicting my future p/s: some of them come true :)
Salam Perantauan

2005
A pencil
My journey as a fruit picker

• Cobram I (this is a series of post and it takes some time to read all of the post. Label: fruit picking)

1426 sapience
Ten words of wisdom
Hatiku milik siapa?
Test for the believers: Fluctuations of life
The shade of Allah
Love
Winter Trip 2005 (Kembara dari Melbourne ke Canberra, Sydney dan Adelaide. Satu lagi siri post yang panjang)
Erti merdeka
Andai ini Ramadan terakhir

2006
value-able
Muslims by choice
To make heart tender
Lost and found [ You have to read this especially if you are a medical student :) ]
Bertemu dan berpisah kerana Allah
Anguish and delight
Analogy of knowledge
Honesty

2007
Cool pictures
They didn't study. Funny :D
Favourite Firefox extensions
Pulitzer Prize Winners 2007. The photographer certainly deserved the prize. Click to find out why.
CSS hacks for Internet Explorer
How to migrate from old Blogger template to new Blogger layout
Useful links for new Blogger
Broken heart syndrome
Medical Student. Comic. Interesting :)
The big C
Medical Abbreviations

Enjoy. Good bye and please forgive me for any of my mistakes...

exams

There are 4 OSCE stations.

1. Iron-deficiency anaemia. Take history and try to diagnose possible causes of iron-deficiency anaemia. The patient is well and do not have significant history except symptoms of anaemia. I was stuck on this station for a while. The only things that I could think for differential diagnosis were colorectal cancer, angiodysplasia, peptic ulcer, parasites and diet.
   
2. History of headache. Possible diagnosis were severe migraine, meningitis and sub- arachnoid haemorrhage. I think I did well except for answering the questions from the examiner.
   
3. Gastrointestinal examination on real patient with chronic liver disease. The questions were about liver function test, signs of portal hypertension and causes of decompensated cirrhosis.
   
4. Visual acuity and visual field. Questions were on the location of the lesion and possible aetiology. I need to interpret from a CT scan.
   

Overall, I think I can get at least a passing mark :).Now, I should not be thinking about exam. I just wrote the OSCE stations for future references.

Next on my agenda is going home :). I need to buy few souvenirs for my family and friends.

split

I met one of my old classmates in Friendster and while we were chatting about the past, I've realised that some of my classmates in high school perceived me as a quiet person. However, I am quite talkative whenever I am among my siblings. Perhaps, the situation or environment has influenced on how I am interacting with people.

I am extremely quiet and shy whenever I'm among strangers and I take some time to overcome my shyness. The point when I started to gain a bit confidence in breaking the uncomfortable silence was when I becoming a medical student. This requires me to talk to strangers a lot more than in the past. I used to stutter and speak differently from my own thought process. Many people have misunderstood me and it requires reasonable amount of effort on my part, to correct the situation. This is also prevent me from giving random comment at other people's blog just in case I might hurt someone's feeling. To overcome this, I try to talk slowly and observed how people converse with each other.

One of the impetus for me to be more talkative with strangers is exam (OSCE). OSCE assess how well a medical student talking with a patient and whether they are able to diagnose the disease.

It is not easy to talk comfortably with a stranger that you have never met before. Added that with the pressure of exam, and you need to talk with the patient in less than 10 minutes. You need to ask appropriate questions and try to diagnose the disease. This is a hurdle requirement and you need to pass this exam one way or another.

Now, if you meet me in the real life and see me of not greeting you, it might be that I am still unable to overcome my shyness. Yet I will be a totally different person with my family. I might have a split personality, I think.

search engine

Sometimes, it can be interesting to see how people find out about this blog. I use Google Analytics to analyse the traffic to this site and 40% of the visitors come from search engine.

August
14.31% Direct Traffic
53.54% Referring Site
32.15% Search Engine

Top Keywords

1. kembara di bumi melbourne
2. pelajar terbaik spm mckk
3. e-novel malay
4. ladybug layout
5. hafiz238
6. allahumma anta rabbi la ilaha illa anta translation
7. e-novel malay malaysia
8. ladybug "blogger template"
9. ladybug layouts
10. css version in blogger

September
14.50% Direct Traffic
45.69% Referring Site
39.82% Search Engine

Top keywords

1. ladybug layouts
2. ladybug layout
3. e-novel malay
4. hafiz
5. hafiz238
6. kembara di bumi melbourne
7. alam baqa
8. erti kemerdekaan
9. erti merdeka
10. kelebihan al-mathurat

October
11.16% Direct Traffic
44.00% Referring Site
44.84% Search Engine

Top Keywords

1. ladybug layouts
2. dock menu
3. date header+calender icon+blogger
4. kembara di bumi melbourne
5. kerja sebagai fruit picker
6. ladybug layout
7. peperiksaan blogspot
8. raya di australia
9. raya di melbourne
10. erti kemerdekaan
    

There are several patterns that can be observed from this data.

Some of the searches were seasonal and this highlights the important of having post which is related to certain important season. In September, keywords related to independence were among the top keywords and in October, keywords related to Eidul fitri were linked to this blog. The summer holiday in Australia start in November and hence the reason of searching about fruit picker ;).

Another pattern is writing about blogspot layout/template will attract traffic at any time. I think there are many people who are looking to modify their blogspot layout. I never know that there are many people who are looking for ladybug layout. This is quite a surprise for me.

Another surprise is to see that an old blog post is coming up in one of the searches. E-novel malay is referring to this entry which was written in 2004.

If you are keen in analysing the web traffic, you will be able to learn a lot and this information will be useful in the future. By analysing which keywords land your site in the search engine, you are able to plan your writing and design an effective marketing strategy.

However, I am not planning of using this blog to get additional income. This blog will stay as a personal blog and occasionally I will write and talk about blogspot layouts/templates. Part of my hobby is to design website. At least, I will be able to put my knowledge on CSS into practice.

update

It has been a while since I last updated this blog. Life has been busy.

The summer holiday is so near. The only thing that stands in the way is the exam. I think I've forgotten of what I've learned in the first rotation. This must be one sign of aging and I need to revise my notes again.

In retrospect, I have learned a lot this semester. It is quite amazing of what I have achieved so far and to think that I'm already more than half way of this course...that is a bit scary though. Can't really imagine myself to be responsible to write drug prescription for sick people.

Anyway, back on the subject of holiday...there are few things that I've planned during this summer. Hopefully, I will be able to reach all my objectives this summer.

Medical Abbreviations

It has been a while since I last updated this blog. Beside the busy schedule that I have, I am not sure what should I write here.

