When a medical patient turns blue, it is sometimes possible to identify the cause. Here is a report of one such incidence: “Adverse Reaction; Patent Blue Turning Patient Blue,” Meera Joshi, Matthew Hart, Farid Ahmed, Sandy McPherson, BMJ Case Reports, epub December 7, 2012. The authors, at Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust, UK, report: “The authors […]
Tag: medical
In search of Grollman’s remembered vacuum incident
My column this week in The Guardian, looking back at medical reports about the epidemic of penile amputations in Thailand, inspired this letter from a reader, which the newspaper published on November 23: I’m afraid your Improbable research piece (An epidemic of penile amputation, explained, 20 November) brought back to me something I foolishly read […]
“The Woman Who Needed to Be Upside-Down”
Behold the curious case of a woman whose defective pacemaker wiring caused her to pass out unless she was being held upside-down. Dr Louis F. Janeira, writing in Discover’s Heath and Medicine blog, reports (though changing “names and certain details”): I ran to the ambulance bay, rounded a corner, and saw a huge man, seven-foot-something, […]
Hands-On Experiment: The Safety of Pumpkin Carving Tools
A hands-on experiment, or rather, an experiment on hands,tried to determine the safety of pumpkin carving tools. Details are in the study: “The Safety of Pumpkin Carving Tools,” Alexander M. Marcus, Jason K. Green, and Frederick W. Werner, Preventive Medicine, vol. 38, 2004, pp. 799–803. (Thanks to investigator Kurt Verkest for bringing this to our […]