Tag: Spring 2022
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Beans: an indelicate subject of conversation
Anatomy books describe kidneys as bean shaped, but the converse does not apply. This is because beans, multitudinous in their species, come in different shapes and sizes. Many look like small kidneys, but only one is called a kidney bean.1,2 Like their cousins lentils and peas, beans are the dried seeds of the flowering plants…
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Diagnosis: Neurosyphilis. Treatment: Malaria, iatrogenic
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “The syphilitic man was thinking hard…about how to get his legs to step off the curb and carry him across Washington Street. Here was his problem: His brains, where the instructions to his legs originated, were being eaten alive by corkscrews.”– Kurt Vonnegut, The Breakfast of Champions Julius Wagner-Jauregg, M.D. (1857–1940) graduated…
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Ladies in hats
Alan BlumTuscaloosa, Alabama, United States I was encouraging an overweight patient in patent leather shoes with two-inch heels to start wearing sneakers instead, when she calmly reached into her totebag and pulled out a pair of Nikes. The pumps, she explained, were her “comin’-to-the-doctor shoes.” Her finest footwear was a sign of respect. Hats, too,…
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A tale of three doctors
Howard FischerUppsala, Sweden “How true it is that it is difficult to benefit mankind without some unpleasantness resulting for oneself.”– Dr. Edme-Claude Bourru, giving Dr. Guillotin’s eulogy Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, M.D. (1738–1814) was an ex-Jesuit priest, a practicing physician, and a politician just before and during the French Revolution.1,2 He was an opponent of capital punishment…
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Early surgery of meningocele
JMS PearceHull, England A variety of dysraphic states, recorded since antiquity, (Fig 1)1 are caused by the failed closure of the neural tube during the fourth week of embryonic life. They include hydrocephalus, Chiari malformations, and various types of spina bifida with meningocele or meningomyelocele. Nicolaes Tulp (1593–1674)—subject of Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson—in Observationes Medicae…
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Book review: Understanding the NHS
Arpan K. BanerjeeSolihull, United Kingdom The National Health Service in the United Kingdom was founded in 1948 by Aneurin Bevan, a Welsh Labour Party politician and health minister in Clement Attlee’s post-war Labour government. Bevan was a coal miner before entering Parliament in 1928. He had long campaigned for a free health service for all…
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Robert the Bruce
Robert the Bruce and leprosy King Robert I of the Scots (1274–1329), better known as Robert the Bruce, is revered in Scotland as a national hero. He is principally remembered for defeating the English at Bannockburn in 1314 and thereby restoring the independence of Scotland for several centuries. He presents a medical as well as…
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Arthur William Mayo-Robson
JMS PearceHull, England, United Kingdom Arthur William Robson (1853–1933) (Fig 1) was born the son of a chemist John Bonnington Robson, in Filey, a popular Yorkshire seaside resort.1 He later added Mayo to his surname. He is reported as attending Wesley College in Sheffield, though he is not mentioned in their list of alumni. He…
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Bone headdress
Susan SampleSalt Lake City, Utah, United States After artwork created by a person with cancer Why tens of bones linkedwith silver chain intoan earthly veil? I gaze at other entries:hand-stitched quiltswith undulating seams. I am accustomedto O’Keeffe’s paintingof the lone cow skull; Ezekiel’s storyof dry, disconnectedbones strewn in a valley until divine breathbinds bone to…