Anyway, I would like to introduce the common medical abbreviations that I have learned so far from my three rotations. Every time I look at patient medical records, I learned new medical abbreviation and sometimes it can be confusing to read.

First rotation: Neurosciences, Opthalmology, Ear, Nose & Throat Surgery.

AF - Atrial fibrillation
AMI - Acute Myocardial Infarction
AVM - Arteriovenous Malformation
CCF - Congestive Cardiac Failure
CIDP - Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy
CRAO - Central retinal artery occlusion
CSF - Cerebrospinal fluid
CVA - Cerebrovascular accident
GBS - Gullain-Barre syndrome
GCA - Giant cell arteritis
ICP - Intracranial Pressure
IOP - Intraocular pressure
MS - Multiple Sclerosis
MSA - Multiple System Atrophy
PERLA - Pupil Equal and Reactive to Light and Accommodation
POAG - Primary Open Angle Glaucoma
PSP - Progressive Supranuclear Palsy
RAPD - Relative Afferent Pupillary defect
SAH - Subarachnoid Haemorrhage
SOL - Space Occupying Lesion

Second rotation: Haematology, Oncology, Infectious Diseases and Breast disease.

ALL - Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia
AML - Acute Myeloid Leukaemia

CHOP - Cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin (hydroxydoxorubicin), vincristine (Oncovin), prednisone

CLL - Chronic Lymphocytic Leukaemia
CML - Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia
DCIS - Ductal Carcinoma In-situ
DIC - Disseminated Intravascular Coagulation
EPO - Erythropoietin
ITP - Idiopathic Thrombocytopenic Purpura
LCIS - Lobular Carcinoma In-situ
LRTI - Lower Respiratory Tract Infection
MGUS - Monoclonal Gammopathy of Unknown Significance
MM - Multiple Myeloma
NHL - Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma
NSCLC - Non Small Cell Lung Cancer
PSA - Prostatic Specific Antigen
SCLC - Small Cell Lung Cancer
STD - Sexually Transmitted Disease
TTP - Thrombotic Thrombocytopenic Purpura
URTI - Upper Respiratory Tract Infection
UTI - Urinary Tract Infection
VAD - Vincristine, adriamycin and dexamethasone

Third rotation: Gastroenterology, Hepatology, Gastrointestinal & Hepatobiliary Surgery and General Surgery.

AAA - Abdominal Aortic Aneurysm
AIH - Autoimmune Hepatitis
BPH - Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia
CLD - Chronic Liver Disease

ERCP - Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography

ETOH - ethanol / Ethyl alcohol
EUS - Endoscopic Ultrasonography
HBV - Hepatitis B Virus
HCC - Hepatocellular carcinoma
HCV - Hepatitis C Virus
IBD - Inflammatory Bowel Disease
IRS - Irritable Bowel Syndrome
IVDU - Intravenous Drug user

MRCP - Magnetic Resonance Cholangiopancreatography

NASH - Non-alcoholic Steatohepatitis
OLT - Orthotopic Liver Transplantation
PBC - Primary Biliary Cirrhosis
PHT - Portal Hypertension
PSC - Primary sclerosing cholangitis
SBP - Spontaneous Bacterial Peritonitis

Duration of Time
It is common for medical professionals to use this abbreveation for time

x/24 - x number of hours
x/7 - x number of days
x/52 - x number of weeks
x/12 - x number of months

Medical Prescription

This is quite common and can cause confusion if not written properly

time
mane - morning
nocte - night

Frequency
bd - twice daily
tds - three times a day
qid - four times a day

Route of administration
po - per oral
pr - per rectum
IV - Intravenous
IM - Intramuscular
tab - tablet
supp - suppository
sc - subcutaneous

Ending with x
It is quite common to see few medical abbreviations ending with x :). I guess this is a trend among doctors and nurses.

Hx - History
Sx - Symptoms
Dx - Diagnosis
DDx - Differential Diagnosis
Rx - Treatment
Mx - Management

differential diagnosis

Yesterday, we had a bedside teaching with one of the consultant. The consultant told us to take history of presenting complaint and try to diagnose the disease. We were taking turn for asking appropriate questions. After few minutes, we realised that this is not a common disease.

The patient has weird episodes which are induced by doing heavy physical activity. Each episode has the same symptoms. The patient will feel dizzy, palpitation, headache, pale face, feeling of anxiety and sometimes shortness of breath. No fever, nausea, vomitting, or pain. The episodes last for few minutes and will only stop after resting. This has been happening for few months.

We are thinking of epilepsy or migraine or myocardial infarction but further questioning shows that this is not the case.

The consultant keep on asking us what is the differential diagnosis for this patient. We were baffled by the signs and symptoms. Somehow during the tutorial, an episode of House ran into my mind. I've seen this before in one of the episodes of House and the signs and symptoms are similar.

I know the disease but I can't exactly remember the name. Few minutes later, one of my groupmate said the name of the disease. Apparently most of us were thinking of House but we forget the actual name of the disease.

This is quite a rare occasion for me to diagnose a patient from watching House. This is an interesting week for me :)

gut and liver

The new rotation is less busy than the previous one. The current rotation is Gastroenterology, hepatobiliary and general surgery. There are many tutorials that has been cancelled or postponed which gave us lots of free time. However, I usually stay late at the hospital either to do some revision or interviewing patient.

As usual, there are many things that I've forgotten and need to catch up on that. There is roughly 5 weeks before my semester exam. Can't wait for the holiday now :).

p/s: There is something wrong with few javascript that I've been using in this blog. Will fix it later when I've time.

catching up

Yesterday, I visited several of my friends and it was a good opportunity for me to keep up-to-date of what have been happening in the past few years. I rarely listen to any rumours and as a consequence of that, I'm always among the last to know about any event.

To illustrate this, I'm quite surprised to know that few of my former classmates will get married at the end of this year. I'm more astonished to know about their future spouse. Some of them are doing the same course ie medicine and not necessarily in the same university.

It seems that there are many big events at the end of this year and I will be going home somewhere in December. I guess I'll be quite busy during the holiday and hopefully I'll be able to attend all of the weddings. My cousin who is of the same age as me will get married too. I need to prepare myself for possible interrogation by my aunty and uncle about my future :)

Aidilfitri

Ingin menjawab tag daripada Kasyah, maka kali ini ingin menulis di dalam Bahasa Malaysia. Minta maaf jika ada kesalahan tatabahasa. Maklumlah agak jarang menulis di dalam Bahasa Malaysia

1. Bila agaknya mula berpuasa penuh?
Kalau tak salah, mungkin mula berpuasa penuh pada usia 10 tahun.


2. Pernahkah ponteng puasa? Dan apakah alasannya?
Ponteng puasa ketika masa kecil. Sekitar 6-7 tahun. Melihat adik makan dan minum menyebabkan semangat berpuasa berkurangan :).


