What's Wrong with This Country?

Our glorious leader is ok with asking $200 billion for a war that does nothing but harming more people but vetoed a bill for giving $35 billion that can protect 4 million American kids' lives?

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WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush vetoed legislation Wednesday that would have expanded government-provided health insurance for children, his second slap-down of a bipartisan effort in Congress to dramatically increase funding for the popular program...

The bill Bush vetoed would have increased federal funding for SCHIP by $35 billion over five years, to add an estimated 4 million people to the program that provides insurance coverage for children from families who earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but cannot afford private insurance.

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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Democratic lawmakers and staffers privately say they're closing in on a broad budget deal that would give President Bush as much as $70 billion in new war funding...

A senior Republican aide also said both sides are nearing a deal that would give Bush a large chunk of the $200 billion in war funding he requested earlier this year. "We're not there yet, but we're close," the Republican aide said.

Be Afraid...

Came across this special weather alert today... by the sound of it this could be big!

A STRONG STORM FOR SEPTEMBER MAY MOVE THROUGH SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA LATE THURSDAY THROUGH EARLY SATURDAY. THIS STORM HAS THE POTENTIAL TO PRODUCE WEATHER VERY RARELY SEEN IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA IN SEPTEMBER. THIS COULD BE THE STRONGEST MID LATITUDE SEPTEMBER STORM FOR SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA IN AROUND 20 YEARS. SEPTEMBER STORMS WITH SOME SIMILARITY TO THIS STORM OCCURRED IN 1986 AND IN 1963.

What One Sees Can Be Deceiving

In ER today, I saw a 30 year old male with a 1-week history of decreased hearing from his right ear. He didn't have any pain complaints or fever. The symptom started after he came back from the beach last week. He tried some OTC ear drops and q-tips with no relief. He jokingly said that he feels like there's "a piece of grass or fish stuck in his ear." Otoscopic exam showed a complete blockage of the ear canal with some yellowish substance that is either cerumen or purulent discharge from an otitis media. I went ahead and lavage the ear and interestingly, a 5-cm piece of yellowish looking stripe came out - it's a piece of seaweed that got stuck in the ear. The patient has immediate relief.

Sometimes what one sees in an otoscope is deceiving - the piece of seaweed looks nothing like cerumen or pus once it's out of the ear. The childhood tale of "3 blind men examining an elephant" comes to mind.

Music Blog

I have created a separate blog to share some of the tunes I like. The link can be found below and also in the sidebar:

Relishing rhythms
http://babydocjackie-rr.blogspot.com

Crazy ER

Got a page from the ER to admit a multiple sclerosis patient who's been having "2 month history of worsening unilateral arm and leg pain and paresthesia", and diagnosed her with "MS exacerbations". I knew something is not right - after finding out more about the story, it turns out that she has been having the same symptoms for 2 months and were just a little worse this morning. She couldn't get an appointment from her clinic soon enough and decided to go to the ER instead.When we saw her, the pain has resolved. She doesn't have any neurological deficits and no visual changes or orbital tenderness. How this qualifies as an "exacerbation" requiring keeping the patient in the hospital is beyond me. A call to neurology confirms our plan, and the patient is sent home on oral steroid with outpatient follow-up.

Sometimes I am just amazed by how low some ER attendings' admission thresholds are.

It's Nice Being an R2

This month is my first month working on the ward as an 2nd year resident (R2), carrying my own team with an intern and medical students, and today is the first admission day. The fact that I am actually making decisions for my patients (and others actually following them) is kinda fun. At the same time, I am feeling that I am more directly responsible for the patients too.

Birthday, Part II

My first continuity obstetric patient from the family health clinic gave birth to a baby boy today! Too bad I didn't deliver the baby because it is a C-section and I wasn't informed that that patient is already in the hospital.

Which means this little guy, who is of course also my first newborn continuity patient by default, shares my birthday. This is great ;-)

Perhaps he'll be a doctor too some day...

Birthday

I found out today that I have the same birthday as Mélissa Theuriau:



Ms. Theuriau(29) is the unbelievably hot news anchorwoman in France who has gained unexpected international fame through fans on the internet. Video clips of her on YouTube have received over 1 million views. Happy birthday to us :)

YouTube - "Beautiful News Reporter"

Some of the famous people also sharing my birthday today include Nelson Mandela(89), John Glenn(86), Steve Forbes(60), Vin Diesel(40), and Kristen Bell(27).

Hungry Doctors, Rich Salesmen

I went to another pharmaceutical-sponsored "educational dinner meetings" last night. Obviously, it's not the "education" part that draws the event to my attention (this is not to say that the meeting doesn't have its educational value). It was at a really upscale steakhouse in Rancho Cucamonga that I just have to try. The place was PACKED.

So the next morning someone asked me about the meeting:
"Great steak!" I said.
"Actually, I was trying to ask you about the talk."

The "Medicine" in Family Medicine

I was talking to a fellow FP resident who's complaining that some of the faculty members in our program are playing down on the scientific aspects of family medicine and placing too much emphasis on "non-scientific" things like emotional/spiritual support and "integrative medicine". I agree with him to a certain degree.

A catchphrase for the FPs is to "treat a patient as a whole", which sets apart from specialists who treat "only parts of a body." I think it is important to understand, however, that the building blocks of FP is still the core knowledge of medicine. Our goal to become a good FP doctor is to be a physician who know "at least" as much as any other doctor, with the value-added bonus of being sensitive to a patient's emotional need. We are not psychologists or priests, and we are not referral robots. We should be physicians with a heart.