jfb | (no subject)

Medicine is amazing. Once in a while, during ER or something, it strikes me that there had to be a first person to think, oh yeah, the way we'll stop this person's pain is by CUTTING THEM OPEN AND MOVING STUFF AROUND. Counterintuitive, I guess you'd say.

For another example, on All Things Considered today I heard a story about this girl in Wisconsin. Rabies is a deadly disease, which is why usually when you get bitten you have to get a lot of vaccine. This is the first documented case, ever, of someone surviving after symptoms appeared, with no vaccination.

On NPR they interviewed one of the doctors, who explained it like this: There wasn't much in the literature about rabies, but there were some indications that the way you die from it is, it triggers some dysfunction in your brain. Your body can handle the disease itself, but your brain responds to it in some active and misguided fashion that kills you. So what they did is, they shut down her brain for a week--induced coma--allowing her immune system to square off against the virus, with her brain safely off on the sidelines.

It worked, as far as we know so far; she can't walk or talk, but she's alive, the rabies is gone, and they're hoping for a full recovery. Amazing.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Slight riff on your posting: There are a number of amazing leaps that people had to make for everyday objects, much less cultural practices like surgery, French kissing, or parimutuel wagering.

"Hey, let's roll up these leaves and burn them - IN OUR MOUTHS."

"Hey, I wonder if this bug I found in the mud is good to eat."

"Hey, do you suppose if I rubbed this plant on rocks for a while, it would leave fibers behind that I could use for something to cover up my nads so I won't freeze to death?"

"Hey, do you suppose we could move up north, where it snows all the time?"

This reminds me of that Calvin and Hobbes where they're at the breakfast table, and Calvin says, "The more you think about things, the weirder they seem. Take this milk. Why do we drink cow milk?? Who was the guy who first looked at a cow and said, 'I think I'll drink whatever comes out of these things when I squeeze 'em!'? Isn't that weird?"

And Hobbes says, "I think conversation should be kept to a minimum until afternoon."

Well, there were some even more drastic things before we got to CUTTING THEM OPEN, like ATTACH BLOOD-SUCKING LEECHES.

There's a nice story about the first surgeon to operate on a heart without killing the patient. Circumstances sometimes conspire to patiently make plain that you can do such and such without killing the patient, frequently because such and such has already happened due to accident or, er, insult.

Aw, happy thanksgiving to our bodies and knives.

that is amazing. my coworkers and i were just talking yesterday about amazing medical technologies and practices. i guess now the doctors and scientists are figuring out how to identify dogs that are able to sense seizures in human beings before they happen. and now they're discovering that some dogs are able to sense cancer in people.

I think everything is amazing. Take this "internet" thing for example. It's totally BLOWING MY MIND, MAN.