one here wanted to savor the breadth of understanding the medical profession had gleaned in an eyeblink of history. Park was flustered. As a result, he spoke faster, with choppier English, and his grammar started falling apart.
“We all know Phineas live, but he is changed man. His personality surly. He swears a lot. His reasoning skills, diminished. His doctor offer him one thousand dollars for a pocketful of pebbles he collect, and Phineas refuse.”
“Dr. Park,” Hooten injected in a quiet voice. “This discourse is best suited for another time. Would you mind if we present the case of Ruth Hostetler?”
Park sighed, irritated that his history lesson wasn’t hitting the mark. He explained the facts of the odd woman in the print dress. He told his colleagues how he had placed a stereotactic frame on the patient, secured with screws that were placed through her skin and into the skull. He’d then made a precisely fourteen-millimeter incision over the right top of her head and used a perforating drill to expose her brain. A thin probe was then snaked directly into her brain, having been measured perfectly the night before. A slight charge was given, and the deep tissue stimulation had eliminated the patient’s tremors but produced a strange side effect, an awakening of carnal desire in this deeply religious woman.
“Was this side effect, this carnal desire you describe, was it directed only at her husband or was it directed at others in the room? You, for example?” Villanueva asked to more guffaws.
“George may want her phone number,” a male voice called from the back of the room.
“Gentlemen,” Hooten said. “We are not in a locker room. We are in a time-honored forum established so that we may learn from our mistakes. So we can become better surgeons and make this a better hospital.”
“Ruth Hostetler is like a modern Phineas Gage,” Park said. “We learn a lot about the brain, but there are things that remain unknown to us at this time.”
“Would you perform this procedure differently next time?” Hooten asked.
“Because etiology of side effect is not known, I say no. I do the same way,” Park said. He thought about the question a little more. “Two choices for us: Do not do deep tissue stimulation. Try medicine to solve the problem. Or, do deep tissue stimulation and accept the fact we do not know everything that may happen. I do the same way.”
“Very well, Dr. Park,” Hooten said. “A cautionary tale,” he added to the room at large.
Joining the doctors in the queue shuffling out of the room, Ty turned to Tina. “Did you see the study that found there are two hundred thirty-seven reasons people have sex?”
“Missed it,” she said, laughing.
“There were the obvious ones: ‘I was drunk.’ ‘For pleasure.’ ‘To reproduce.’ There was also ‘to feel better about myself.’ ‘To be closer to God.’ ‘For revenge.’ ‘For power.’ Need to add number two thirty-eight. Deep brain stimulation.”
“If the word gets out, the procedure could challenge breast augs in popularity,” Tina mused.
“No doubt.”
The two reached the hallway outside Room 311. Tina turned right. Ty turned left.
“You’re not heading this way?”
“Got something to do,” Ty said.
E very time a doctor checks a patient’s records, he or she leaves electronic fingerprints. The hospital software was written to prevent curious doctors checking out the blood alcohol level of the Wolverines wideout admitted to Chelsea General after a car accident or the rap star’s lab results. Administrators take these breaches seriously. Doctors who weren’t directly involved in a patient’s care were warned to stay away from that patient’s electronic record. Chelsea General went so far as to kick a senior resident out of the orthopedics program for his curiosity over whether the rap star was high on marijuana or cocaine. Both, it turned out.
Ty found a computer in one of the hospital’s
“We all know Phineas live, but he is changed man. His personality surly. He swears a lot. His reasoning skills, diminished. His doctor offer him one thousand dollars for a pocketful of pebbles he collect, and Phineas refuse.”
“Dr. Park,” Hooten injected in a quiet voice. “This discourse is best suited for another time. Would you mind if we present the case of Ruth Hostetler?”
Park sighed, irritated that his history lesson wasn’t hitting the mark. He explained the facts of the odd woman in the print dress. He told his colleagues how he had placed a stereotactic frame on the patient, secured with screws that were placed through her skin and into the skull. He’d then made a precisely fourteen-millimeter incision over the right top of her head and used a perforating drill to expose her brain. A thin probe was then snaked directly into her brain, having been measured perfectly the night before. A slight charge was given, and the deep tissue stimulation had eliminated the patient’s tremors but produced a strange side effect, an awakening of carnal desire in this deeply religious woman.
“Was this side effect, this carnal desire you describe, was it directed only at her husband or was it directed at others in the room? You, for example?” Villanueva asked to more guffaws.
“George may want her phone number,” a male voice called from the back of the room.
“Gentlemen,” Hooten said. “We are not in a locker room. We are in a time-honored forum established so that we may learn from our mistakes. So we can become better surgeons and make this a better hospital.”
“Ruth Hostetler is like a modern Phineas Gage,” Park said. “We learn a lot about the brain, but there are things that remain unknown to us at this time.”
“Would you perform this procedure differently next time?” Hooten asked.
“Because etiology of side effect is not known, I say no. I do the same way,” Park said. He thought about the question a little more. “Two choices for us: Do not do deep tissue stimulation. Try medicine to solve the problem. Or, do deep tissue stimulation and accept the fact we do not know everything that may happen. I do the same way.”
“Very well, Dr. Park,” Hooten said. “A cautionary tale,” he added to the room at large.
Joining the doctors in the queue shuffling out of the room, Ty turned to Tina. “Did you see the study that found there are two hundred thirty-seven reasons people have sex?”
“Missed it,” she said, laughing.
“There were the obvious ones: ‘I was drunk.’ ‘For pleasure.’ ‘To reproduce.’ There was also ‘to feel better about myself.’ ‘To be closer to God.’ ‘For revenge.’ ‘For power.’ Need to add number two thirty-eight. Deep brain stimulation.”
“If the word gets out, the procedure could challenge breast augs in popularity,” Tina mused.
“No doubt.”
The two reached the hallway outside Room 311. Tina turned right. Ty turned left.
“You’re not heading this way?”
“Got something to do,” Ty said.
E very time a doctor checks a patient’s records, he or she leaves electronic fingerprints. The hospital software was written to prevent curious doctors checking out the blood alcohol level of the Wolverines wideout admitted to Chelsea General after a car accident or the rap star’s lab results. Administrators take these breaches seriously. Doctors who weren’t directly involved in a patient’s care were warned to stay away from that patient’s electronic record. Chelsea General went so far as to kick a senior resident out of the orthopedics program for his curiosity over whether the rap star was high on marijuana or cocaine. Both, it turned out.
Ty found a computer in one of the hospital’s
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