she experienced any loss of appetite, any general malaise? If this was how she made her living, I said, she’d better make sure and get regular smears.
“If you smoke more than a pack a day,” I said. “This way, I mean.”
A conization wouldn’t be a bad idea, I told her, or at the very least a D and C.
She gets down on her hands and knees, rotating her open butt, her puckered pink trapdoor in slow motion, and looks back over her shoulder at us and says, “What’s this ‘conization’ scene?”
She says, “Is that something new you’re into?” and exhales smoke in my face.
Sort of exhales.
It’s when you razor out a cone-shaped sample of the cervix, I tell her.
And she goes pale, pale even under her makeup, even under the wash of red and black light, and pulls her legs back together. She puts out her cigarette in my beer and says, “You have one sick issue with women,” and goes off to the next guy down along the stage.
After her I yell, “Every woman is just a different kind of problem.”
Still holding his cork, Denny picks up my beer and says,“Dude, waste not … ” then pours everything except the drowned butt into his own glass. He says, “Your mom talks a lot about some Dr. Marshall. She says he’s promised to make her young again,” Denny says, “but only if you cooperate.”
And I say, “She. It’s Dr. Paige Marshall. She’s a woman.”
Another patient presents herself, a curly-haired brunette, about twenty-five years old, exhibiting a possible folic acid deficiency, her tongue red and glazed-looking, her abdomen slightly distended, her eyes glassy. I ask, can I listen to her heart. For palpitations. For rapid heartbeat. Has she had any nausea or diarrhea?
“Dude?” Denny says.
The questions to ask about pain are COLDERRA: Characteristics, Onset, Location, Duration, Exacerbation, Relief, Radiation, and Associated Symptoms.
Denny says, “Dude?”
The bacteria called
Staphylococcus aureus
will give you STAPHEO: Skin Infections, Toxic Shock Syndrome, Abscesses, Pneumonia, Hemolysis, Endocarditis, and Osteomyelitis.
“Dude?” Denny says.
The diseases a mother can pass to her baby are TORCH: Toxoplasmosis, Other (meaning syphilis and HIV), Rubella, Cytomegalovirus, and Herpes. It helps if you can picture a mother
passing the torch
to her baby.
Like mother, like son.
Denny snaps his fingers in my face. “What’s up with you? How come you’re being like this?”
Because it’s the truth. This is the world we live in. I’ve been there, taken the MCAT The Medical College Admission Test. I went to the USC School of Medicine long enough to know that a mole is never just a mole. That a simple headache means brain tumors, means double vision, numbness, vomiting followed by seizures, drowsiness, death.
A little muscle twitch means rabies, means muscle cramps, thirst, confusion, and drooling, followed by seizures, coma, death. Acne means ovarian cysts. Feeling a little tired means tuberculosis. Bloodshot eyes mean meningitis. Drowsiness is the first sign of typhoid. Those floaters you see cross your eyes on sunny days, they mean your retina is detaching. You’re going blind.
“See how her fingernails look,” I tell Denny, “that’s a sure sign of lung cancer.”
If you’re confused, that means renal shutdown, severe kidney failure.
You learn all this during Physical Examination, your second year in medical school. You learn all this, and there’s no going back.
Ignorance
was
bliss.
A bruise means cirrhosis of the liver. A belch means colorectal cancer or esophageal cancer or at the very least a peptic ulcer.
Every little breeze seems to whisper squamous carcinoma.
Birds in the trees seem to twitter histoplasmosis.
Everybody you see naked, you see as a patient. A dancer could have clear lovely eyes and hard brown nipples, but if her breath is bad she has leukemia. A dancer might have thick, long, clean-looking hair, but if she scratches her scalp, she has
“If you smoke more than a pack a day,” I said. “This way, I mean.”
A conization wouldn’t be a bad idea, I told her, or at the very least a D and C.
She gets down on her hands and knees, rotating her open butt, her puckered pink trapdoor in slow motion, and looks back over her shoulder at us and says, “What’s this ‘conization’ scene?”
She says, “Is that something new you’re into?” and exhales smoke in my face.
Sort of exhales.
It’s when you razor out a cone-shaped sample of the cervix, I tell her.
And she goes pale, pale even under her makeup, even under the wash of red and black light, and pulls her legs back together. She puts out her cigarette in my beer and says, “You have one sick issue with women,” and goes off to the next guy down along the stage.
After her I yell, “Every woman is just a different kind of problem.”
Still holding his cork, Denny picks up my beer and says,“Dude, waste not … ” then pours everything except the drowned butt into his own glass. He says, “Your mom talks a lot about some Dr. Marshall. She says he’s promised to make her young again,” Denny says, “but only if you cooperate.”
And I say, “She. It’s Dr. Paige Marshall. She’s a woman.”
Another patient presents herself, a curly-haired brunette, about twenty-five years old, exhibiting a possible folic acid deficiency, her tongue red and glazed-looking, her abdomen slightly distended, her eyes glassy. I ask, can I listen to her heart. For palpitations. For rapid heartbeat. Has she had any nausea or diarrhea?
“Dude?” Denny says.
The questions to ask about pain are COLDERRA: Characteristics, Onset, Location, Duration, Exacerbation, Relief, Radiation, and Associated Symptoms.
Denny says, “Dude?”
The bacteria called
Staphylococcus aureus
will give you STAPHEO: Skin Infections, Toxic Shock Syndrome, Abscesses, Pneumonia, Hemolysis, Endocarditis, and Osteomyelitis.
“Dude?” Denny says.
The diseases a mother can pass to her baby are TORCH: Toxoplasmosis, Other (meaning syphilis and HIV), Rubella, Cytomegalovirus, and Herpes. It helps if you can picture a mother
passing the torch
to her baby.
Like mother, like son.
Denny snaps his fingers in my face. “What’s up with you? How come you’re being like this?”
Because it’s the truth. This is the world we live in. I’ve been there, taken the MCAT The Medical College Admission Test. I went to the USC School of Medicine long enough to know that a mole is never just a mole. That a simple headache means brain tumors, means double vision, numbness, vomiting followed by seizures, drowsiness, death.
A little muscle twitch means rabies, means muscle cramps, thirst, confusion, and drooling, followed by seizures, coma, death. Acne means ovarian cysts. Feeling a little tired means tuberculosis. Bloodshot eyes mean meningitis. Drowsiness is the first sign of typhoid. Those floaters you see cross your eyes on sunny days, they mean your retina is detaching. You’re going blind.
“See how her fingernails look,” I tell Denny, “that’s a sure sign of lung cancer.”
If you’re confused, that means renal shutdown, severe kidney failure.
You learn all this during Physical Examination, your second year in medical school. You learn all this, and there’s no going back.
Ignorance
was
bliss.
A bruise means cirrhosis of the liver. A belch means colorectal cancer or esophageal cancer or at the very least a peptic ulcer.
Every little breeze seems to whisper squamous carcinoma.
Birds in the trees seem to twitter histoplasmosis.
Everybody you see naked, you see as a patient. A dancer could have clear lovely eyes and hard brown nipples, but if her breath is bad she has leukemia. A dancer might have thick, long, clean-looking hair, but if she scratches her scalp, she has
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