The ICU continues to be frightening, but now not because it raises the questions of mortality or displays the prone bodies of the helplessly sick, but mostly because i still don't understand the vent settings.
All things can become conquerable, once they are named. Once they are named, divided, classified. Once they are named, translated and become a puzzle of cognition, technique, logical and mechanical resolution.
Grand Rounds today: surgical education. It began with a typical display of graphs. Outcomes, surveys, studies. Rigor was demanded, plus or minus p values. A new laparoscopy lab has been built, the bottom line, measured. Interns were made fun of. Papers were published. The last speaker (the one that i thought was smirky, that pimped us on Charcot's triad on day 1) ended with a discussion of his mother's death and the meaning of teaching: this [life] too shall pass. In teaching, the work caries on. We lift up others to see the future.
I got a bit teary.
Spock, 1. Kirk, 1.
