Sick to Your Stomach? What's Really Wrong

Q. How can you tell whether you have a stomach virus or food poisoning, and what do you do for each? -- Lori, West Hills, CA

A. Food poisoning and a stomach virus are tougher to tell apart than twin tigers at 2 miles. They have the same symptoms -- that dynamic duo of vomiting and diarrhea -- and the same danger (dehydration, which can be life threatening). When either is relatively mild, you don't really need to know which is which, except to remember which restaurant not to go back to. They're treated in the same way -- fluids to replace what you've lost, rest, giving your stomach a break, and then easing into easily digestible food such as gelatin, rice, bananas, or chicken. But if your symptoms -- especially diarrhea, or blood or mucus in loose stools -- last for several days or if you develop a fever, the time for keeping matters in your own hands has passed. You need to see your doctor: It could be food poisoning, a norovirus (the cruise ship "flu"), or even an infection from bacteria or a parasite (which can also come from something you ate). Any one of them has the potential to send you to the hospital for IV fluids and drugs -- or worse -- if you wait too long.

Q. I have a cat and a 15-month-old daughter. My neighbor told me to worry about the germs the cat may carry on to the carpet or tile floor from his cat box to my daughter. Are there any serious germs to worry about?
-- Anonymous

A. Put away the Lysol (it will ruin your carpets, anyway). Your cat and your toddler should be able to coexist peacefully, as long as she's not treating the litter pan as her personal sandbox. Cats aren't particularly germy, but there are a few diseases they can pass along to humans, especially babies. Toxoplasmosis, for example, is a parasitic infection that cats can pick up by eating infected rodents or birds. It causes flu-like symptoms in humans, but if a child is infected before birth (through the mother), exposure can lead to vision loss, seizures, and mental disability. Following a few simple rules should keep the whole family (cat included) safe:

• Don't allow your cat and kid to be alone together -- at least until your child is 5 years old. Not gonna happen? At least make sure your child doesn't kiss the pet on the lips or put her hands in her mouth after handling the animal. If a fight breaks out, clean up bites or scratches and apply antibiotic ointment.
• Keep kitty inside. Outdoor cats (and dogs) are likely to pick up more than fleas and ticks. They can acquire roundworms and hookworms from the feces of other animals and then pass them along. These worms can burrow their way into your child's (or your) intestines and other parts of the body where they can cause some serious damage, even blindness. Make sure your pets are tested and wormed regularly. Which brings us to our next tip: Clean up all pet waste immediately.

Q. I recently read a newspaper article that said there wasn't a big difference between organic and regular beef if animals are fed corn that is genetically modified. Is there a difference? -- Hana, via e-mail

A. You get no advantages if the cow eats genetically modified corn. The big difference with organic beef is that the animals raised this way don't get the antibiotics and other chemicals given to those raised conventionally. Also, to be called organic, cattle must have access to pastures that provide the bulk of their dietary needs. Notice we said "access." Finding out whether they used that access is harder than scoring a front-row ticket for the Beatles. (Yes, we know they don't exist any longer; that's our point).

If you're looking for a vastly different meat product for the occasional times you eat meat, look for 100% grass-fed organic beef. Cattle fed on grass alone have less saturated fat (but you still need to limit yourself to less than 4 grams of this per meal), more vitamin E, more beta carotene, and as much as 40% more omega-3 fatty acids -- the heart-and brain-healthy fats found in fatty fish -- than corn-fed beef. But that's still not a mother lode: 3 ounces of grass-fed beef has about 75 milligrams of omega-3s. Salmon has nearly 2,000.