3. Pernah main bunga api atau mercun?
Hanya pernah main bunga api dan tidak pernah terlibat dengan mercun. Namun begitu, ramai kawan di sekolah rendah pernah bermain dengan mercun.


4. Apakah juadah kegemaran ketika berbuka?
Hmm, soalan yang sukar untuk dijawab. Bukanlah seorang yang agak memilih dalam bab makanan.


5. Selalu lagu raya mana yang menjadi kesukaan?
Lagu bertajuk 'Hari Raya Untuk Semua' dendangan Raihan dan NowSeeHeart. 'Lebaran Ini' nyanyian Raihan, Rem, Ajai dan NowSeeHeart dan pelbagai lagu 'evergreen' yang sering berkumandang di radio tanah air.


6. Tahun ni beraya di mana?
Seperti biasa, hari raya tahun ini akan disambut di bumi Melbourne. Ini adalah kali keempat beraya di Melbourne dan kali kelima beraya di perantauan. Kali pertama beraya di perantauan ialah pada tahun 1996 di Cardiff, United Kingdom.


7. Pernah ke bertugas/berkerja di hari raya?
Masih lagi belajar. Namun begitu, sambutan hari raya di perantauan adalah sangat berbeza daripada Malaysia. Kebiasaannya hari raya Aidilfitri akan jatuh pada musim peperiksaan dan kena menelaah untuk peperiksaan. Oleh kerana itu, hari Raya Aidilfitri hanya disambut ala-kadar sahaja.


8. Ada kenangan manis tak di hari raya?
Banyak kenangan manis menyambut hari raya di Malaysia. Agak kurang kenangan manis menyambut hari raya di perantauan :)

Ini ialah gambar raya pada tahun lepas. Gambar ini diambil di hadapan rumah bersama rakan satu rumah.

Pada tahun ini, Melbourne akan menyambut hari raya Aidilfitri pada hari Sabtu. Di kesempatan ini, saya ingin mengucapkan Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri buat semua pembaca blog. Semoga kita semua dapat bertemu dengan bulan Ramadan pada tahun depan dan berusahalah untuk berpuasa sunat di bulan Syawal bagi menampung segala kekurangan amal puasa kita di bulan Ramadan.

the big C

which stands for cancer. My current rotation will be finished by next week. Few weeks ago when I commenced this rotation, I'm not sure of what I'm going to learn as this is quite advanced and involved sub-specialty.

Reflecting back on the past few weeks, there are some surprises in this rotation. Previously I thought that I will be learning on how to diagnose and treat few major cancers. Just know few chemotherapy drugs, radiotherapy and surgical options and that will be sufficient for my level.

I never thought the impact of cancer on the patient and their family. Some cancers were diagnosed at late stage and the only option for treatment is palliative. The patients might have few days or weeks to live. Some patients died on the ward and some passed away at home. Some patients have early stage of cancer and there is still hope for them but chemotherapy has some nasty side effects.

This rotation introduces me to psychological impact of aggressive disease towards patient and their relatives. I have learned few tips on how to tell the patient that they might have cancer. It is not an easy task to do though. Another challenge will be for the relatives. If the patient has young children, the oncologist needs to discuss with the patient the best way to tell the children the concept of dying.

This reminds me of my own experience watching my auntie passed away when I was 7 years old. I didn't understand that she is leaving forever and I only partially comprehend the concept when I never met her for a long time after that.

I close this entry with these verses from al-Quran.

He will say: "What number of years did ye stay on earth?"
They will say: "We stayed a day or part of a day: but ask those who keep account."
He will say: "Ye stayed not but a little,- if ye had only known!
"Did ye then think that We had created you in jest, and that ye would not be brought back to Us (for account)?"

[al-Mu'minun: 112-115]

internet resources

Since I've started my clinical years, I have changed my method of looking for information. Previously back when I studied at university, I used to borrow lots of books for my revision. I will go to the library and borrow some books that is usually on loan for short period of time. That method was sufficient at that time.

My current rotation requires me to modify my way of searching for medical knowledge. I need more up-to-date information and books can sometimes be outdated. This explains my reliance on internet resources. It is good to be a student under two institutions which are the university and the hospital. Both provide subscriptions to few excellent resources. At the moment, I frequently used Access Medicine, UpToDate and Clinicians Health Channel. Besides that, there are also free resources available on the net such as eMedicine and Online Medical Dictionary.

Even doctors rely heavily on these internet resources. I'm not sure how I am going to cope without internet. The medical field is always changing and we need to be updated with any medical breakthrough in term of treatment and management of patient.

I'm not sure about the situation back in Malaysia but I think I might be dependent on the internet in the future. I hope the internet service in Malaysia will be more competitive and cheaper to the people. High internet broadband penetration in any country will bring more benefit in the long term.

fasting and clinical years

Ramadhan this year is a bit different from previous year. My typical days would begin at 8 or 9 am and finished by 5 or 6pm. I usually go to the hospital one hour earlier. So, any tutorials that begins at 8am means that I go out from the house by 7am. Usually, I arrived home at 6 or 7pm and I will be fortunate if I am able to come home earlier.

Now, Maghrib is usually after 6pm and the day is getting longer now. Most of the time I arrived at home after 6pm and it means that I break my fast a bit later. Isha'a is now around 7.45pm and the mosque start 30 minutes late to give time for people to relax after Maghrib.

If I'm not too tired, I will try to study a bit after Taraweeh. Most often this is not the case though :). Therefore, my weekend is extremely precious for me as it is the only time for me to revise.

There are a lot to do in clinical years and I need to know few major diseases. There is also emotional component involved whenever you interview any patient with terminal illness. My current rotation introduces me to relatively high number of patients who are going to die within days or weeks. It is not an easy sight to deal with though.

busy week

This week is quite busy. Tutorials can start as early as 8am and finished by 5pm. Today is full with tutorials. From 9 am to 1 pm without any break. Then, 1pm to 4 pm. Unfortunately Fortunately, the tutorial at 3-4 pm is postponed to next week. So, next week, we will have 2 hours tutorial.

No wonder I am so tired. And tomorrow is another busy day. And I need to see few patients too. To be optimistic, this might be a good preparation for my future working hours back in Malaysia. Junior doctors at Malaysia are usually associated with working overtime with decent salary and it won't be any surprise to me if they make serious mistakes due to extreme fatigue.

