Shout Outs

Updated 3/2017--photos and all links removed as many are no longer active and it was easier than checking each one.

Mother Jones, Nurse Ratched's Place, is this week's host of Grand Rounds. You can read this weeks grand rounds, Medicine Show edition, here. Wonderful!

Welcome to this week’s edition of Grand Rounds. I want to thank Colin and Dr. Val for allowing me to serve as host. I also want to thank everyone for their submissions. I got hit with an avalanche of email, and I’m sorry that I was not able to post every submission that I received. Healthcare consumers use to do a lot of crazy things in order to stay healthy. Quack medicine has been around for a long time, and many early remedies were laced with cocaine, heroine, and mercury. Then things really got strange with the advent of electricity. Take this gadget for example. Its inventor, Dr. Snake Oil, claimed that his battery charged gizmo would cure all the ills of mankind. I wonder where you were suppose to stick this thing. Medical history is full of weird stuff and some of it is pretty entertaining. Please enjoy the Grand Rounds Medicine Show.

A new blog by a general surgeon (thanks, Vijay, for finding them) called Ant Ears, a metaphor for life long learning.  I look forward to reading more from him.  Here's why he calls his blog Ant Ears

"Ant ears” is surgical jargon for the perfect length.  The medical student will repeatedly be asked to cut suture.  Sometimes the knot will accidentally be cut, but most times the student will cut “too long” or “too short”.  Fifty or more attempts will usually produce a reliable knot cutter capable of trying more advanced techniques like tying suture around some non vital structure - maybe closing skin or holding a drain in place.
“Ant Ears” is the thoughts, rants, and experiences of a young doctor training as a surgeon - attaining the ideal much less than I like, but trying to always attempt it.

In case you haven't discovered these sites yourself, here are some nice places for medical information. 

• Hand Surgery News -- Access to journal articles, CME's, plans to add on-demand video and web casts.  They state "a new resource for those dedicated to improving quality of life for patients through healing hands".  I think it is off to a decent start with great potential.
• OR Live  -- live and previous webcasts of surgeries and lectures, CME's, podcasts.   I have watched several of the procedure videos.  Nice site.

Do You Really Want to See Your Doctor's Elbows?  is an article by Tara Parker-Post in the New York Times last week which discusses physician dress and infection rates.  I found the history section most interesting.  Here is a small sample:

* Hungarian Ignaz Semmelweis (1818-1865), from the Vienna Maternity Hospital, noticed that a ward attended by medical students had a death rate of about 20 percent while a ward attended by midwives had a death rate of 3 percent. Students regularly came straight from the anatomy dissecting rooms without washing their hands, then performed internal examinations. Infection rates plummeted when they started washing their hands with chloride of lime when they entered the ward.
* Polish surgeon Johannes Von Mikulicz-Radecki (1850-1905) was probably the first to use a face mask, and William Halstead (1852-1922) is said to be the first surgeon to use rubber gloves. He commissioned them from the Goodyear rubber company for a senior nurse who developed a skin irritation caused by repeatedly immersing her hands in antiseptic solution. Scottish surgeon William MacEwan (1848-1924) is credited with the introduction of a sterilisable surgical gown.

Check out the William P. Didusch Center for Urologic History Museum.  There you will find Collections, Exhibits, Milestones, and Press sections.  The Scope of Urology (collections section):

has extensive collections of many medical "scopes"— cystoscopes, resectoscopes, microscopes and laparoscopes — in addition to catheters, lithotriptors and other medical artifacts. To view items from our major collections, select from the list below.
Cystoscopes, Resectoscopes, Microscopes, Laparoscopes, Lithotriptors, Catheters, Implants and Prostheses

This Thursday Kim, Emergiblog, will talk about the upcoming BlogWorld Expo on the Dr Anonymous' Blog Talk Radio show.  I hope you will join us this Thursday night at 8 pm CST (or 1 am GMT) both to listen to the show and to participate in the chat room.

Last week, I received an e-mail from Sarah Marchetti who is working with CMS, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, to promote a new initiative being launched around Medicare.  I think it is worth passing on to anyone who reads this blog.

On behalf of CMS, I would like to invite you to a live Webcast unveiling Ask Medicare, a new caregivers initiative, that will be held at 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM EST on Thursday, September 18, 2008.

During the Webcast, caregivers and those interested, will have the opportunity to view the new Ask Medicare Web page, submit questions related to Medicare's new caregivers initiative and questions relating to care giving. A panel of experts, including Kerry Weems, Acting Administrator of CMS, will be introducing the new Ask Medicare initiative, the Web page and answering questions often asked regarding the resources available for caregivers, those questions submitted online may also be included in these discussions.

Currently, you can visit here to register for the Webcast and sign up for the Medicare e-newsletter. After the launch of the initiative, you will be able to access the Ask Medicare Web page through the same link.