Strangely enough, now that I'm enjoying my mini-retirement, I spend less time reading blogs than I did when I was working. Of course, I'm tackling the Herculean task of getting my house in order, which tends to obscure all such pleasures. What time I do find to read blog is enlightening as always. To whit:
- The Anesthesioboist weighs in on the subject of end of life planning. I'm always glad to see the idea of discussing limits of care at the end of life discussed in the marketplace of ideas, from a variety of perspectives. One area I struggle with is the cultural barriers to end of life care. I live near a large and scattered network of Native American reservations (our local natives prefer to be called "indian"), and can say the experience of explaining the end of life to native families is very different from having the same discussion with non-native families.
- Dr. Happy describes the frustration of waiting for a patient to arrive for direct admission. This often happens to our hospitalists, which is why we have a policy of having direct admissions check in through the ER for an initial evaluation. The problem arises when we receive a phone call at 10 am, informing us that a patient needs to be admitted. Even if we accept the admission, the patient may be coming from 40 miles away, and might elect to stop for lunch or a visit to family members on the way into the hospital. We used to have direct admissions show up at 10:30 pm--over twelve hours after notification. As Dr. Happy points out--this is NOT okay.
- Shadowfax shared a sobering case of trauma occuring during the third trimester of pregnancy. The CT images from the case are disturbing but illustrate the necessity of using such technologies during pregnancy when the clinical situation is urgent.
- Ramona is making a wonderful lobster quilt, in part because I suggested a lobster theme after Monsieur Zippy's recent visit.
- The Buckeye Surgeon described the fear of his first needlestick. Most of us have our version of this story to share, even if we follow universal precautions to the letter.
- The Fat Doctor had not one, but TWO unusual diagnoses on a recent hospitalist service. This is why we stay in this business: there is always something interesting going on.
Awesome job, bloggers. What will next week bring?
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