Fasting and hadith

There are numerous false hadith on the benefit of fasting in the month of Ramadhan. We need to be cautious on this matter and prevent this from spreading further. I still remember that back at my hometown, the mosque used to put up notice on the benefit of performing Tarawih for each night in Ramadhan. As a small child, I used to believe this type of info since this notice is being put up by mosque committee, and hence this is supposed to be accurate. However, I eventually find out the truth and learn the reason behind this fault.

Muslim community in Malaysia, mainly Malay, practices Islam as part of the tradition and there are many instances whereby custom/tradition is mixed with religious teaching. Many, if not all, members of mosque committee were elderly people and they are not used to abrupt changes in their daily activities. Hence, any old custom is being passed from one generation to another without any second thought.

Besides that, it is difficult to find young people praying at the mosque. Perhaps they were too busy with their work to the extent that many mosques were only filled by the elderly.

We can easily point out other people mistakes but it is another matter to correct their mistakes. It takes courage, time and careful strategies to implement any changes in the community. I guess I'm still far from being able to change anything in the community. Perhaps time will tell whether there will be any improvement in our Muslim community in the future.

Interesting read: Soalnya di mana Ramadan kamu? [in Malay]

the fate of efx2

I have another blog at efx2 and I rarely updated this blog. I used this blog mainly to give comment at some of my friends who blog over there. Apparently the blog hosting server is facing severe problem right now. I am pasting the message from the blog developer, Keith, taken from King 0f Ankh

My blog script on EFx2.com was exploited and a phishing scam was put on the server through our site. Apparently this is the 3rd time this has happened in recent months. The problem is this is the first time I have heard about this. If Martin would have said something to be the first time I could have done something to prevent it from happening again.

So now since its the 3rd time in recent months it violates the main hosts TOS so that single server was canceled (he has a total of 4 servers with that hosting company) so he is trying to work with them to get it back.

I personally feel he is no longer going to host us though .. even though its not exactly our fault this happened. It is not something that was done intentionally.

This whole thing completely sucks and is the cherry on the top of my crap cake this past month ..

Because or script is exploitable and I don't have the time to redo it all over again I am going to try out Wordpress MU. Wordpress MU is a multiple user Wordpress script and is developed and tested by professional and will be the fastest way to get back up.

http://mu.wordpress.org/

Check out the FAQ there. It has all the features of EFx2 as well as some we never had. Some of the cool ones include multiple authors per blog and the ability to post from a 3rd party software. Almost all the wordpress plugins work for it as well as all the wordpress themes.

I will pass on any information I get to various bloggers so they can pass it on to everyone else. :D

Hopefully this will clarify what is happening with efx2 at the moment.

UPDATE 14/9/2007: Check efx2 Blogs for current update on the problem.

Ramadhan

It will come within few days. It is the time of the year where one should reflect how much he/she has improved since previous Ramadhan. I'm not saying that we should only reflect when Ramadhan is near. In fact, we should contemplate on our actions every day. What I meant was to use Ramadhan as a measure of our deeds within a year.

Abu Huraira reported: Verily the Messenger of Allaah (sallAllaahu alayhi wa sallam) said: Five (daily) prayers and from one Friday prayer to the (next) Friday prayer, and from Ramadhan to Ramadhan are expiatious for the (sins) committed in between (their intervals) provided one shuns the major sins.

[Sahih Muslim, Book of Purification, Hadith no 450]

As I reflect back upon this year, I realised that there are too many mistakes that I've committed. I ought to improve and strive to conquer my own desire. Astaghfirullah.

O Allah, please help me to be sincere in practising Islam as it should be. O Allah, grant me strength and wisdom to stay in the path of truth. Amin.

Muslims by choice.

medical student

This should lighten up my feeling whenever confronted with difficulty of knowing why did I choose medicine as my future career :)

12 types of medical students.

Medical hierarchy

Created by Michelle Au.

cancer, blood and infectious

That is my current rotation. The proper medical name for my rotation is haematology, oncology, infectious disease and breast. It seems there are a lot of topic need to be covered in this block. However, the timetable is a bit relaxed compared to my previous rotation.

First impression, the block is interesting and the patient are a bit challenging. There are few patients in the ward and many of them are facing incurable disease and most of them will be going into palliative care. This is challenging because this is one of the field in medicine where there are not much that can be done to cure the disease.

Majority of the oncology patients will be treated for side effect of chemotherapy or radiation such as nausea and diarrhoea (loose bowel motion). Interviewing patients with incurable cancer who are going to die within few days, months or years is a thought-provoking experience. It reminds me of my own experience watching my relatives who have passed away. It will remind you the temporal nature of this life.

end of Neuro

6 weeks of neuro, eye and ENT rotation is over. Overall, it was an interesting block which requires a lot of revision and practice.

What is contained in this block? Well, first of all, there are a lot of physical examination that need to be mastered theoretically by the end of this block. 12 cranial nerves, upper limb, lower limb, gait, checking the eye, nose, ear and throat. That is quite a big area to cover and not to mention there are a lot of diseases in the eye.

At the end of week 6, I think I know most of the physical examinations except the eye since I do not have the luxury of having an ophthalmoscope. The only gap that need to be filled quickly is the knowledge of major neurological diseases.

Two of the most common presenting symptoms that I feared right now is headache and back pain. There are many diseases that can caused back pain and headache. Some of those are mild and does not present any danger to the patient. However, the one that can cause severe disability to the patients are not to be missed and it is this category that requires me to be extra cautious.

An easier way is to ask the patients to undergo CT/MRI but this is not an option. Plus, the interpretation of radiology a.k.a the dark art :D is still not in my grasp yet.

erti kemerdekaan

Hari ini usia Malaysia mencecah 50 tahun. Kalau usia 50 tahun ini diterjemahkan ke dalam kehidupan seorang manusia, dia mungkin sudah mempunyai cucu dan memiliki pengalaman luas dalam beberapa aspek kehidupan. Kalau ditanya mengenai bentuk nasihat yang ingin diberi kepada generasi muda, mungkin dia mampu memberi beberapa nasihat yang penting.

Situasi Malaysia pasca merdeka masih mempunyai ruang untuk diperbaiki. Mungkin erti kesabaran dan perpaduan perlu diajar dengan lebih tekun kepada sesiapa yang bergelar warganegara Malaysia.

