Tag: Winter 2013
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Richard Bright, the father of nephrology
Two centuries will soon have passed since Richard Bright, of Guy’s Hospital, London, described the disease that came to bear his name. Within a few years of his original publication, the term Bright’s Disease became virtually synonymous with kidney disease—in England, Germany, France, and the United States. In its full-blown formulation it consisted of four…
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Giddiness
There can be few physicians so dedicated to their art that they do not experience a slight decline in spirits on learning that their patient’s complaint is of giddiness. This frequently means that after exhaustive enquiry it will still not be entirely clear what it is that the patient feels wrong and even less so…
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Restraint: A foot-binding story
Daniel WongPalo Alto, California, United States My grandmother is with me. She sits perched on the edge of the bed, where I’m lying with my feet propped up by pillows. My feet hurt from running. I’ve asked her to tell me another story, and for a moment she looks back down at her Chinese newspaper.…
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J.I. Guillotin: Reformer and humanitarian
It is a strange quirk of fortune that the name of a reformer and humanitarian who spent his life in the search of social justice should have become associated with a device used to decapitate people. Yet such was the fate of Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin. Trained in his youth as a Jesuit, he then went…
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Observing the human condition: Letters and case reports
Thomas PapadimosColumbus, Ohio, United States From time to time medical students and residents ask me to mentor them in regard to the exploration of a research topic. My retort is that I do not consider myself a researcher, even though I engage in scholarly endeavors. I tell them that I am a writer, and emphasize…
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Thomas Linacre: Catalyst for the Renaissance
Patrick GuinanChicago, Illinois, United States “Linacre led a life of devotion to learning, to medicine, and to the interests of humanity.”– William Osler Thomas Linacre, personal physician to King Henry VIII of England, was the founder and first president of the Royal College of Physicians of England. He is remarkable not so much for his…
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Borderline
William MarshallTucson, Arizona, United States When family and friends from back East ask me about the Arizona/Mexico border, two images come to mind: first, an almost unlimited view of blue sky and distant mountains; second, a sick, frightened teenage boy sitting on an exam table in the urgent-care clinic. Hiking among the pines on the…
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Waiting for the darkness to lift
Sheila KlassNew York, New York, United States From early childhood I wanted to be a writer and tell stories. But Mama and Papa, impoverished and struggling to survive at the end of the Great Depression, scoffed at such ideas and insisted I should be enrolled in a commercial course so that I could have a…
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Go to work on an egg
Liam FarrellCrossmaglen, Ireland “I’m worried,” said Joe, “I read in the paper that more than three eggs each week increases the risk of prostate cancer.” “The lay press is uninterested in hard facts and instead prefers attention-grabbing headlines,” I explained, “a problem compounded by researchers desperately looking for headlines to beef up their grants.” “But…
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Jeremiah Kenoyer’s cancer cure
Jonathan D. Lewis The remedies prescribed in the past by many of the learned (and even some unlearned) members of the medical profession were neither evidence-based nor presumably effective (unless the patients got better anyway!). Here are some samples derived from the therapeutic armamentarium of Dr. Jeremiah Kenoyer: Dr. Jerimiah [sic] Kenoyer’s cancer cure Spanish…