Morula or Raspberry ?

The Sartorius Muscle

The other night I awakened with severe muscle pain(cramp) in my leg. As usual I got up to stretch by walking around. This time no improvement. It hurt so bad I thought I was going to vomit. The next morning I decided it was my sartorius. Located in the medial thigh, the Taylor's muscle responds to sitting cross legged or putting your foot on your opposite knee and pressing the knee toward the floor. This is the longest muscle of the body and crosses 2 joints(hip and knee). Hope you never have a sartorius spasm but if you do now you know how to treat it.

Trich or Treat

A Funny Japanese Commercial

Pretty funny for an antihypertensive.

Black and White Insect

I found this interesting insect in my yard today. I can not identify it.

Photo Quiz: A Human Parasite

Here is an easy one for you. This is a picture of a small part of a human parasite I took with a Celestron LCD Digital Microscope.
What is it?

Derm Photo Quiz: An Interesting Rash

This case involves a 67 year old, diabetic man who has taken no medications for the last 4 years except for a daily aspirin. He presented to my clinic for the first time in over four years with a 2 week history of a rash that started on his right arm as seen below. His left arm had a similar appearance.
The rash then spread to the rest of the right arm and all extremities. The rash was initially pruritic but by the time of the visit the itching had resolved. He denied any recent OTC medication use except for the daily aspirin. He denied any new or unusual foods or contacts. He was feeling well. He denied fever, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain or headache. He denied any recent tick bites or possible exposure to ticks. His trunk showed no lesions but his legs were affected as seen below.



Lab work revealed: glucose 281, creatinine 0.9, sodium 134, total bilirubin 1.50, direct bilirubin 0.30 (both slightly elevated), AST 42, ALT 72, CRP 0.2, WBC 4,800 a with normal differential, platlets 92,000. He was seen by a dermatologist that day, and given a provisional diagnosis. A biopsy was done which confirmed the diagnosis. What was the diagnosis?

Giant Sunflower

This is a picture of a giant sunflower that my mother sent me. She has several sunflowers next to it that she planted from the same pack of seeds but this one is 2-3 times taller than all the rest. I guess it is just a different variety that got mixed in. Judging from a picture that I have of my wife standing next to it, I estimate that it is about 13-14 feet. By the time I saw it in person it began to droop with the weight of the mature seeds. Believe it or not this is nowhere near the world record, which the latest I could find was in 2004 from the netherlands standing almost 25 and a half feet tall.

Real COLOR TV in Chi-town

Took this picture in Chicago. I thought it was interesting with the shadow and a throw back to the 1950s when COLOR
TV was rare.

Deer Ticks

As I was looking at a deer in my yard this afternoon, I noticed something on both of the doe's ears. It looked like ticks to me and after searching the web I found pictures of ticks on deer ears. The explanation is that the ear is the most difficult part of the deer to remove ticks by scratching. This obviously is true for dogs also(have pick many ticks off and around my dogs' ears). I don't think these ticks carry Lyme disease in our locale. I hope I am right or I may have a red halo around my next tick bite.

Now with one hand!

Here is the "original" photo that no one has ever thought of before!

Stereographic Projection

Here are some beautiful photos that are examples of stereographic projection.

The Next Day

Remember we were in Honduras and leaving this area the next day. We had various concerns: ? necrosis of distal finger tips, possible compartment type syndrome of the hand due to obvious swelling and severe pain, secondary bacterial infection, or possible autoimmune problems.

We had limited medications but did give 1 gram of Rocephin, 40mg of prednisone , 20mg of tramadol q 6 hrs for pain. The morning before we left we got to see our patient before getting on our school bus to leave. She was much better, smiling , happy , and obviously better. This is the photo at that time. It may not look very different and doesn't to me now, but the patient looked much better.

What can we credit with the improvement? Antibiotics, steroids, analgesics ?? I am not sure but I think the steroids probably helped the most.

Red Snow Moon Over Edmonton

Please look at this Astronomy Picture of the Day for a great photo!