Ramai rakyat Malaysia yang kurang sabar apabila berada di atas jalan raya. Namun begitu, kalaulah ingatan saya masih utuh, Malaysia terkenal dengan rakyatnya yang bersopan-santun. Apabila tiba suasana perayaan, angka-angka kematian di jalan raya meningkat berkali-ganda dan mungkin boleh mengatasi jumlah orang yang mati kebuluran di benua Afrika atau jumlah orang yang terbunuh di Palestin.

Istilah perpaduan masih lagi merupakan suatu konsep yang sukar untuk diterapkan di Malaysia. Kita masih lagi memandang orang lain berlandaskan konsep bangsa dan istilah bangsa Malaysia adalah suatu istilah asing di halwa telinga kita. Ada banyak tembok yang perlu diruntuhkan untuk kita memupuk semangat perpaduan ini.

Rasanya cukuplah setakat ini celoteh saya di dalam bahasa Melayu :). Sudah lama tidak menulis dalam bahasa Melayu yang menyebabkan saya memerlukan masa yang lama untuk mencari-cari kata-kata yang sesuai. Kadangkala perlu berfikir di dalam bahasa Inggeris dan menterjemahkannya ke dalam bahasa Melayu untuk menulis. Secara perlahan-lahan, perbendaharaan bahasa Melayu saya sudah terhakis walhal saya dahulu sering mendapat A di dalam subjek Bahasa Melayu.

erti kemerdekaan

week 5

Now, I have finished the 5th week of my rotation. Only one more week left. I guess I will try to practice neuro physical examination throughout the semester since it will take lots of practice to become familiar with those examinations.

Every medical student need to learn the steps in examining a patient and every system in the body has its own specific examination. What I mean by system is the division of human body for example brain, hand, leg, chest, breast, abdomen and genital. Each of the system has different steps involved which will help in diagnosing a specific disease.

Now, in my current rotation, I need to know how to examine eye, ear, nose, throat, specific cranial nerves , hand,leg and gait. Different diseases have different types of presenting symptom and I need to be aware of that. An example would be Parkinson's disease. There are a lot of diseases that can mimic Parkinson's to the point that many physicians/doctors misdiagnosed someone with Parkinson where in reality those people have another disease.

I was quite busy this week that I forgot the actual date of my birthday. To recap what I have posted on my birthday in the past few years, here are the links to my previous post.

2006
2005
2004

I will end this post with this verse from al-Quran as a reminder for me.

For, Believers are those who, when Allah is mentioned, feel a tremor in their hearts, and when they hear His signs rehearsed, find their faith strengthened, and put (all) their trust in their Lord;

[al-Anfal:2]

neurosurgery

I had an opportunity to attend a neurosurgery last week. The surgery was to remove a brain tumour which has caused the patient to have chronic headache in the past few years.

Prior to the operation, I changed my clothes to the surgical cloth. There were few people in the operating theatre: few surgeons and the supporting nurses. The tumour was meningioma which is a type of tumour that attaches to the surface of the brain (dura).

At the start of the operation, the patient was put under general anaesthetic. Since the tumour is located at parietal lobe, the patient's head need to be turned sideways. To ensure the head does not move during the operation, screws were attached at the front and at the back of the head. It seems painful to me to have screw put into your head, front and back for few hours and your head need to turn sideways throughout the operation. Anyway, general anaesthetic helps this situation.

To reach the tumour in the brain, the surgeons need to remove the layers of the scalp. There are five layers in scalp [Skin, Connective tissue, Aponeurosis, Loose connective tissue and Periosteum]. Each layer need to be removed separately. It was amazing to see the layer being removed carefully and you could see the brain beating according to the heart beat. Whenever the scalpel cut through blood vessels, blood spurts out and I think by the end of the operation, the amount of blood gushed out from the brain was around few cups of blood. It is not something that can be seen by someone who is haemophobia.

When all those layers and bone have been removed, we could see the tumour. It was big and it took quite a long time to remove the tumour from the brain. The surgeons need to peel off any attachment of the tumour from the brain. It requires strong concentration and stamina too. The operation lasts about 4 hours and I think only surgeons are capable to stand for more than 4 hours without moving a lot. I need to move around the operating theatre to prevent leg cramps from standing too long. I guess surgery will not be my future career :).

After the tumour has been removed, the surgeon connects the layers and the bone. The bone is connected using screws and the scalp is secured using staples. I am surprised to see the staples being used in the operation. I was thinking the surgeon will attach the skin back using sutures. I guess staples is a better option in this type of surgery.

This neurosurgery gave me an opportunity to refresh my knowledge on neuroanatomy and it was interesting yet tiring.

of neurology

In this semester, we have three 6-week rotations. Each rotation introduces us to different specialty of medicine. We got to see different type of patients and how different disease affects the patient and the family.

Next week will be the fourth week of my neurology,eye & ENT rotation. I should theoretically know at least half about the related disease such as stroke, ataxia, Parkinson, epilepsy, macular degeneration, ear problems etc. To tell you the truth, I don't know that much yet. Still struggling to learn those diseases and I believe I will know the important disease by the end of this rotation :).

Part of tasks that I need to do is to interview and examine patients and learn about patient management. Sometimes this is not an easy task to do. Partly, I'm not that confident and forgot the relevant question to ask. Another contributing factor is most of the patients have some disability ranging from paralysis in one part of their body, language difficulty (aphasia) due to the problem in the brain, dementia and depression. It is not easy for patients to cope and understand the burden of their disease. It just reminds me of this television show which depicts the life of a patient with a disabling disease. It is sad yet good in showing how disease can impact life of the patient and their family.

Anyway, hopefully I will be able to grasp the important concepts from this rotation.

broken heart syndrome

Image taken from here

I attended case presentation by the registrar this morning. The meeting start at 8 am and free breakfast was provided. This is a weekly case presentation.

One of the cases that were presented was broken heart syndrome. The name is interesting and the clinical presentation fits the description.

This describes a situation when a person had a sudden onset of chest pain and it mimic severe heart attack [again, why do we always call severe heart attack instead of small heart attack or heart attack :) ].The investigation of the coronary arteries (this is the blood vessel of the heart) will be normal whereas in a heart attack, coronary arteries sometimes can be blocked. The left ventricle sometimes can be seen as bulging due differences in muscle contraction in ventricle.

Diagram of the heart. From Yahoo health

How this syndrome happens? This usually happen in elderly women who had severe emotional stress such as the loss of a loved one or receiving bad news.

How this is related to my neurology rotation? Apparently, stroke can cause broken heart syndrome too. Another name for this disease is Takotsubo. It means octopus trap in Japanese.

