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Why Heart Patients Should Order Their Pizza Delivered

… because the pizza deliveryman might just save your life. From The Associated Press:

LAKEWOOD, Colo. — Ordering a pizza may have saved George Linn’s life.

Linn’s wife says he had just gone into cardiac arrest Friday when the pizza deliveryman knocked on the door of their Colorado home to bring their order. Kami Linn says she opened the door to “some burly-looking dude” and immediately asked for help.

The deliveryman, Chris Wuebben, happened to be a paramedic recently returned from Iraq.

Kami Linn says Wuebben performed CPR on her husband and revived him. Other paramedics who later arrived then took over. George Linn remains hospitalized in the intensive care unit.

Kami Linn says her husband has a history of heart problems.

-WesMusings of a cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist.

*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*

Get Yourself Into A “Medical Jam”

Thanks to the PSP Blog which linked to the “Culture Map” article by By Douglas Newman — Medical jams: From plastic surgery to cancer to sex changes, it’s been rocked about.

Newman has put together the following list with audio links included in his article. I hope you will pop over and give them a listen. Do you have any to add to the list? 

“Heart Doctor” by Lee “Scratch” Perry

This late period track by the legendary (and legendarily kooky) Lee “Scratch” Perry finds the reggae/dub artist and producer doling out “advice” to his patients…

“A Nurse’s Life is Full of Woe” by Billy Bragg

An unreleased track taken from the sessions of Talking With the Taxman About Poetry, “A Nurse’s Life is Full of Woe” finds Bragg taking on the plight of the working class…

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*This blog post was originally published at Suture for a Living*

Vocabulary Expando

Speedo-Clad ManThis past week I learned several new words and phrases. Allow me to share a few with you.

“Speedo sag” –- I learned of this phrase from a tweet from @BAAPSMedia:

Have just seen a cosmetic surgery press release about so-called “Speedo Sag”….Eww.

My first thought was the same as my OR crew, whom I polled. We all thought it had to have something to do with the parts of the male anatomy which should be covered by the Speedo, such as perhaps the scrotum. It doesn’t. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Suture for a Living*

Cardiologist Job Security

All it takes to assure you’ll keep your local cardiologist employed is 19 strips of bacon and an egg and you’ve got yourself one heck of a solid bacon burger:

Having read about the difficulties people making such burgers have had keeping them together, I decided to add one large egg to the food processor along with the 19 slices of bacon. I ground the bacon and the egg together, then, using my hands, pulled the mixture out and used a hamburger press to make a burger. It is possible that my hands have been greasier at some point in my life, but if so I have (fortunately) forgotten it. I was not quite prepared for the raw burger to look like pure fat, and I must admit that it didn’t look very appealing. But it was for science, so I soldiered on!

I put the burger on the rack-Pyrex assembly and slid it under the broiler. Having learned a lesson from last week, I turned the stove exhaust fan to high immediately. I peeked in on it as it cooked, and it seemed to be cooking nicely, with tons of little fat bubbles sizzling on top. After seven minutes or so, I took it out to turn it over, and was pleased how easily it flipped. Five minutes later, it looked done, so I took the temperature of the inside (you need to be careful with pork, of course), and it registered at 160 degrees Fahrenheit, so out it came. Now it looked like food, and smelled delicious.

My family and I thank you, America!

-WesMusings of a cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist.

*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*

If Doctors Billed Like Lawyers

From a discussion thread on Medscape (registration required) posted in response to comments on my earlier post entitled “If Lawyers Billed Like Doctors:”

Mr. Clark, it appears quite likely you are having a heart attack and will require my services. I will need a retainer of $1,500 via either cash or cashier’s check. This does not cover any treatment, but merely retains me as your physician.

Then you will need to deposit $5,000 into an escrow account. I will bill this account for services rendered. My charges are $400 an hour and I bill in 15-minute increments. Which means if it takes me 5 minutes to review your EKG, I still bill for 15 minutes.

When the escrow account reaches $1,000 you will need to deposit an additional $4,000 into the account or I will cease to be your physician and you forfeit the money in the escrow as well as the retainer, and if you continue to require my care you will need to retain me again.

Would you like me to treat your heart attack?

Ouch.

-WesMusings of a cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist.

*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*

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IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

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How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

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Latest Book Reviews

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I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

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The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

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Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

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