It’s amazing how deep people’s “-isms” run. It’s not just against black doctors, but essentially against everyone who isn’t a white male. When I was a resident, I had a patient who had gone into kidney failure so severe, she was in a uremic coma (and had uremic frost, google it) which is clearly a medically urgent…

IIRC, Paul Reiser tells a version of the pie joke on the extras of The Aristocrats’ DVD, but its not on YouTube.

When I was a resident, we still had 30 hour call shifts which were usually every fourth night (but sometimes every third night depending on the service). We had so many car accidents among the house staff, that our hospital started giving us cab vouchers to take you home from the hospital (and, unfortunately, bring…

I was thinking about this, but it’s not exactly right...

The most amazing thing about the video is that he signaled his left turn before making it ;)

It’s amazing his kids turned out so well...

It is really hard to know. While it is probably hard to tell from my very rare posts here, I am what most people would consider successful in my career, extroverted, and socially very comfortable in many, many environments (off the top of my head, the only place I’ve ever felt out of my element is the poolside bar at…

It doesn’t seem that way now, but you’ve got so much in front of you to look forward to. Rejection is always hard, but you can succeed professionally from pretty much any starting point. I’ve spent my entire life in academics and have either studied at or worked for MIT, Harvard, Duke, UNC, Pitt, and Tufts, and at…

Good luck! I recently got licensed to practice medicine in Massachusetts and it was a nightmare. After six months of turnaround, they asked for a letter from my supervisor (who doesn’t even work at the same institution any more) for a research fellowship I did in 2009 to talk about my attendance and duties. No time…

Medusa has angry boobs

You have to play enough to accrue with a season (different from being “credited” with a season), or else you do not progress to being a UFA. In order to “accrue” a season, you have to be on the active roster for 6 games. Any less, and the team still owns your rights.

When I was in medical school, our model for learning how to do prostate exams was the clerk of the medical book store. Every customer he ever had has had a finger in him. Now, that *was* awkward.

The baseball system is totally broken, but I think the parallel that is being lost is that in baseball, you have to be in the league for 6 years to be an unrestricted free agent. In football, it is 4 years. Butler has only played 3. When he plays 4, he gets the big payday (if he has a good year and anyone wants a…

I am a doctor, and, yes, you get a blistering rash that follows a nerve distribution (dermatome). It’s very characteristic, so you don’t usually need any lab testing. In cases where the rash is atypical, you can culture the vesicles that erupt looking for the virus.

This reminds me of going to see a Clutch/Corrosion of Conformity concert a couple of years ago with a buddy. He brought a friend with him who I had never met before, and when I told him I was a doctor, he just couldn’t wrap his head around the idea that I was going to the same concerts that “regular” people go to. He…

Or know where roads come from

The one and only time I have ever used the “I’m a doctor and need to make it back to the hospital” with an airline was when I was stuck in Iowa City and there was bad weather in the Chicago area keeping me from getting back to an ICU full of patients in Richmond VA. Our team was already down a physician due to an…

I just moved from Pittsburgh to Boston, and due to circumstances beyond everyone’s control, the start of my job was put off for 2 months after I had already moved. The cost of living adjustment was very, very apparent without any income.

Critical care doc here butting in. Not restricting salt is the right answer. I wouldn’t try to manage your fluid intake beyond your normal thirst response, either. Until you’ve had your next visit with your physician as it is so close, I wouldn’t try to do anything acute for the swelling. Following your labwork…