Unusual cases part 2

I just posted "Unusual cases part 2" on Physician's Weekly. Here is the link. Find out how this happened:

And what about this?

Or this?

Three more new posts

Here are three more new posts on Physician's Weekly.

The third leading cause of death revisited. Link.

The top 10 harms patients experience in hospitals. Link.

Bilateral pneumothoraces after acupuncture. Link.

The arrows point to collapsed lungs on both sides.

Three new posts on Physician's Weekly

I've been remiss in not keeping you updated on my blog posts on Physician's Weekly.

Here are my latest ones:

Next time you eat a club sandwich, think about this. Link. If accidentally swallowed, toothpicks can cause serious injury to organs (some of which you will find surprising) and death.

State rules surgeon whereabouts must be documented. Link. Minnesota has mandated that surgeons must log out of the operating room during a case and designate who is in charge while they are gone

Should speed eating contests be banned? Link. I discuss the subject include a bit about how professional speed eaters manage to wolf down 70 hot dog in 10 minutes. Yes, there is a research paper about speed eaters.

Two more unusual cases

My latest post on Physician's Weekly is about two more unusual cases. One case involves an eel in a place it should not be, and the other describes a nasogastric tube that found its way to a most unexpected position—the spinal canal. Here's the link.

Three unusual cases

My latest post on Physician's Weekly is about three cases that you don't see every day. Find out the story behind the x-rays below.

The one on the left is called "You couldn't do it again if you tried."

Who still uses a pager?

Here's my latest post on Physician's Weekly. Who still uses a pager? Probably more than you think. 

More germs than a toilet seat

My new post on Physician's Weekly. "More germs than a toilet seat." Why is the toilet seat the gold standard to which everything else is compared? To read it, click here.

My new post on Physician's Weekly is Who is my doctor? The advent of hospitalists and "teams" of physicians has negatively impacted patients' perceptions of who is taking care of them.

Here is my latest post on Physician's Weekly. 

"Do you have CoPaGA Syndrome?" Do you even know what it is?

You can read it here.

Diagnosing appendicitis

I have a new post on Physician's Weekly. My thoughts on diagnosing appendicitis: What works and what doesn’t .

New post. “Master herbalist” convicted of practicing medicine without a license in death of 13-year-old

Here is my latest post on Physician's Weekly. It's the sad story of a “master herbalist” who convinced a mother to treat her newly diagnosed diabetic son with herbs instead of insulin. He was convicted of practicing medicine without a license, a misdemeanor and was sentenced to only 4 months in jail.

Should residents appear on medical reality TV shows? I say "No."

Here is my latest post on Physician's Weekly.

Should residents appear on medical reality TV shows? I say "No."

Doctors share amusing comments seen in patient charts

"Doctors share amusing comments seen in patient charts" is a new post of mine on Physician's Weekly. Here is the link. 

An unusual end-of-life case

I just posted a new article on Physician's Weekly.

An end-of-life case with a different twist. It's very easy for things to go wrong.

Here's the link.

A letter to my loyal readers

Dear readers,

You may have noticed my blog posts have decreased in number over the last year or two. A couple of factors have brought about this change.

After blogging for more than eight years, I am running out of ideas. When I started, I had accumulated a number of things I wanted to say about medicine, surgery, medical education, research, and other topics.

The second issue is the Blogger platform I use is very clunky and slow. I’m sure it has discouraged people from commenting. It even runs slow for me. I just can’t face the hassle of migrating the blog to another site like WordPress.

I am going to try to blog exclusively for Physician’s Weekly, a website I have written for regularly over the last six or so years.

Yesterday, I posted “Odd medical stories. The third one is jaw-dropping” on the PW site. Here is the link.

Whenever the next post is ready, I will link to it from here so those of you who are on my email list will know a new piece is available. I hope the extra click is not too inconvenient for you.

Of course, I will continue to promote my blog on Twitter. If you have not followed me there, you can by finding my twitter handle, @SkepticScalpel.

I thank you for reading and hope you will continue to do so.

Sincerely yours,

Skeptical Scalpel

Should residency program directors look at applicants’ social media activity?

Please take a look at my new post on Physician's Weekly: My thoughts on whether residency program directors should review applicants' social media activity.

For longevity, is it better to be short or tall?

Being short is associated with worse outcomes for critically ill adults.

A large retrospective study of 233,000 men and 184,000 women consecutively admitted to 210 ICUs in the UK over a six-year period found hospital and ICU mortality decreased with increasing height after adjusting for available potential confounders. The difference was statistically significant.

The definition of short or tall was based on the median height of the subjects—175 cm (5’9”) for men and 162 cm (5’2”) for women. These figures are nearly the same as the averages for non-hospitalized adults.

The study had several limitations. Height was measured in just 44.5% of the group while the rest were based on estimates. However, the authors noted the median estimated height was exactly the same as the measured height for men and only 1 cm different for women, and measuring height in critically ill patients is difficult.