Tag Archive | Medicine
A Lexicon for Public Health Students: Hobson’s Choice
This is a new series of posts in which I intend to de-mystify some concepts that are largely confusing (to me) and try to come up with some simple, sticks-to-memory explanation for the same. I may make mistakes in unearthing these concepts since I a myself learning more about these, so do be kind in […]
National Doctors’ Day & The Perils of Being an Indian (Junior) Doctor
“There is no greater reward in our profession than the knowledge that God has entrusted us with the physical care of His people. The Almighty has reserved for Himself the power to create life, but He has assigned to a few of us the responsibility of keeping in good repair the bodies in which this […]
And the AIPG Fiasco Continues
The 5300-odd rankers in the AIPG were breathing a sigh of relief when the notification for counseling for Post Graduation seats was declared, along with dates and ranks and the rank cards were uploaded on the site. It seemed that the concept of online counseling which seemed innocuous on the surface but was fraught with […]
World TB Day: Make Your Own Poster, SHow your Support
Well, its not too fab considering I did not put too much thought into which floating head of mine should go into the image, but then again, more than the image, it is the thought that counts. You can make your own World TB Day poster by going to My Stop TB. It is very […]
TEDx Comes to Kolkata
As a part of a bigger TEDx webcast from Berlin, a TEDx event is being organized in Kolkata, at Eastern Metropolitan Bypass. The program is being supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. TEDx events have been organized in India before, especially in Delhi and Pune, a number of times, but it has only […]
Remembering Tinsley Harrison, the Oslerphile Physician
The past few weeks have been very demanding on me and I have not had the best of times, either on the personal or on the professional front. So, today, I took a break from the usual drudgery of life and decided to take a step back and remind myself of the bigger picture of […]
Thoughts on World Cancer Day: Part I–Unraveling Yuvraj Singh’s Cancer
Sorry for missing the train on this one. February 4th is the World Cancer Day and is one of the public health days that could do with some more propaganda in the public eye. I was so caught up with work and studies it just passed me by and I could not even get the […]
Facebook won’t pay anybody. STOP reposting these images!
Warning: Graphic Images In the last couple of days my Facebook feed has been overrun with images of sick kids from hospital who need super-specialized medical care and their parents are too poor to afford it. I always dismissed it as faddists just spreading their brand of stupidity, but when I saw a couple of […]
Mistakes in Medicine: The Brian Goldman TED Talk
This TED Talk has been on my radar for quite some time now, but thanks to my exams and study schedules, I have not been able to get around to going through it. At nearly 20 minutes (plus a lot more if your connection is as slow as mine) it is a bit longer than […]
Tech Care of Your Health
Well, it took a massively thought provoking article by Vinod Khosla on TechCrunch to jerk me out of my inertia of lethargy with blogging. In his post “Do we need Doctors or Algorithms” VK embarks on a sci-fiesque prediction of a day when doctors will be replaced by automatons delivering care on the basis of […]
Rapid Revision: Serum Sickness Like Reactions
Background: Serum sickness like reaction is a rare but well-recognized adverse effect with certain drugs, especially antibiotics, amongst which Cefaclor is particularly famous for this. The condition mimics typical serum sickness, which is a type III Hypersensitivity reaction but has not been associated with a similar pathophysiology. In fact the pathogenesis of serum sickness like […]
Rapid Revision: Rheumatoid Pneumoconiosis
More popularly known as Caplan’s Syndrome, after Dr. Anthony Caplan of the Cardiff Pneumoconiosis Panel, who was the first to describe this condition, this is, as the name suggests, a combination of Rheumatoid Arthritis and Pneumoconiosis. Epidemiology: With the fall in coal mining industry and the rise of health standards for industrial workers, this disease […]
Rapid Revision: Chromoblastomycosis
This is the segment where I jot down high yield notes for rapid revision of some key features of a focused topic. I know I have not done these for a while now, but well, with the exams right around the corner, and blogging on the backburner, I decided this might be the format to […]
Is MBBS Becoming a Vestigial Degree?
