Archive | October 2011
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Trick or Treatment: Do Doctors Encourage Poor Patient Behaviors?
Happy Pumpkin Day folks, and to celebrate this day of weird encounters, I am going to reel off a list of the commonest peeves I have experienced in the past couple of years I have been doing Medicine. There are obvious gaps in the stories, and many are not even unique to me, but I […]
On-Plussed!
OK! So I am officially on Google+ now. Please put me in your circles and stuff. My Google Profile can be viewed here: Pranab Chatterjee. Right now, thanks to the desolate landscape that my Google+ page is, it looks something like this: Come on, encircle me friends, and make my G+ life enriched! On a […]
Charles Beevor: The Sign of a “Bloody” Jerk
Forgive the hyperbolic title. Do not take offense and read on before hating on me. Please note the post script for added justification for this inflammatory title, if you so feel. Thanks. Now on with the main show! Not the best known of neurologists, history has not been very kind to this amicable gentleman, who […]
Google+ for Google Apps, Open Lab and Exam Musings
So this is a bit of a mishmash of a post. Google Plus is finally being opened up to the Google Apps users! Phew. That settles the hash of using my old Gmail address solely for the purpose of sticking stuff in the Google Plus panel! Anyways. With over 40 million users in a few […]
OAW 2011: Guerilla Open Access
Thanks to Aaron Swartz and Greg Maxwell, the issue of Guerilla Open Access is no longer discussed in hushed tones in libraries and hallways of big academic centers, but it has come out in the open. Now although I must own up to the fact that I am intensely supportive of both civil disobedience and […]
OAW 2011: “Predatory” Open Access–Making Hay When the Sun Shines
As the whole academic world is lamenting the loss of knowledge to paywalls, there are a bunch of unscrupulous people who are trying to mint money off the OA wave. In what has been termed “Predatory” Open Access by Jeffrey Beal in his fantastic review in The Charleston Advisor, the ploy for these posers has […]
Grand Rounds Time AGAIN!
Another Grand Rounds is up. This time over at Laika’s MedLibLog, and once again, one of my posts has been put up. Thanks for giving me some jostling space with the most wonderful bloggers on healthosphere! Meanwhile, today is Diwali, the celebration of lights (and sounds), and hence ever since I woke up, my Mom […]
OAW 2011: So You Hit A Paywall?
This is in celebration of the Open Access Week, which is celebrated all across the globe between October 24 – 30 every year. This year, since I am no longer in medical school, I will not be able to organize an event on the grounds but will try my best to see if I can […]
What Flies in KVPY: A Sample Project
I have been getting a deluge of requests to post some examples of the type of projects that have been selected. While it is a bit of a chore to track down the folks who got through and ask them for their project abstracts (most people are not so open minded about handing out unpublished […]
The Wait is Over: Gaddafi’s Money is MINE!
Cue evil laughter, along the lines of: “Bwahahahaha…” Why? Look at this: Oops, I meant this: From: Mr MICHEAL JOHNSON SMITH <info@accountant.com> Date: 2011/10/24 Subject: CONFIDENTIAL RESPOND!! To: MY Dear, How are you today? Hope all is well with you and your family? I know that this letter will come to you as a surprise […]
Gender Bias + Ignorance = DANGEROUS Patients?
Oh well, just read this post, and had to come write about it before sitting down to study for the night. The issue the author raises on the blog is a VERY important one, but dilutes it with her abject ignorance. The basic premise of the post is the right to choose physicians of a […]
Mediquiz: Rhapsody–Preliminary Round
This was the FIRST ever Mediquiz I conducted and fittingly, it was conducted with none other than Parijat Sen, the master quizzer himself. Along with Parijat (who will soon be leaving for an Internal Medicine residency in the US of A) and Shibojit Talukdar (who is doing his Surgery residency at the prestigious Post Graduate […]
MediQuiz: Inquizzitive–Mixed Bag
This is the last and final round from the MediQuiz that me and Tamoghna hosted at KPC Medical College on the occasion of Researching – The Foundation Workshop. This was meant to be like a closing round for the quiz, and most of the questions were culled from an earlier quiz conducted at Medical College […]
Grand Rounds Comes to INDIA!
