Friday, April 15, 2011

benchmark 6, hernia, fox















  Variations on a theme. Passing.

The surgeon sends me a copy of his letter to my GP which arrives today.  I like the precision  and spareness of his language even though many of the technical terms are new to me. "...I operated on your patient today attending to his right inguinal hernia under intravenous sedation and local anaesthetic. I found a moderate sized direct sac. There was no indirect sac. I have repaired the transversalis fascia with proline and carried out  a Lichtenstein tension free hernioplasty with light weight, open weave, Ultapro mesh between the conjoint tendon and inguinal ligament. There were no problems with the procedure..."

"There's a fox walking along the wall," calls Heidi from the upstairs window. I am too late to see it, as I was a few days ago in response to a similar alert.

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9 comments:

Lucy said...

I'm so glad you didn't have an indirect sac...

CC said...

Terrific series, your bench pictures.

Glad they fixed what ailed you and apparently knew what they were doing.....

Maybe the 3rd time's the charm with that Fox.

Roderick Robinson said...

Dimly reminiscent of the Doctor's Dilemma: one of the society doctors specialised in stimulating the phagocytes and the other in removing the Luciform sac (which had no function and which was no loss to the patient). Happily for Brittany's Best Blogger the sac was named before she was born and is therefore a burden she need not bear.

Lucy said...

I thought it was the nuciform sac?

Roderick Robinson said...

Right as usual, Lucy. I checked the IMDB and found that that version of the movie appeared in 1958 (which is when I saw it) and I must have been so entranced by Alastair Sim as the surgeon, Cutler Walpole, that I misheard or, more likely, misremembered his limpid dialogue. If I had to suffer from either I'd prefer the incorrect one on the grounds of its greater euphony. I think this qualifies as a left-handed tribute.

Lucy said...

:~)

Lucy said...

:~)

Was it Dirk Bogarde as the artist? I could go and check but it's more fun to chat...

Unknown said...

In a referendum, I would vote for a luciform sac if only for reasons of euphony.

Roderick Robinson said...

Lucy: Yes, it was Dirk Bogarde looking prettier than any of his contemporary Rank starlets. I think the argument (about whether artists are worthier of life than other more humdrum people) would have lost some of its force if Dirk had been required to wear Tolstoy's beard.