Working in a Medical ICU these days, it seems like 45% of our patients are admitted with Sepsis. That means that almost every day we are fighting to keep up somebody's blood pressure with Levophed and generous IV fluids. True enough.

However, there are people walking around with some sort of autonomic disturbance, where their blood pressure is dangerously low, and they need daily medicine to somehow support and sustain, cerebral perfusion. You might be thinking, hmmmmm, it seems like I've heard of that, but what the heck, is the name of it? Well that's the crux of the matter; it has never had a good, catchy name. That is, until I discovered it!

Hypertension Deficit Disorder

I have named a new disorder
According to my think,
We were discussing low blood pressure
And it came to me in a blink,
As if a cursor were brightly flashing
Within the deepest recess of my mind,
Several concepts were bouncing around
When all at once, it was clearly defined.

Rarely do we ever examine
That hypotensive son of a gun,
There are a lot of good reasons a BP is low
Like the planets revolving the sun,
But more commonly, our major statistics
Are driven by those hypertensive fools,
Yes we know these bloody freaks so well
They're the drivers for all of our tools.

And as a result, the naming
Of this barely known, uncommon disease,
Has gone for eons without its own title
It's more like a sniffle, than a sneeze,
So let it be known, upon this day
October twelve in the year twenty-ten,
Hypertension Deficit Disorder
Has now been transcribed by this pen.

Wielded by this one very author
And posted on this world-wide-web place,
If you wish to hijack this naming
I'll throw my copyright into your face,
You see, I need to rake in some royalties
My autumn years will come quickly to hand,
I'm open to grandiose ideas and schemes
It's a part of the future I've planned.

Hypertension Deficit Disorder
Is a well-defined disease, to a few,
In the many long years of this nurse
I remember just a couple I knew,
Who were prescribed high-salt in their diet
And proposed to render higher emotions,
Because we know in retrospective analysis
These are evidenced, and reliable potions.

I am thinking of publishing my data
Though it's a narrow, small selection research,
I'll set up a booth and a table
On Sunday, outside of your church,
When it's one-hundred degrees 'neath the shade tree
The parishioners will be dropping like flies,
Hypertensive Deficit Disorder
Will be easily proven, no surprise.

Fibril_late;
10/12/10

Here comes the holiday season, lot's of good eatin' and sure-as-shootin', there will a bunch of choking going on at the dinner tables across America. So, I got to thinking about what the statistics might reveal.

Choke

Who chokes more
The woman or man,
Fat or skinny?
Ask the statis-tishan,
Anecdotal evidence
Is a bit unreliable,
While restaurants worry
If they will be liable.

The Heimlich maneuver
Will save quite a few,
But some choke so bad
There’s not a thing you can do,
While they retch and they rasp
With hands clutching their throat,
The medical examiner will say
“Buddy, that’s all she wrote”.

Fibril_late;
10/4/10