This disease does not usually leave permanent damage to the heart and usually patient can recover within few days. Although there is no physical damage to the heart, the person will be suffering from emotional damage. Now, how do you mend a broken heart?

anatomy

Another tiring week. There are a lot of things to do. The biggest thing that I forgot now is the neuroanatomy. I can't exactly remember which foramen the cranial nerves travel into and the name of main muscles and related nerves in upper and lower limb. I think I will remember those by this weekend.

For non-medics, the term arm and leg are not sufficient to cover both hand and leg. The layman term of hand/arm and leg has different meaning in medicine :).

young

Kasyah has asked me to put my childhood pictures. I have combined these two pictures to show you how much my face changed. I cannot exactly remember when the pictures were taken.

I have lots of pictures when I was small but I think this should be enough :).

age and risk factor

We were discussing some eye diseases such as macula degeneration, retinal detachment and retinal artery occlusion in the eye tutorial given by a registrar. One of my groupmate suddenly asked why age is always a risk factor in some of the eye diseases that we have discussed.

The registrar said he doesn't exactly know. He further told us that age is always associated with any diseases. As we get older, we are more likely to get one disease or another. It is the way of life. People dies due illnesses. The only way to prevent age as a risk factor is to stay young or die early :).

It is an interesting answer. Somehow it reminds me of this hadith...

Narrated Abu Huraira:


The Prophet said, "Allah will not accept the excuse of any person whose instant of death is delayed till he is sixty years of age."

[Sahih Bukhari, Book 76, hadith no 428]

---

Another interesting story I found is this: The cat who can predict death.

first week of neuro

It was quite a busy week. Our PBL case this week was stroke. It requires thorough knowledge of the structure of the brain and related nerves.

The hospital that I'm attached to, has three campuses and we usually rotates around only two campus, Austin and Repat. There is free shuttle bus between the two campus and I usually park my car at Repat since the parking at Austin is relatively expensive. However, there were many times when I missed the bus. It took me around 10-20 minutes to travel from my home to Repat depending on whether I'm stuck in a traffic jam or not. Whenever I missed the bus, I prefer not to wait for the next bus which will come in another 15 minutes. Within that time, I will be able to reach Austin by walking :).

I guess if this trend continues throughout this semester ( I mean, walking from Repat to Austin), I might shed some kg from my weight. Just for your information, Austin is located at the hilltop.

How to survive the first week of neuro rotation?

1. Learn the arterial territories of the brain.
2. Cranial nerve.
   
3. CT and MRI.
4. Upper and lower limb examination.
5. Upper motor neuron and lower motor neuron lesion. Know the differences between these two disorders.
   
6. ALS, DCML and motor tracts.
   
7. Parkinson and the structure of basal ganglia.

There are still a lot that I need to revise for neurology. I have not covered 12 cranial nerves in detail yet.

For non-medic, cranial nerve is a special group of nerves that connect the brain to special part of the face and shoulder. For example, some cranial nerves are connected to ear, eye, face muscles, tongue and shoulder muscles. You can imagine nerve as wire that delivers information between brain and any part of our body. Anything that disconnects nerve will cause paralysis of the organ that the nerve is connected to. This is what usually happens when someone has stroke.

Ski trip

I went out for skiing yesterday at Lake Mountain. It was about 2-3 hours drive from the city. This is the first time I am skiing. I went there with many Malaysian students and the trip was fun and a bit exhausting.

The snow at Lake Mountain was thick and some places even waist deep. The scenery was amazing and a bit cold. We even managed to make instant 'ais kacang' using snow, baked beans and creamed milk B-)
The ski trails has many path and we choose the easiest route. The path is about few kilometres long and it was the most tiring journey I have made using ski. Since this is my first time using ski, I often falls and trip over for every 10 metres. The worst is when we tried to ski down a slope. I am able to ski properly down the hill but I don't know how to stop or slow down. As the speed increases, I became a bit anxious and lost the balance. This happened every time I skied down a steep terrain.

Some people even crashed against each other and few people almost hit a tree on the way down. For a beginner, this sport can be a bit dangerous if you are not able to balance properly.

In the last 100 metres of the ski trail, after countless falls and suffering enough bruises at my knee, ankle and wrist and pain at my back, I gave up. I took off the ski and started walking :). Next time I am planning to ski, I should read some tips on how to ski properly and safely.

UPDATE: The picture of 'ais kacang' :)

cumulative updates

First day was a tiring day. We started around 8.30 am and finished around 5pm. It was a busy schedule and I will need some time to get used to this kind of schedule. In the past, that is when we were studying medicine at university, we have a more relaxed timetable and lots of free time.

Now, the timetable for the clinical years seems like there are a lot to be covered and the tutorials will be flexible. If the tutor is too busy, he/she will postponed to it on later/earlier date. We have to prepare for rescheduling at any time. This semester is 18 weeks without any mid-semester break at all. We have three 6-weeks rotation for this semester. The only official holiday that we could get is 3 day break in between the rotation. I would not call Friday, Saturday and Sunday as a long break though. We have to prepare for the next rotation.

Fortunately/unfortunately our exam is not that long. From the timetable that they gave to us, it seems the exam will finish in less than a week. And I think the gap for something like SWOT VAC is about 3 days. Never ever study last minute :).

My group has the opportunity to have cardio tute right on the first day.The tutor expects us to know everything about cardio since we have learned that in pre-clinical years. Perhaps the tutor forgot that most of us have one year of holiday research year prior to clinical years. When the tutor asked us to describe what causes three waves in JVP, my mind became blur. When the next question was asking about differential diagnosis on heart murmur, I could not remember. I guess one year of doing research has totally diluted my medical knowledge.

p/s: I extremely need lots of time to do revision now.

---

A bit sad to know that one of our medical staff that helps us a lot since first year has passed away due to cancer.

Diencephalon

This is part of human brain structure. It is located right in the middle of the brain. My new semester will start with neurology,that is the study of the brain and nerves.

Image from Stanford

This is part of human brain structure. It is located right in the middle of the brain. My new semester will start with neurology,that is the study of the brain and nerves.

It is tough to master the structure of the brain. When I was first introduced to the neuroanatomy back in Semester 4 [almost 2 years ago], it took me weeks to understand the whole structure and function. You have to view the whole structure in 3D and able to imagine the impact of any damage/lesion to any part of the brain.

Why put the title as diencephalon? Learning about brain and its related structure will introduce to lots of new [sometimes hard to pronounce and decipher] medical jargon.

