(View entire post here)

As a physician, I am used to answering medical questions from my patients. However, friends and family also like to ask me health questions, ranging from serious topics like brain tumors to trivial ones like ingrown toenails. My two daughters, Andrea and Julia, also like to query me about medical matters. One day, my husband, Charlie, heard the girls ask me, "Why don't your eyelashes grow?" It is a basic questions, but one for which most people don't know the answer. As I explained to the girls about the cycle of hair growth, it gave my husband and idea. Why not write a book about everyday medical questions? Andrea and Julia would compile the questions, and I could provide the answers. Within days, Andrea and Julia had come up with dozens of questions--involving human body trivia (How many bones are in the body?), gross scientific facts (Why do we have boogers?), urban myths (Will you go blind if you sit too close to the TV?), and basic medical facts (Why do some people have innie belly buttons and others have outies?). In a little more than a month, we had more than 150 questions to answer! This book is intended for children and parents to address the everyday medical questions that come up frequently in day-to-day life.

Excerpt from p.55: "Why Don't Your Eyelashes Grow?"

Your eyelashes do grow, but not very fast.

Every hair on your body goes through a cycle - first the hair grows, then it transitions to a resting phase when it stops growing, and eventually it falls out. The hair on your head has a long cycle that lasts for man years - scalp hair goes through its growth cycle for several years, followed by a two-to-three-week transition phase and a resting period of three to four months before falling out.

On the other hand, eyelash hair goes through a short cycle of growth (two to three months), then a transition phase (two to three weeks), followed by a resting period of two to three months before the eyelash falls out. The cycle then begins again with new lashes. Because your eyelashes live only several months - compared with your scalp hair, which grows for several years - your eyelashes never grow enough for you to notice. Finally, because individual hairs start and end their growth cycles at different times, all of your hair never falls out at once!

View more information on Why Don't Your Eyelashes Grow?

Beth Ann Ditkoff, Why Don't Your Eyelashes Grow, questions, kids, human body,factoids,books, Penguin Books