Got sidetracked by yesterday's round, which ended at 5pm, thankfully. :) There appears to be a virulent flu bug going around, and some of the consultants and registrars are down with colds. Today, my consultant's baby got sick, so he couldn't come to the hospital. Reminder to myself: double dose on Vitamin C when post-call tomorrow!

In continuation... yet another call today, hopefully a good one. Have been lucky so far, but the Hungry Ghost Festival may have a part to play in this anomaly. Quite a few patients in the wards have turned bad recently. And a few of those left upstairs aren't too well either. One of them, an elderly lady with dilated ischemic cardiomyopathy and an ejection fraction of only 15% ( normal being 50% ) was admitted last weekend for fluid overload -- yet again. She's got end-stage renal failure, diabetes, infected leg ulcers, but refuses dialysis, so her kidneys are shutting down and everything we give her isn't helping. It's terrible for us to see her day after day, sitting up in bed, gasping away, unable to eat or sleep or talk. Her family seems indifferent, and I've yet to meet any of them. In fact, last Saturday, when she arrived in the ward and I went to see her almost immediately, her children had already left. It's hard to believe that such people exist. Certainly not one of the finer moments in the life of a doctor.

Which reminds me of a comment I heard on "C.S.I." ( a link is provided below ). A pathologist on the show, upon hearing the grisly details of a victim's death, said," Sometimes I'm glad I only deal with dead people." Hear, hear.

The July issue of Reader's Digest features excerpts from the autobiography "Lucky Man", written by Michael J. Fox. I've followed his career from the beginning -- used to watch "Family Ties" in primary school, followed by the "Back To The Future" trilogy, "The Secret Of My Success", "The American President" and "Spin City". Like millions of his fans, I was shocked when he announced he has Parkinson's Disease, as he only recently turned 40, and has 3 young children to bring up. His account of what happened is both touching and honest, as he reveals how he battled alcoholism and withdrew from his loved ones. He also has a surprisingly good writing style, and his words are entirely his own, unlike other celebrities who enlist the help of professionals in writing their life stories. An inspiring story.

Okay. Here're links to my favourite websites, which can also be found on my homepage. Check them out.

1. Josh Groban - aka Grobania. Great site that gives you the opportunity to sample Josh's entire CD. The forum is practically overflowing with daily posts, with quite a number from the young man himself. I'm actively involved in the Asian Grobanites thread. Page 19 has a transcript of a recent Asian Grobanite group chat ( my nickname is
"spacefan"). Somehow, it's more hilarious reading it on the forum. A bit embarrassing too. :)

2. Blogger.com - enough said. Mentioned before in an earlier blog. Promises endless hours of amusement!

3. C.S.I. - This one's based on the TV series which has overtaken "ER" in the ratings race in the U.S.

4 Website for Emergency Physicians - for ER-philes only. I use this to check up on the latest developments in emergency medicine, but it also has a cool evidence-based medicine tutorial, which links to some pretty interesting pages. E.g. they define confidence intervals using polls in the U.S. presidential elections -- very clear and concise, and better than any tutorial I ever got in med school!

5. . My homepage - just being opportunistic here. :D I update this regularly, and it's got a few things some people don't know about.

6. Website for Singapore Doctors - came across this last week, and thought I'd mention it. Still relatively new, and a bit quiet, with 200 members but most of them keeping silent. Areas of interest include the forum for houseman and medical officers -- night calls being a hot topic. Medical students are apparently also allowed access.

7. Movies.com - haven't visited this one in a while, but I used to be addicted to it while doing surgery at Changi General -- all that time idling in between cases can really bore me to death! It's a great site for viewing trailers for upcoming movies, and reading reviews.