Nigh Anxiety

Some places are more stressful than others, like your in-laws' house or the dentist's office. Also cities. The personal finance company WalletHub surveyed 182 U.S. cities to determine which were most or least stressful, at least in terms of how residents were faring economically.

Cities were ranked according to 39 metrics, such as average weekly work hours, the unemployment rate, divorce rate and suicide rate.

Top Five Most Stressed Cities

1. Detroit, Michigan

2. Baltimore, Maryland

3. Cleveland, Ohio

4. Memphis, Tennessee

5. Shreveport, Louisiana

Top Five Least Stressed Cities

178. Lincoln, Nebraska

179. Fargo, North Dakota

180. Bismarck, North Dakota

181. South Burlington, Vermont

182. Fremont, California

Some particulars:

-- Rapid City, South Dakota, and Honolulu, Hawaii, have the lowest unemployment rate, which is five times lower than in Detroit, the city with the highest.

-- Fremont, California, has the lowest divorce rate, which is 4.4 times lower than in Cleveland, the city with the highest.

-- Cheyenne, Wyoming, has the lowest share of adults in fair or poor health, which is 3.1 times lower than in San Antonio, Texas, the city with the highest.

-- Columbia, Maryland, has the highest median annual household income (adjusted by cost of living), which is 3.3 times higher than in Detroit, the city with the lowest.

Body of Knowledge

Women cry more frequently than men, an estimated 30 to 64 times a year compared to six to 17 times annually for men. That's about four times more often. Some reasons suggested may be higher levels of prolactin, a hormone associated with emotional states and tear production.

Contrarily, testosterone may actively inhibit crying -- except, of course, during that scene in "The Dirty Dozen" when Jim Brown is running for the truck, dropping grenades down air vents, when a German machine gunner takes aim. ...

Get Me That, Stat!

Among the many stressors in life (regardless of where you live -- see above) is the constant deluge of emails, solicited and unsolicited -- mostly the latter. A survey of 1,000 U.S. adults by All About Cookies, a personal information protection site, found that people have an average of 1,044 unread emails in their digital accounts.

Less than one-third of respondents said they had zero unread emails.

Bonus stat: Respondents reported getting 17 texts, 18 social media alerts and 18 push notifications a day on average.

Mark Your Calendar

August is awareness month for children's eye health, gastroparesis (a chronic disorder where stomach muscles don't properly move food into the small intestine), breastfeeding, immunizations and psoriasis, a chronic autoimmune disorder that causes skin cells to multiply rapidly, leading to thick, raised, scaly patches, and, according to old TV commercials, causes heartbreak.

Stories for the Waiting Room

Salmonella enteritidis is a major bacterial pathogen and a leading cause of salmonellosis, an infection that typically results in diarrhea, fever and stomach cramps. In vulnerable individuals, it can require medical treatment.

It's the reason U.S. government regulations require commercial egg producers to wash and sanitize eggs ahead of sale.

Producers do so by rinsing eggs in warm water followed by a sanitizing agent, often chlorine based. The washing eliminates any salmonella bacteria that might be lurking on the egg's outer shell.

But there's a catch. Washing the eggs also removes a thin film that naturally prevents bacteria from entering the egg and infecting the unborn chick. So washing temporarily sterilizes the eggs but leaves them open to future contamination.

That's why eggs are required to be refrigerated from production through the point of sale. Keeping them cold is the only way to impede bacteria returning.

Doc Talk

Oral commissures: The corners of the mouth where the upper and lower lips meet and connect

Best Medicine

"What does your daddy do for a living?" asked the man.

"My daddy's dead," replied the little girl.

"What did he do before he died?"

"He sorta clutched at his chest and fell over."

Medical History

This week in 1903, Thomas Edison opined on the front page of New York World newspaper about his concerns regarding the newfangled X-ray technology. Under the headline "Edison Fears Hidden Perils of the X-rays," he noted a history of injuries of his lab's employees while studying X-rays, including one worker who had his arm and hand amputated because of cancer caused by exposure to X-rays. Edison said working with his own X-ray fluoroscope had harmed his eyesight.

Edison abandoned his X-ray research, writing, "I am afraid of radium and polonium too, and I don't want to monkey with them."

Med School

Match these compounds found in the body with their definitions.

1) Peptides

2) Nucleotides

3) Lipids

4) Saccharides

A) The building blocks of DNA and RNA, which store and transmit genetic information.

B) The basic structural unit of carbohydrates, commonly known as sugars.

C) Short chains of amino acids that are the fundamental building blocks of proteins.

D) A broad group of organic molecules that include fats, waxes, oils and steroids.

Answers: 1-C; 2-A; 3-D; 4-B.

Curtain Calls

In 1834, Scottish botanist David Douglas (1799-1834) died in Hawaii after falling into a pit trap and being mauled by a bull. A bullock hunter and escaped convict named Edward Gurney was the last person to see Douglas alive, and there were suspicions, but no conclusive evidence, of foul play by Gurney. The Douglas fir is named after the botanist. More than 80 species of plants and animals have "douglassi" in their scientific names to honor Douglas' years of research and discovery.

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To find out more about Scott LaFee and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.