Tag: Fall 2018
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The art of surgery: ‘surgical theatrics’ on the surgeon’s stage
Cynthia Avila Chicago, Illinois, United States Thomas Eakins. The Agnew Clinic. 1889. Oil on canvas, 84 3/8 in x 118 1/8 in, John Morgan Building at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Sorry indeed should I be, to sport with the life of a fellow-creature who might repose a confidence either in my surgical…
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The ligament of Vaclav Treitz
Vaclav Treitz (1819-1872) was born in Bohemia, studied humanities at the Charles University in Prague, and obtained his medical degree there in 1846. He then furthered his education at the New or Second Vienna School under the great luminaries of the time, Karl Rokitansky, Joseph Skoda, and Ferdinand von Hebra. He specifically worked in anatomy…
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Erasistratus
Erasistratus (304–250 BC) founded a school of anatomy in Alexandria, where he described the valves of the heart; concluded that the heart functioned as a pump; and distinguished between arteries and veins. He believed that the arteries were full of air and that they carried the “animal spirit”; appears to have almost discovered the circulation of the blood; and carried…
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Dominic Corrigan (1802–1880)
In the days when students were expected to have at least a smattering of medical history, they would have known that Corrigan’s sign and pulse were indicative of aortic regurgitation and would have guessed that Corrigan was Irish. Very few, if any, would have known about Corrigan’s cirrhosis, Corrigan’s button, or the maladie de Corrigan.1…
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Jacarandas – a dream
In the year when the Olympic Games were held in Australia, the Jacarandas were in full bloom and their blue blossoms wafted through the air. At the Olympic campus an English boy and an Australian girl fell in love. Every night they would be seen walking through the cool air holding hands. Sometimes they went…
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Nothing prepares you for this
Anne RooneyOak Park, Illinois, United States There are never enough beds. Seventy women lie side by side on the floor of a hospital ward intended for thirty patients. Some sleep on torn brown blankets on the cement floor. Those lucky enough to have a bed have neither sheets nor a pillow, only a wafer thin…
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Until I get my strength back
Anne L. Rooney Oak Park, Illinois, USA Hospice hands The emaciated woman lay scrunched in a fetal position with her back to me. I stood in the doorway to her cramped bedroom. “Hello, Loretta. Can I come in?” Loretta rolled over, squinting with suspicion. “You a nurse?” I nodded. “I’m a nurse who visits…
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Addressing hunger in Tamilnadu
Dhastagir Sultan Sheriff Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India “There’s enough food on this planet for everyone’s needs but not for everyone’s greed.” – Mohandas Gandhi Around 800 million people suffer from hunger globally, a number that may double by 2050. Chronic hunger creates a vicious cycle of malnutrition, stunted growth, and childhood death before the…
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He is not coming back
Jack Riggs Morgantown, West Virginia, United States US Military Hospital Kuwait (2005) surrounded by large concrete barriers with “seating” at base. These relatively private seats were the frequent site for all sorts of meetings; counseling sessions, grief reactions, friendly meetings, unfriendly meetings, gripe sessions, etc. (Author is middle individual in photo). “Good evening,…
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Shackleton’s angel
Paul G. Firth Boston, Massachusetts, United States Shackleton’s angel. Photo by Paul Firth. South Georgia Island is a tortured upheaval of mountain and glacier that falls in chaos to the jagged coastline of the South Atlantic Ocean.1 From thirty miles of this wind-blasted sub-Antarctic wilderness came walking on the afternoon of the 20 May 1916…