Medical Stuff below the fold

The line between being aware and not aware gets fuzzier all the time.

If a patient is conscious during surgery but doesn’t remember any of it, is that good enough? It’s a bit like the tree falling in the forest with nobody to hear it. An anesthesiologist’s koan. If even the patient has no recollection of surgery, was he aware?

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 Related item: the problem of post concussion syndrome is discussed here. there has been a lot of studies on post concussion syndrome due to the IED injuries in Iraq in veterans.

And I found it interesting that the second and third book of the Hunger Games trilogy has some of the characters dealing with injuries including PTSS...

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The US Catholic bishops draw a line in the sand. on an important constitutional issue, and get noticed on page A 19 of the NYTimes...which describes it as a political debate between the right and left wings of the church.

If the MSM ignores an issue, does it exist?

The dirty little secret is that if the bishops threaten to close the hospitals, they will laugh and let them...and then take them over on the cheap...which may be what's behind the rule.

And I'm still trying to get information on the Obamacare mandate that mandates everyone buying health insurance has to buy a second insurance policy to cover abortion...I keep reading snippets about it, but no good information about it.

 Even this pro abortion BBC post admits it's about Obama getting reelected. Which is why Anne Romney is now the face of the "enemy"...it's not that she didn't work (Sarah Palin did work and was demonized)...it's because they decided it was a worthy vocation to be married and raise children...

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Tell the cost cutters that cancer chemotherapy is worth it, even if you define "worth it" in dollar amounts.

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 The latest diet advice: Red wine and peanuts.

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British rationing board cuts back on "hands on" physical therapy. Yeah, I've seen this in the US too: tell you what to do and then let you do it on your own.

The article is fairly good about explaining the problem of this cheapskate approach. Ironically, the IHS was fairly good at supplying physical therapy for our patients: maybe because it was a drug free way to treat musculoskeletal pain without addictive drugs in a high risk population.

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