Guess what, grand rounds is in India, hosted over at Radiologist Dr. Sumer Sethi’s blog. He has several great posts in it. Check out the whole deal here. One of my posts has also got in. I mailed it in to him today, and he was kind enough to put it up! I have been […]
PG CET: Not Happening in 2012. Thanks for the mess!
Oh well, this question has been bugging us endlessly for the past few weeks, ever since the MCI declared on its website (ridiculously named MCIIndia.org. Redundancy five!) the much vaunted plan to redesign the ridiculous exam that guards the gates leading into the pantheons of post graduate medical education in India. And now, it seems, […]
…maybe your life just sucks?
I don’t know why but this cartoon by the FANTASTIC Abstruse Goose reminded me of my life.
Amit Gupta Needs Us!
Amit Gupta is an entrepreneur of Indian origin, based in USA, and has recently been diagnosed with Acute Leukemia. When he went to see his doctor for his continued loss of weight and weariness, he was handed a diagnosis of Acute Leukemia. He has started with his chemotherapy regime and is now slated to get […]
House MD 8×02: Transplant
As big a fan of the House MD show I am, let me start off with the disclaimer that I consider this to be one of the worst ever episodes of House MD to come on air. EVER! And that is not just because of the sucky medical mystery, but also because of the very […]
MediQuiz: Inquizzitive–Occam’s Razor
Occam’s Razor is the law of parsimony or, in Latin, Lex Parsimoniae, which dictates that when faced with competing hypotheses, that are equal in all other respects, the better bet is to go with the one that makes the fewest new assumptions. In simple words, the simple hypothesis is the one to go with. In […]
Medical Student Research: The First Year Quandary
The problem with the Indian Medical Curriculum is that it is too intense, as it should be, no complaints there, but it offers no leeway to people who want to test out the waters in the fields like medical student research or public health or other associated streams not directly fed by the MBBS course […]
Embryology Mnemonic #Fail
Anatomy and Embryology have remained some of the most volatile subjects that I learnt in my medical course. Little has remained in my memory thanks to the attrition over the years, except for the clinical bits that were needed in the day to day life of a medical intern, which was not much, to say […]
A Doctor’s Touch: An Oslerphile’s Delight
First watch this TED Talk: This talk touched upon one of the most important aspects of Medicine today. It is indeed a cruel irony that a profession so close to humanity is now so devoid of care for the very subject of its existence. While the issue with the iPatient may not be the main […]
House MD 8×01: Twenty Vicodin
So, like I said in my last post, House is back, and with a bang. The new season starts off on a bleak note with House serving out the last few days in his 8 month old sentence, and being on the verge of getting paroled. After the rather weird season finale for season 7, […]
House MD: You Can’t Keep Him Away!
While I was away enjoying my well earned break from civilization, House MD’s season 8 has premiered. And tonight, they will be showing the second episode too! So, remember what happened at the end of last season? House drove into Lisa Cuddy’s house and fled the country to go to some tropical island. And what […]
National Conference on Students’ Medical Research
The Community Medicine department of Medical College, Thiruvananthapuram is organizing the 5th National Conference on Students’ Medical Research. The theme for this year is: Translational Medicine. Their website has more details. Here is their brochure: Their website (which is very chic, easy to navigate and user friendly, something we are not accustomed to while browsing […]
Interesting Blog Post
Just ran across an interesting blog discussing issues around Public Health, and especially, Masters in Public Health. This post on interesting facts about the History of Vaccinations caught my attention. Just a post to let my readers know of potential source of questions for future Mediquizzes!
MediQuiz: Inquizzitive–“Foreign” Sick
Since a large segment of the participants of the workshop were from the first and second professional MBBS years, we decided to pitch in with a healthy dose of Forensic questions. Here are the questions for the round which we dedicated to the one and only TKB! Once again, credits (or criticism!) for making these […]
Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Steve Jobs’ 2005 Stanford Commencement Address The prepared text transcript of the above address from the Stanford News website: I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to […]
Jobs: It’s a Ding Thing!
I have been reading the masses of news that is rolling in from all corners of the earth lamenting the loss of Steve Jobs. He is not just a technical genius that gave people the power to tame the beast, but also a visionary who saw far ahead of his times. His success lies in […]