If you see any medical students who are studying neuroanatomy [the anatomy of the nervous system], you might able to hear them talking in a foreign language ;)

Related post

Changing blog direction

Mac-alike dock menu

This is a rather interesting application of CSS and Javascript. Click here to see the demo created by ndesign.

Another version that I found on the net is this one. Cool.

With advanced CSS technique, you could modify the code and put it in the blogger template. This technique could be improved if internet browsers support vector graphics. If this format is supported, that would be totally awesome.

Changing blog direction

For the past few weeks, I have been blogging on Blogger-related stuff such as displaying my new blogger templates, blogger hacks and tips on web design. These posts were written to fill my part time interest which is to design blog templates.

Now, my winter holiday almost at its end. I guess I have to stop blogging about blogger layouts and started to blog about my mundane life as a medical student :). If I have time, I will try to create another blog to transfer my posts on Blogger hacks and blogger layouts.

I still have another one week before the new semester starts. I guess I should do some revision after one year break from medical school :D.

Tagged for charity

I have seen few bloggers did this meme. I'm not tagged by anyone but since this is for charity, I would like to join the effort too :).

This is started by Mr Idham. I never met him in person though. By doing this meme, he will contribute RM 127 (roughly AUD 50) towards Darul Izzah orphanage, on behalf of those bloggers who completed this tag before 26th August 2007. Once you have completed this tag, leave a comment at his blog to let him know.

Instead of direct donation to the orphanage, this tag will hopefully highlight the struggle of those children. This is my guess of the reason behind this tag :).

---

By doing this meme you are contributing RM127 to the Darul Izzah Orphanage...

The meme is about completing at least seventeen out of the following twenty seven sentences.......

1. A person is only as good as how strong he believes in faith/religion.
   
2. Friendship is always a sweet responsibility, never an opportunity (Kahlil Gibran)
   
3. To love is a characteristic that make people more humane. Without love, humanity will suffer.
   
4. Money makes me rich and gives me an opportunity to help others.
   
5. I miss my family.
   
6. My way of saying I care is by to listen attentively to other people problems even though I could not help a lot.
   
7. I try to spread love and happiness by helping other people.
   
8. Pick the flowers when they fully bloom.
   
9. To love someone is to to share happy and bitter moments with the other person.
10. Beauty is something that in its supreme development, invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears (Edgar Allen Poe).
    
11. When I was thirteen, what I remember the most was my experience living in UK.
    
12. When I was twenty one, I remember the excitement of having a personal blog (refers to this blog) :)
    
13. I am most happy when I'm not sad ;)
    
14. Nothing makes me happier than a clean and well-organised house.
    
15. If I can change one thing, I will change my past attitude.
    
16. If smiles were able to heal the wounds of the heart, then I would smile often.
    
17. Wouldn't it be nice if we could have a life without any misery.
    
18. If you want to achieve your own ambition, then you have to work hard for it. There is no short cut in life.
    
19. Money is not everything but sometimes it is able to alleviate other people's burden.
    
20. The most touching moments I have experienced is to learn that my grandmother used to babysit me at the time she is dying. Not much I could do except my prayers.
    
21. I smile when I'm happy
    
22. When I am happy, I smile :D
    
23. If only I don't have to do a research for my medical degree, then I would graduate one year earlier.
    
24. The best thing I did yesterday was to learn something new about CSS.
    
25. If I ever write a book, I will give it this title,"Ways to achieve ultimate happiness in life"
    
26. One thing I must do before I die is to leave a good memory to my family and relatives
    
27. Doing this meme, I feel like there are a lot of things to do to alleviate the ever increasing world problems.

---

I'm not tagging anyone to do this though :).

Useful links for new Blogger

Understanding new Blogger template/layout

1. De-constructing Blogger Template. One of the earliest attempt to understand the code behind new Blogger layout.
   
2. Understanding new Blogger template. Part 1, 2 and 3. Detailed analysis of new Blogger template.
3. Blogger Help - Layout. The explanation given here is rather technical and requires some basic knowledge on programming. Not exactly helpful for average users though.
   
4. Creating a new blogger template from scratch. Part 1, 2, 3 and 4. This blog will help you to build your own blog template and this series is intended for blog users who do not know anything about CSS and HTML.
5. Tutorial on blogger template. Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12. This tutorial will guide to understand further on new blogger layouts.
   

Problems with new Blogger.

1. Blogger Status
2. Known Issues
3. Real Blogger Status.
   
4. Blogger Help Group. There are millions of blogspot users. Chances are that there will be some people who have experience the same problem as yours. Please do not expect quick reply from Blogger Employees. Please exercise patience and search the group first before posting your own problem.
   

Blogger hacks

There are thousands of blog/websites that offer hacks for new Blogger. I will try to list some of the important websites.

1. Blogger Hacks Wiki. Well, this should be a good starting place :).
2. Beautiful Beta Wiki.
3. Blogger Hack Search. This searches 15 sites that offer Blogger hacks.
4. Hackosphere. I like his Neo template. Quite cool.
   
5. Blogger Hacked.
6. Hoctro
7. Phydeaux3
8. Last Word
9. Blogger University
   
10. Blogger for Dummies.
    
11. Google [Please note that google is a verb ;) ]. If all else fails, there are always Google/Yahoo/MSN to help you.
    

Blogger templates

Same case as blogger hacks. There are millions of websites offering blogger layout. I will try to focus on websites that specifically designed new Blogger layouts for free. Any websites that are only offering Blogger template for the old Blogger will be excluded.

1. Gecko & Fly
2. Blogger templates
3. New Blogger template
4. the Blogger workshop
5. Free templates
6. Final Sense
   

General tips for serious bloggers

Many blogspot users try to increase their revenue by putting Google Adsense code in their blogs. If you are serious in attracting large number of web visitors, this category should help you. Please remember that high quality content will be the key to increase your blog visitors. This is applicable to all range of blogging platforms, be it Bloggers, Wordpress or your own domain.

1. Problogger.net. With more than 26000 subscribers, this should highlight the importance of this website. Highly recommended for those who are serious about blogging.
   
2. Copyblogger.
3. 55 essential articles every serious blogger should read.
4. Google Adsense - Facts, FAQ and tools by Smashing Magazine.
5. Google Page Rank: What do we know about it? by Smashing Magazine.
   

This post will be updated in the future whenever I find interesting links to add. If you know any important links that I miss, please put it in the comment.

Few Blogger hacks

Nakul has asked me few questions on Blogger hacks. I will give the explanation here and hopefully it will benefit other people as well.

