Come on now (iPod) touch me, babe

Tom wrote this …
“I predict all your pagers go off … right now.”
This scene, played for comic effect on the TV show House M.D., actually used to happen at UNC Hospitals all the time. All of our hospital interpreters carried pagers that were tied to the same phone number.
So, when a doctor needed an [...]

Another “best” list?

Clinton wrote this …
They’re at it again. US News & World Report published online Oct. 20 a new list of “Best Hospitals” rankings based on patient satisfaction.
This is a new one. Sort of. The magazine extracted data from a list that’s already available to the public on the Hospital Compare Web site, managed by [...]

Sometimes the cure may cause a new disease

Tom wrote this …
Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is the  name given to a group of disorders, including ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, that cause the intestines to become red and swollen. This inflammation typically lasts a long time and comes back again and again over time.
If you have IBD, you’re likely to suffer cramps, abdominal [...]

Drop a few pounds, avoid arthritis

Clinton wrote this …
Here’s another good reason to shed a few pounds: by losing just a small percentage of your body weight you could reduce the risk of developing osteoarthritis in the knee.
The swinging hinge is the most common site of osteoarthritis, which is the most common joint disease; nearly half of all adult Americans [...]

Appropriate surgical care: Who gets it? Who doesn’t, and why?

Tom wrote this …
Consider this: For many years now there has been a broad consensus among medical experts that far too many babies in the U.S. are being delivered by cesarean section. But repeated attempts to bring the number of c-sections down have hardly made a dent. At the same time, many morbidly obese people [...]

Is there a doctor or writer in the house?

Stephanie wrote this…
It’s not all that uncommon for a person change professions mid career.  In fact, with this economy, many are having to reinvent themselves.
However, changing from one noble profession to another, makes me raise an eyebrow.  And that’s what happened when I heard about Terrence Holt.  No, not THE Terrence Holt, American football safety who [...]

The eyes have it

Stephanie wrote this…
It seems inevitable that as we age things on our bodies tend to fall apart. I think it’s a part of life’s instruction manual that we fail to read. Between forgetting the simplest of things or needing to buy a pair of reading glasses, we tend to blame it on age.
I was comfortable [...]

An update on Patrick Kahuma

Tom wrote this …
Back in May, I wrote about how Patrick Kahuma, an 18-year-old from Uganda, came to the N.C. Children’s Heart Center at N.C. Children’s Hospital for treatment from Dr. Elman Frantz to correct heart problems that had greatly limited the quality of his life up to that point.
The procedures were a great success, [...]