perfect weekend

i'm not sure yet what "living the dream" means in medicine jargon, but just finished a perfect weekend (thanks to paul and costco):
saturday: philz coffee, driving over golden gate bridge to napa (mondavi, stag's leap -- cask 23 is uhmazing), napa outlets, spicy dinner in berkeley
sunday: philz coffee, casual walk to SF Giants game for $10 seats in the view box behind home plate, 9-hole game of golf at Golden Gate Park, and watching the movie "Up" in 3D using $7.50 costco tickets.

most people do not know where the heart is

recent study in BMC Family Practice showing that less than half of 722 Britons surveyed can identify where the heart is on a diagram.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/15/body.knowledge.survey/index.html

reminder to self: draw more pictures for patients

Radiology

Currently on a didactic radiology rotation for the next month. Medicine at SFGH was great, and I look forward to working in the ED next month (read: avoid the ED next month).

Currently watching basketball.

osborne wave!

Craig showed me the coooooolest EKG this morning of a 58 M "found down" in the tenderloin. rectal temp 24 degrees celsius. he had very large and distinct osborne waves!

It was very exciting to see real osborne waves for the first time, like reading someone's biography and then meeting them in person for the first time. Do people still read biographies?

Thanks, Craig!

reflections on a "stabbiversary"

extremely well-written reflection on near-death experiences from NYT blog. curiously, this author was stabbed in the neck with a stiletto 14 years ago...

"You can’t feel grateful to be alive your whole life any more than you can stay passionately in love forever — or grieve forever, for that matter. Time forces us all to betray ourselves and get back to the busywork of living in the world. Before a year had gone by the same dumb everyday anxieties and frustrations began creeping back. I’d be disgusted to catch myself yelling in traffic, pounding on my computer, lying awake at night wondering what was going to become of me."

http://happydays.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/02/reprieve/?em

"Winning the Game"

In medicine, "winning the game" means that a team or person has discharged all of their patients before the next call night, which means that they have no work until the next call. Clinical medicine is an interesting culture, with slang and neologisms that can roll off your tongue before you can think, "wait, that was incomprehensible to a normal person." For instance, you can say, "CBC q 6 hours, goal crit 30" or "cycle the trops" or "wean the nebs" and most people around you in the hospital will nod knowingly.

But i often digress. Medicine at el general has been great, I really enjoy working with my team and treating patients who are often underprivileged and have complex psychosocial situtations. The residents and attendings at SFGH are fantastic, and provide top notch care to patients who can easily fall between the cracks.