Hide Blogger navigation bar
Insert this in your b:skin

#navbar-iframe {
  height:0px;
  visibility:hidden;
  display:none;
}

Use Blogger custom search engine in layout

It is important for you to hide blogger navigation bar first. I don't think you would like to see two search box in the same layout :). Put this code on anywhere where you want it to be displayed.

<form action="http://yourblogname.blogspot.com/search" id="searchthis" method="get" style="display: inline;">
<input id="b-query" maxlength="200" name="q" size="30" type="text" />
<input alt="Search" id="b-searchbtn" src="http://hafiz238.googlepages.com/search.gif" align="top" hspace="1" type="image" />
</form>

Replace yourblogname with your blog address. Maxlength refers to the maximum number of characters eg letters and numbers, that can be put into your search box. Size refers to the length of your search box. For example, the length of my search box is 30 characters. src refers to the image of search button. You can change this link to your own search button. Perhaps, you want to change the search button into a magnifying glass :).

If you would like to use standard search button, Replace this code

<input alt="Search" id="b-searchbtn" src="http://hafiz238.googlepages.com/search.gif" align="top" hspace="1" type="image" />

with this code

<input id='b-searchbtn' type='submit' value='Search' />

How to add social bookmarks

Full credits goes to Beautiful Beta. Please refer to this post for further instruction :).

How to change date header format into a date calendar icon

This hack is achieved by using an image. All my new blogger layouts have this hack. The image for this layout is this one .

If you would like to use this image for your blog, insert this code in b:skin

.date-header {
height:52px;
width:45px;
float:left;
text-align:center;
font: normal normal normal 10px/100% Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;
padding: 22px 4px 0 0;
margin: 0 10px;
background: url('http://hafiz238.googlepages.com/calendar.gif') no-repeat;
}

Next, go to your setting tab and click formatting. Use the following options

• Language: English (United States)
• Date Header Format: Month Day Year. Please ensure that the month is in abbreviation form. For example 15 September 2007 will be written as Sept 15 2007.

B-)

Related post
Useful links for new Blogger

Silver Ray

The name of this layout is a combination from silver lining and sunray which has been suggested by Minci and Farah. Thanks to Striker, Moshimoshi, Aria Ayumi for giving suggestion :).

Silver Ray is a fixed width 3-column layout. This is based on my current blog layout. This new blogger layout is compatible with IE6, IE7 and Firefox 2. Snapshot of the layout.

Update: Silver Ray version 2. Blog post is in the middle.

Comment Section.

I have modified the comment section. In my previous blogger layouts, I have designed it as a dialog box. For this one, I designed the comment section as a box.

Installation guide

1. Backup your current blog layout. How to migrate from old classic Blogger to new Blogger.
2. Download Silver Ray or Silver Ray (blog post middle) by right click and save link as...
3. Open the file using Notepad.
   
4. Search the following words: yourprofile, YourBlogName. [How to search? If you are using windows, press Ctrl and F together at the same time, or go to Edit and scroll down to Find]. Change yourprofile with the address of your profile. Change YourBlogName to your blog address. There are 3 places that you need to update YourBlogName.
5. Save the file.
6. Login into Blogger and click layout. Click edit html tab and upload Silver-Ray.xml by clicking upload button.
7. At this point, Blogger may ask you that the current widget setting will be deleted. Please save the setting into a text file [eg Notepad, Microsoft Word] if you are going to use the widget in the future. Otherwise, click confirm and save.
8. Next, click setting tab. Go to formatting and choose the following options.

• Language: English (United States)
• Date Header format: Month, Day, Year. Please make sure the name of month in abbreviation form. For example, December 10 2007 will be written as Dec 10 2007. This step is to ensure the date will fit into the date-calendar icon.

9. Check your blog and hopefully you will have Silver ray installed as your current blog template :)
   

Blogger Hack

1. Encrypted blog post. Read More.
2. Language Translation Widget.
3. Expandable post with Peekaboo view.
4. Recent post widget
5. Recent comment widget
6. Blogger Label Hack
7. Need more hack? Use Blogger Hack Search Engine or Google :).
   

If you have any problem, feel free to contact me.

rainy day

It has been raining for the past few days. Some area even have been flooded [read more]. Not that I am complaining though. Victoria is currently facing severe drought and many areas has been put under severe water restriction. Rain is a blessing for Victorians.

This is the current satellite picture.

The current enormous clouds has moved from East Australia to New Zealand. It seems like the cloud has gobbled up NZ. Hopefully the people of NZ will be all right :).

finding a name

I usually put a name to a blog layout based on the header image. At the moment, I am designing another blog layout. This time the header image is the picture below.

This picture is taken on top of Mount Lofty, Adelaide. The time was somewhere before sunset. So, what should I called my new blog layout? Should it be waiting for the sunset, cloudy day...any idea will be welcomed :).

Related post
My winter trip adventure (in Malay)
Taking pictures from Mount Lofty (in Malay)

Ladybug (Red theme)

I have edited the original Ladybug layout and modified the colour from green to red :). I'm not sure whether the colour is too striking or not. This is the first time I designed a blog layout in red.

This is the snapshot of the Ladybug (red theme)
The snapshot of the comment section.

This new blogger layout/template is compatible with Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 2. There is one issue with Internet Explorer 6 though. The header is created in gif format and thus, when view using Internet Explorer 6, white corner appear around the header image as shown below. Issue has been fixed :).

Installation Guide

1. Make sure you backup your original blog layout/template in your computer. How to migrate from old blogger to new blogger.
   
2. Download the ladybug (red theme) by right click and click save link as....
3. There are several links that need to be updated with your blog url.

   • open the file with Notepad.
     
   • Search this in the file yourblogname and update this to your blogspot name. There are 5 places where you need to update the blogspot name.
   • save the file.
     

4. Login into Blogger and click layout. Click edit html tab and upload ladybug.xml by clicking upload button.
5. At this point, Blogger may ask you that the current widget setting will be deleted. Please save the setting into a text file [eg Notepad, Microsoft Word] if you are going to use the widget in the future. Otherwise, click confirm and save.
6. Next, click setting tab. Go to formatting and choose the following options.

• language: English (United States)
• Date Header format: Month, Day, Year. Please make sure the name of month in abbreviation form. For example, June 16 2007 will be written as Jun 16 2007. This step is to ensure the date will fit into the date-calendar icon.

7. Final step is to check your blog and hopefully you will have Ladybug Theme :D.
   

Related post

Ladybug (Green theme)

Feel free to contact me if you encounter any problem.

UPDATE 2/9/2007: Ladybug (red theme) with 3 column.