Tag Archives: Medical

Short Stories

A medical student surgically attaches google glasses and a micro computer to their face. The dean of the medical college contemplates what to do about this

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“The student who performed the surgery is here to see you.” My assistant informs me.

“Give me a moment.” I tell her. I can’t believe he managed to afix the google glass to his skull without fracturing his skull. I saw the pictures and it was amazing the implant didn’t cause some sort of structural damage.

I should expel hir for the risk. I tell myself. If she’s this careless as a student, how much more so will she be with a MD?

But think of the benefit to mankind. The metaphorical devil on my shoulder replies. How large of a boon will such a device be to researchers everywhere? Instantaneous access to the complete knowledge of mankind with a mere thought? Vast medical statistics could be immediately provided to patients, or to speed up the diagnostic processes. We cannot let this invention end here.

But whose to say it will even work on someone else? I argue with myself. Perhaps her brain is uniquely suited to this device? It could very well cause an aneurism in other patients. It could still cause an aneurism in her.

So I have an answer for her then? I ask myself.

Yes, I think the answer is clear. I conclude to myself.

“Send her in.” I tell my assistant.

As soon as the bionic student sits down I launch into my recently prepared speech.

“You’re immediately dropped from the program.” I tell her as calmly as I can.

“How can you!” She shouts, standing up. “I did it by myself, and this thing.” She points to her face. “Really does work!”

“Sit down Eve.” I tell her. “I wasn’t finished. She looks torn between a decision to punch me or to burst into tears.

“As I was saying. You are no longer a medical student because no one who will take such unauthorized liberties with the human body should be let near a patient. Besides that our IT department hacked your internet feed and we knew you’ve broken the honor code by cheating on tests. However.” I quickly move on as she looks ready to stand up again.

“You have an exceptional medical mind that we cannot possibly let go to waste. So we are granting you three doctoral degrees with valedictorian status. I also have five offers from major tech companies, including google, who are looking for new research directors.” She stand up again and begins to simultaneously giggle and clap her hands.

“I will say that all of these offers, and the degrees, are contingent on you restraining yourself from future spontaneous acts of bionic surgery. From now on, you have to tell someone before you upgrade yourself. Now then, which offer would you like to discuss first?”

Real Life

Inspiring Medical Weekend

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I wasn’t planning on doing any real life stories, but I figured this was better than anything I could possibly make up.

I was witness to two inspiring moments of humanity this weekend. One was from the accident seen above, the other was from a good friend who had a fairly horrific accident of her own.

The first inspiring moment, that accident was not the first medical incident of the weekend. Saturday morning I hear that a good friend is in the hospital because ‘her foot is facing the wrong way’. Long story short she tripped on a treadmill and landed in such a way that she dislocated her ankle, and broke one of her shin bones in half. The X-ray photos were like something out of ER or House(wish I had the photos to post). The two bones in her left leg that normally form parallel lines were now forming a 20 degree angle around her ankle, and one of them was snapped in half. So naturally when I drove down to see her I expected her to be in a lot of pain. Someone once told me the worst pain you can experience is the thigh bone breaking. My own experience with broken bones tells me the bigger they are, the worse the pain. Both of these facts led me to believe she would be practically incomprehensible when I arrived. To my surprise, when I see her she smiles and gives me a hug, despite having just undergone surgery. Just thinking about it kind of makes me feel like wimp for taking a sick day the last time I had a cold.

The second moment was when I was driving back from seeing her, and ran into the accident showed above. My car is just visible in the bottom right of the photo. I’m fine, one of the persons in the accident was not so lucky. Near as I can tell, the red mustang pulled out of a side street, and knocked the other red car into the woods. Both cars are very obviously totaled. The four people in the mustang are fine(he was at fault for the accident, but I didn’t see it to know this). The person in the car in the woods(who is being extracted by paramedics), was not so lucky. She was awake, and relatively lucid, but judging from the brief description of pain she gave me, and the equipment being used to extract her, she has likely some spinal damage(hopefully minor, and prayers are appreciated). The inspiring moment comes in from when I showed up on the scene. I see the two cars(no EMS yet), some debris, and a lady walking toward the car in the woods. I figure something is wrong so I get out. A couple of passing joggers were responding at the same time I was. One of them was calling 911 the other helped me work with the lady in the car. A few more passersby show up from cars driving either way. One is a combat medic and takes over with the lady in the woods car. The other helps me try and get the mustang out of the road(unsuccessfully), along with the driver. The car was too wrecked to move by our strength. I didn’t put 2 and 2 together until afterwards, but all five people who first saw this scene, stopped to help out. All of us had places to be and could have driven on. I know I at least was made late for a service, and several others were stopped for almost an hour, yet all of us took the time to help these people out. There was a 100% response rate among the first people to see the accident, the driver took responsibility, 911 was called immediately, and everyone got out of the way and let the professionals take over as soon as they arrived.

In a lot of movies people seem to crumble under stress, and only the protagonist is gifted with any meaningful intelligence and tenacity. Yet this weekend, I saw a substantial number of people put through the ringer, and every single one of them did so in an inspiring and responsible way that anyone would be proud of.

I don’t intend to do many of these, but this boosted my hope for humanity, and I wanted to pass it on.