Pages

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

The write way to kill your friend

Monday morning 10am: (No lies!)


I'm busy dissecting through the right side of my patient's chest wall with blunt dissecting scissors.

I have made sure that I'm working in the space between the fourth and fifth ribs on that side, and my fingers are hurting from the effort it takes to make it through the muscles into the space surrounding the lungs known as the pleural cavity.



I'm patiently waiting to hear that ultimately satisfying "POP!" as I breach the pleural space.

But this is taking longer than usual, and I'm getting irritated because the patient won't stop screaming and writhing around, despite the more than adequate local anaesthetic and analgesia I've given him.

I think he's behaving this way because he's dressed in a school uniform, and is fifteen years old.

I glance over at his blood-stained school rucksack on the floor next to him. For some reason I find this overused hand-me-down school bag very touching. It reminds me of my own schooling, and of just how much of a nerd I was. I really loved school.

Then again, unlike this dude, I was never scared of being stabbed by my classmate during class for using their eraser.

He was stabbed with a ballpoint pen on the right side of his chest, in a vicious enough way to puncture his pleural membranes and cause a pneumothorax collapsing his right lung.



Sorry kid.

You missed acquiring knowledge in first and second period.
But you've at least been educated, if somewhat ironically, in the lesson that the pen can sometimes be, as mighty as, the sword...

12 comments:

deluded said...

WOOOOOOOOO!


first!

deluded said...

sorry. tradition dictates my head





sometimes.

like this.

and when it involves chicken biryani.

deluded said...

whoa Dr.S, seeeeerious post.

hmmm.

I should be saying that Im shocked.

but.

erm.

ever since i watched gossip girl, Im beginning to think that kids take social status seriously.

Ketan said...

WTF!

This is too bad! The more I read your posts, I'm realizing how your country is degrading more and more (sorry, please don't take it personally, I'm talking of the country of your country, and not the country itself per se). Things in India are bad, but this is too much! :(

But how is department of education concerned with provision of safe place to study? You mean these kids are emulating the 'antisocial' elements at the school? Or you mean, the school teachers should be monitoring the personality-aspects also of the students, to make sure they don't end up on wrong path?

Things in India are also rotting, but not at this frightening rate.

Schooling in India is all about exams and marks and has nothing to do with inculcation of right attitudes like tolerance, inquisitiveness, meticulousness, compassion, honesty, etc.

I'm not sure what more to say!

TC.

Ketan said...

*condition of your country

Dr S. said...

You're right Ketan. I can't really blame the education department for the cycles of poverty and violence experienced by our school children.

Dr S. said...

I decided to change the ending.

A said...

Kevlar armors as mandatory part of school uniforms?

Geraldine said...

And I thought our school was rough....

S.S. said...

Shocking!!! Damn, the poor kid. What was the predicament of the kid who stabbed him?? I mean they must have taken action on him for such an act!

Dr S. said...

Spark star - sorry to report that probably not much happened in the way of punishment for the perpetrator....

I'm not sure to be honest...I never get the follow up story- I just get to fix them ( or not) and send them back to their predicaments...

Vivere said...

awesome! i literally got gooseflesh..

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails