Tag: Tracheostomy
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Sacrifice
Anthony PapagiannisThessaloniki, Greece The supine and inert feminine form has been reduced to a few square centimeters of uncovered skin between the jaw and the sternum. Strategically placed green surgical drapes shroud the rest of the body. A series of electronic tracings on various monitors, each accompanied by its own distinctive warning note, remind us…
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Young, pretty, and not quite right
Anthony PapagiannisThessaloniki, Greece Unless we are in pediatrics, we start in clinical practice with our patients tending to be in the age range of our parents, or even older. Increasingly, as the grey in our temples is promoted to silver, their mean age gets closer to ours, and the percentage of younger patients keeps rising.…
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Too many doctors: The death of Friedrich III
Nicolas Roberto Robles Badajoz, Spain Un médico cura; dos, dudan; tres, muerte segura. One doctor, health; two, doubt; three, certain death. —Spanish saying Friedrich III of Hohenzollern was the second Kaiser of Germany and eighth King of Prussia. After completing his studies, which combined military training and liberal arts, he married Princess Victoria, daughter of Queen…
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Intubation for diphtheria
In 1904 diphtheria was a dangerous killer that suffocated its victims by obstructing the respiratory passages and sometimes required an emergency but dangerous surgical tracheostomy. In this painting a specialist in infectious diseases is avoiding tracheostomy by inserting a tube to bypass the obstruction. He is observed intently by interested physicians, all watching this new…
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In translation
Michelle PonderPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, United States In my first year of clinical rotation in medical school there was no service as diverse as Psychosomatic Psychiatry. As a third year student I would run between consults; from a schizophrenic patient who believed he worked for Homeland Security, to a patient with several gunshot wounds and now likely…