“There are, in truth, no specialties in medicine, since to know fully many of the most important diseases a man must be familiar with their manifestations in many organs.” —William Osler, The Army Surgeon, Medical News, Philadelphia, 64:318, 1894. The focus of the modern day medical student has shifted from the broad to the specific. […]
"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, and then you win."
Have you heard of Sanjit Bunker Roy? NO? Of course. Your nose mjust have been buried in some rotten MCQ book like mine. Go read this then. STAT! One of the prestigious Time 100 in 2010, he is one rebel I would love to emulate. Check out this TED talk of his. [Thanks to Dr. […]
The Map of the Cat Conundrum: Richard Feynman and AIIMS November 2011
Well, that sounds like an odd assortment of topics to group under the same heading, does it not? Well, today I had the misfortune of experiencing first hand what Feynman had described ages ago in Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman? As my blog readers might know, I had an examination today, and before you ask […]
Menage-a-Trois: Download, Print, Keep, Share
I have received several requests for a printable version of my previous post. Since I did not realize that it would become so popular (relatively speaking), I did not upload the original PDF document that I printed out for myself. I have been told that the “Print” option on wordpress produces a rather ungainly result […]
Menage-a-Trois
Ah! Got you there, didn’t I? They say when trouble comes, it comes in threes. For example, this month, I have three soul crushing, morale destroying, confidence pulverizing examinations lined up one after the other. (That might explain this post!) Anyways, so I was reading a lot of clinical buzzwords and stuff and I realized […]
Trendelenberg vs Trendelenburg: What’s in a name?
I have a slew of exams lined up and am recovering from a (suspected) repetitive stress injury of the right wrist. Combined, they have managed to keep me offline long enough to stay off the blog. But since yesterday my wrist has been feeling a little more supple and hence, this post. Not much of […]
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 […]
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, […]
MediQuiz #4: Incentivized PBL – A New Method of Interactive Clinical Problem Solving
I know I am supposed to put up the answer to MediQuiz #3 before I go on to post the next question, but it is past midnight and I am a little knackered to write up the post and do justice to it. Tomorrow, maybe. Procrastination, every medical student’s best friend… Anyways, this is a […]
Protected: Healthcare Information and the Rural Indian Physician
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
MediQuiz #3: R.I.P.
Well, this MediQuiz question is dedicated in the memory of an individual who has revolutionized the world of medical research, more details of which I shall give in the next post. The clue for this one is that it is not a disease or a clinical entity but rather a tool which is used day […]
CET: Proposing a NEET Idea
I have had this presentation made by Dr. Avinash Supe, Professor and HOD, Department of Gastrosurgery, KEM Hospital and Seth GS Medical College and was waiting for the right time to publish it online. It seems like the time is now here! Knowing how the Google Docs to WordPress thingy does not always work smoothly, […]
NEET: Not Just A Neat Idea?
So according to the latest update on the website of the Medical Council of India, the proposed merging of state and national level entrance examinations for the post graduate education is going on as planned, despite the stiff opposition from certain sections. Though this notification is a bit vague and in no way a complete […]
Argyll Robertson: Better Be His Pupil, Than Have It!
Argyll Robertson pupils (“AR pupils”) are bilateral small pupils that constrict when the patient focuses on a near object (they “accommodate”), but do not constrict when exposed to bright light (they do not “react” to light). This condition is colloquially referred to as the “Whore’s Eye” because of the association with tertiary syphilis and because […]
Super-Bugs in Bugs and A Media Scare
This e-pub ahead of print has sent the media into a tizzy, and why would it not! Consider the power of this headline in your morning newspaper: Bed Bug: Cimex lectularius Image via Wikimedia. “FLESH EATING BACTERIA ISOLATED FROM BED BUGS” Now that the zombie apocalypse has failed, there must be some new fad to […]
