Month: April 2019
-
An abominable habit
Michael Crossland London, United Kingdom Onania, by John Marten. 1730. Eighteenth Century Collections Online (accessed April 4, 2019). Link Jay is a large man in his twenties with a plume of unruly red hair, giving him the air of an oversized rooster. He is a great storyteller with a contagious laugh, and I always…
-
The artistic depiction of Christ’s crucifixion: history meets biomechanics
Mark RansomJohnson City, Tennessee, United States The artistic depiction of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, particularly from the first known images through the seventeenth century, are inconsistent in their portrayal of His cross and body position. There is little doubt that some of the evolution in the scene is in keeping with the artists’ deliberate…
-
A jigsaw puzzle
Julia Nguyen Phoenix, Arizona, USA (Photo credit to Geetika Gupta) Imagine yourself browsing the Entertainment section at the local store. Of all the sections you could possibly be in—Beauty, Grocery, Household, Pharmacy—here you are at the Entertainment section, looking for a jigsaw puzzle. There are so many choices: outdoor scenery or abstract? A 1,000-piece…
-
Falls and art: An evolving story
Glenn ArendtsMurdoch, Australia Coming to rest inadvertently on the ground:1 the World Health Organization (WHO) definition of a fall sounds vaguely patronizing, bordering on disinterested. The human act of staying upright is a complex triumph of the integration of neurosensory, musculoskeletal, and cardiovascular systems, and its failure is associated with injury, fear, and embarrassment. Ancient…
-
Ports of Calls: toward a taxonomy of hospital on-call rooms
Mike Wong Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada Clinical clerks’ on-call room. Photographed by the author. 2018. Glancing around the dimly lit 10’ x 10’ chamber, I placed my backpack on a wilting twin mattress enveloped in standard issue, blue striped flannel sheets neatly folded into hospital corners. Between the doorframe and water-stained ceiling, with indifference,…
-
Montaigne’s Essays: Emotions and empathy
David JeffreyEdinburgh, Scotland The term empathy was coined a little over a hundred years ago and since then its definition has evolved. At first empathy was regarded as a sharing of emotions, but modern medicine emphasizes cognitive aspects of the concept.1 Regarding the sharing of emotion with suspicion has led to a form of professionalism…
-
Living with incidental cyberchondria
Theresa Danna Burbank, California, United States Bioblasts. Credit: Odra Noel. CC BY-NC Before the Internet, if I had a pain in my chest, I would assume it was gas and then burp and move on with my day. After the Internet, if I have a pain in my chest, I panic and think, “That’s…