Wednesday, February 19, 2003

I suppose that everyone's seen the article about the "tragic error" at Duke University Hospital where the girl got a heart and lungs of the wrong blood type. It's really kind of shocking that something like that could still happen in this day and age. I mean, complications arising from surgery, fine. Mismatched blood types from the best surgeons in the country? Not so acceptable. As if that wasn't bad enough, the poor gir's family was told that the mistake was made due to a "clerical error". "Sorry, Mrs Santillan, your daughter's going to die because someone couldn't tell the difference between the letters 'A' and 'O'". Geez. I think even Elmo could manage to get his vowels right on a good day. Time to dust off those Sesame Street tapes, Dr. Fulkerson.

So, as I write this, Duke leads Maryland by 4 at the halfway mark, the U.S. comtinues on its inexorable march towards war, and this poor girl is dying somewhere in the large building 2 quadrangles away from me. I really feel kind of sad about it. Say a prayer with me. All the medical expertise in this University isn't going to save her now.

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