robin@CCB.UCSF.EDU (Robin Colgrove) (01/19/90)
A sleep deprived young man does the zombie shuffle over to the bar tapes his eyes open props himself up like a marionette on the barstool and cuts through the crowd rumble with his annoying trombone of a voice: Quick note and short microstory, friends re proposed callahans realspace self-assembly in Boston Area responses so far From: ckd%bucsf.BU.EDU@bu.edu (Christopher Davis) From: inmet!justin@uunet.UU.NET (Justin du Coeur MKA Mark Waks) From: eliz@world.std.com (Elizabeth Lear) From: gilly%bucsf.BU.EDU@bu.edu (Gilly Rosenthol) and robin@ccb.ucsf.edu (Robin Colgrove) suggested night -> Tuesday 1/23/90 suggested time -> 8-11pm suggested site -> no suggestions so far i am clueless, knowing naught of the locale help needed, time is short am getting slaughtered at work so login time is minimal i'll go anywhere... hope to see you there wherever that may be! robin (have tourniquet, will travel) colgrove voicenet: (415) 753-2580 oh, right a story here's a fitting empath tale from last nite in the SFGH ER: Heroin addict comes in with high temp and chills (shooter with a fever in the local argot) needs admission to rule out endocarditis so needs blood samples drawn and IV access started of course all veins are totally scarred over to the point where he has had to start shooting IM into his gluteus maximus. so, of course I'm there flailing away trying to get blood from a stone a veteran ER nurse comes over to assist and finally the trauma surgeon comes over and we flail some more till finally he gets the vein hands the needle to the nurse and because we are all now at very weird angles from our flail sticks herslf with the needle. silence breaks out this guy is probably HIV positive and the nurses hand is clearly bleeding. In her entire career she'd never stuck herself before. She's putting on a brave face but clearly shaken surgeon is feeling guilty for not being more careful with the needle I am having a strong wave of There but for the grace of God go I We call the Infectious Disease Attending he sets the wheels in motion for testing the blood and prophylactic AZT for the nurse (some data suggest you can abort an infection if AZT gets onboard within 24 hr of exposure) I go back to finish working up the patient and find him sobbing. Here is this guy, covered with scars and abscesses destroying himself and stealing to pay it crawling with lice and probably with an infected endocardium and he is crying not out of self pity but because he cannot bear the thought of putting someone elses life at risk who was only trying to help him. I am deeply moved and push down a lump in my own throat. Estimates are 1/200 medical residents will seroconvert during their training and by and large it's a risk the housestaff bears willingly as a worthy sacrifice but it still hits you when disaster strikes The ID consult says the best estimate of seroconversion from a shallow stick like this is less than 5% but still the team is very quiet for the rest of the night... O what a wondrous work is man...
davidsen@sixhub.UUCP (Wm E. Davidsen Jr) (01/20/90)
In article <9001190721.AA22780@ccb.ucsf.EDU> robin@CCB.UCSF.EDU (Robin Colgrove) writes: | re proposed callahans realspace self-assembly in Boston Area | responses so far | | From: ckd%bucsf.BU.EDU@bu.edu (Christopher Davis) | From: inmet!justin@uunet.UU.NET (Justin du Coeur MKA Mark Waks) | From: eliz@world.std.com (Elizabeth Lear) | From: gilly%bucsf.BU.EDU@bu.edu (Gilly Rosenthol) | and robin@ccb.ucsf.edu (Robin Colgrove) | | suggested night -> Tuesday 1/23/90 | suggested time -> 8-11pm | suggested site -> no suggestions so far Some time you might do this on a weekend, when some of us who are not quite so close can come over. Maybe a Saturday afternoon for a long lunch? I sure would like to meet some of you, but a weekday night is really hard to do if you live out of town (about four hours out, in my case). Maybe in February sometime in one of those little pubs down by Faniul Hall? Or anywhere else relatively easy to find. -- bill davidsen - sysop *IX BBS and Public Access UNIX davidsen@sixhub.uucp ...!uunet!crdgw1!sixhub!davidsen "Getting old is bad, but it beats the hell out of the alternative" -anon