"I do not pretend to be a divine man, but I do believe in divine guidance, divine power, and in the fulfillment of divine prophecy. I am not educated, nor am I an expert in any particular field...but I am sincere, and my sincerity are my credentials."
-El Hajj Malik El Shabazz / Malcolm X
One of my favorite quotes. Check out this TV interview of Malcolm, speaking on one approach to solving the problem of racism in America: Right click and select play, doesn't work in Firefox
You can find a ton of information on El Hajj Malik El Shabazz by visiting the Malcolm X Project, a wonderful resource on this most remarkable of American Muslims. Well worth checking out.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Some funny stuff...
A hilarious segment from Jon Stewart's Daily Show on the "Cheney incident" which I first saw posted on hahmed's blog.
Some of my favorite commercials right now are courtesy of Mountain Dew's new energy drink MDX (which Ali says is good stuff), catch them on the MDX website, and click on the link for the ads (at the top of the page).
Some of my favorite commercials right now are courtesy of Mountain Dew's new energy drink MDX (which Ali says is good stuff), catch them on the MDX website, and click on the link for the ads (at the top of the page).
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Subscribe to the Chronicle!
You can now subscribe to this blog via email, using the FeedBlitz service. Just type your email in the box on the right-hand corner of the page and you'll be notified of new postings to this blog via email. Now you don't have to guess or use those funky feed aggregators to catch the latest in mundane misadventures...
I've also added a Google searchbox, changed the format of the Google ads and still have the link to download Firefox. You can get it all here...exciting isn't it?
I've also added a Google searchbox, changed the format of the Google ads and still have the link to download Firefox. You can get it all here...exciting isn't it?
To God do we belong
Attended a Muslim funeral today. Once the coffin was lowered and they began covering it with dirt, the lonliness of the grave really struck me. You leave everything behind in death, no amount of tears will water you back to life, no prayer will resurrect you nor can any take your place. No matter what what you did, or even what you believe, there is one inescapable certainty, we too shall pass.
Saturday, February 18, 2006
Not so emergent...
Well, about halfway through my ER rotation and I can safely say I wouldn't be much good as an ER doc. There are things I like about the ER--you really do get the chance to save lives, whether it is by doing CPR or intubating someone in respiratory distress--but there are a lot of things that I wouldn't handle so well...
First, it's too raw. People are often in bad shape and that encompasses quite a spectrum of things. Some come in with foot, mouth or body odor so foul, you feel like someone knocked you in the nose and stuffed rotten eggs down them. Others walk in covered in blood or vomit, sometimes both, and you are almost afraid to touch them lest they pour forth right on to you. Still others are intoxicated, on a variety of substances, and you spend half your time worrying whether or not they're going to punch you as you calm them down enough to, hopefully, save their life. And then there is the schizophrenic who came in and told me was is lucifer. There are also whiners, people who are in relatively good shape but seem to think they will get better faster if they continuously complain. I just want to tell them sometimes, "Look buddy, you think you got it bad, have a look two beds down and you'll know what it means to be sick. Go home and thank God you're not in his shoes."
Second, it's the nonlinear way things work. You have like 3 or 4 patients with important stuff going on at the same time, and you have to keep track of everything. One patient could be in diabetic ketoacidosis, another not very responsive because of alcohol overdose and everyone else complaining of pain. You're at the center of all the activity, having to motivate some of your staff to do things while also talking to other physicians, family members and educating your patients. I often feel like getting up in the middle of the madness and saying, "Oh yeah people, what about me? Anyone want to know how I'm doing?" To be a great ER doc, you really have to be selfless, patient and nonjudgemental, more so than in other specialties...
Third, the schedule is all off. Even though, if you look at total hours worked in the month, it is probably less than many other specialties, you work them in shifts, which can be at different times of the day. So your biological clock is always getting set and reset and things that hold meaning for others (like the weekend) lose meaning for you, because your day off may be Tuesday and Wednesday. I don't know, it's weird, you are like on an alternate timeline from the rest of humanity. It feels strange...thank God I don't have any overnight shifts left...
I can see how the pace, intensity and even the schedule appeals to some, but I'm not cut up for it...it does make for some great stories, I'll try and post some of my more interesting patient encounters...
First, it's too raw. People are often in bad shape and that encompasses quite a spectrum of things. Some come in with foot, mouth or body odor so foul, you feel like someone knocked you in the nose and stuffed rotten eggs down them. Others walk in covered in blood or vomit, sometimes both, and you are almost afraid to touch them lest they pour forth right on to you. Still others are intoxicated, on a variety of substances, and you spend half your time worrying whether or not they're going to punch you as you calm them down enough to, hopefully, save their life. And then there is the schizophrenic who came in and told me was is lucifer. There are also whiners, people who are in relatively good shape but seem to think they will get better faster if they continuously complain. I just want to tell them sometimes, "Look buddy, you think you got it bad, have a look two beds down and you'll know what it means to be sick. Go home and thank God you're not in his shoes."
Second, it's the nonlinear way things work. You have like 3 or 4 patients with important stuff going on at the same time, and you have to keep track of everything. One patient could be in diabetic ketoacidosis, another not very responsive because of alcohol overdose and everyone else complaining of pain. You're at the center of all the activity, having to motivate some of your staff to do things while also talking to other physicians, family members and educating your patients. I often feel like getting up in the middle of the madness and saying, "Oh yeah people, what about me? Anyone want to know how I'm doing?" To be a great ER doc, you really have to be selfless, patient and nonjudgemental, more so than in other specialties...
Third, the schedule is all off. Even though, if you look at total hours worked in the month, it is probably less than many other specialties, you work them in shifts, which can be at different times of the day. So your biological clock is always getting set and reset and things that hold meaning for others (like the weekend) lose meaning for you, because your day off may be Tuesday and Wednesday. I don't know, it's weird, you are like on an alternate timeline from the rest of humanity. It feels strange...thank God I don't have any overnight shifts left...
I can see how the pace, intensity and even the schedule appeals to some, but I'm not cut up for it...it does make for some great stories, I'll try and post some of my more interesting patient encounters...
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Life in the ER
Just a quick update, because I really don't have much time for more - I'm doing a rotation in the ER at St. Bernard, located in the rough-and-tumble neighborhood of Englewood in the south side of Chicago. Doing the night shifts right now and seen a lot of your typical ER stuff - chest pain, people with bumps/bruises needing stitches, intoxicated people (cocaine, alcohol and heroin are pretty common here), diabetics with poorly controlled blood sugar (things like DKA) and women with ob/gyn issues (a real gardnerella variety of infections--a bad pun for the medical types). You also see people come in with strokes, heart attacks. We've had one person arrive dead-on-arrival, and the cause was uncertain. There have been a bunch of times we've needed to intubate people because of respiratory distress or they were poorly arousable...
It's not a level 1 center, so we don't see any trauma, that gets sent mostly to Christ...
It's not a level 1 center, so we don't see any trauma, that gets sent mostly to Christ...
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