Death - Life in the Fast Lane Medical Blog

Dangerous Love

January 21, 2011 By Chris Nickson 9 Comments

Love is dangerous. If you don’t believe me, read on to learn about all the ways amorous acts can threaten life, limb and… other body parts.

Filed Under: Cardiology, Emergency Medicine, Evidence Based Medicine, Featured, Health, Obstetrics / Gynecology Tagged With: air embolus, coitus, Death, injury, intercourse, love, penis captivus, pneumoperitoneum, Sex, Sudden Death, Trauma

Fighting the Rust

March 19, 2010 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

Human health, like everything under (and around) the sun, is subject to the relentless progress of entropy. Ice melts, iron rusts, people age and die. Nothing in medicine changes the fact that our overall mortality rate is always 100%. BitingTheDust’s ‘Wreck of the Week’ is a potent visual reminder of this unchangeable law of the universe.

Filed Under: Australia, Bloggers, Featured, Poetry Tagged With: bitingthedust, Death, entropy, mortality, ozymandias, rust, wreck of the week

Out, Out

January 31, 2010 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

Robert Frost’s poem, “Out, Out -”, evokes the senseless madness that we see daily in the ED and in the ICU.

Filed Under: Poetry Tagged With: Death, macbeth, poem, Poetry, robert frost, senseless, shakespeare

Choosing Life or Death

January 30, 2010 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

Alicia von Stamwitz: … Instead, he takes a small step back from the gurney and asks, “Does your father have a living will?” I freeze. No emergency room doctor has asked me this before. I answer, evenly, yes. “Do you have durable power of attorney?” Yes…

Filed Under: Emergency Medicine, Intensive Care, Patients Tagged With: Death, emergency, end of life, Intensive Care, life, patient

Bad News Broken

January 1, 2010 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

The now infamous recuitment ad for NZ restaurant 'Murder Burger'

The patient’s son and two daughters had said little during the family meeting. The older daughter steadied her sister’s trembling hand while the son stared at the doctor intently.

Filed Under: Intensive Care, Literary Medicine, Patients Tagged With: bad news, Death, family, grief, patient

A Philosophical Death

December 1, 2009 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

It is sometimes forgotten that one of the most important goals of medicine is to help people achieve a good death.
What might we learn from the deaths of the great philosophers?

Filed Under: Philosophy Tagged With: Death, Philosophy, simon critchley

Letting Go

November 25, 2009 By Chris Nickson 2 Comments

A few experiences in the last week or two have reminded me of the importance of Peter Safar’s Laws for the Navigation of Life: Law 20. Death is not the enemy but occasionally needs help with timing. Sometimes some of us seem to forget that for all of us the time will come one day. [...]

Filed Under: Intensive Care Tagged With: Death, Hematology, humour, Medical Humor, Nephrology, Oncology, peter safar, Renal

Death by Black Hole

October 31, 2009 By Chris Nickson Leave a Comment

As an emergency doctor it is important to be aware of all the myriad ways of meeting one’s maker. ‘Death by Black Hole’ – a process that results in ‘spaghettification’ – is one of the more exotic ways of dying that until now I hadn’t considered in any great detail… Neil DeGrasse Tyson explains it [...]

Filed Under: Trauma, Video Tagged With: black hole, Death, neil degrasse tyson, spaghetti-fication

Cough or kill

May 21, 2009 By Chris Nickson 2 Comments

I am a belligerent skeptic of over-the-counter cough and cold medications. I’ve been this way since well before I ever entertained the idea of being a doctor. The late Michael Shannon (also known as the ‘dancing doctor‘) nicely summed up the problems with this group of medications: ‘The problem with cough and cold medications are [...]

Filed Under: Healthy Lifestyle, Pediatrics Tagged With: children, cold, cough, Death, fatality, mark mycyk, michael shannon, OTC, over-the-counter, Toxicology

Tired and afraid

May 10, 2009 By Chris Nickson 1 Comment

‘Tired and afraid’ is a poem that could be about any one of a number of patients I have met over the past few years. But its not. It’s about a man I recently met whose words are hard to forget. I doubt I was of much help. The curtains pushed aside Show an old [...]

Filed Under: Literary Medicine, Patients, Poetry Tagged With: Death, elderly, fear, life, poem