Category: Mental Meanderings

You’re on your way to Uruguay A trip you’ve planned for quite a while Excitedly, you board the plane Prepared to sit for many a mile A few days later You feel some heat  Your calf swells up  Like red raw meat It hurts to walk It ruins the trip The dough you’ve spent! And…

Today I had a patient in a wheelchair who was much heavier than I and very old. She was in the beginning stages of Alzheimer’s to boot. When the man who was with her offered to wheel her down the hall to my room, I was initially impressed by his devotion to her. But when…

After listening to me gripe about my poor sleep habits, my partner surprised me with one of the newer Apple Watches that can detect your oxygen level, AFib, breathing disturbances at night, and how much you sleep. This is in addition to keeping track of how much you stand, minutes of exercise, etc.  It’s the…

Every so often, I’ll be doing an ultrasound exam of an elderly person who is lying on the cot trying to breathe through their back pain. They utter the unwelcome words, “I need to use the bathroom. Are you almost done?” This is my sign that I’d better hurry before the patient either asks for…

Whoever decided that serving on a jury should be called a “duty” didn’t do society any favors. Jury duty should be called jury klatch, jury affair, jury session, or jury huddle. These names are much less Puritanical. When something is a “duty,” people’s first instinct is to avoid it. If you detect a dirty diaper…