The Haversian Canal

I finally got a laser printer., network printing, and networked filesharing My brother started the process when he came to visit over Thanksgiving. In retrospect, he solved more problems than necessary: he set up my old Lexmark z615 bubblejet in Linux and set up the basic Samba server. He couldn't get the printer working by the time he left, but he got it working by working from the command line, back at his house in San Antonio. Since then I've gotten the Brother 2070N laser printer ($92) he recommended, and that was a relative cake walk. The real savings on the printer is in the ink: the toner cartridges can be had for under $30, and they last for reams, where as we all have our horror stories about bubblejets with $50 cartridges with a thimble-full of ink. And those refill kits? Why should I bother with that when I can have laser-printer crispness for less money? I've also set up all the laptops to access the printer and the share drive, so now there's really no reason to have multiple copies of anything, except perhaps working copies checked out for work on the road where there may be no internet access. And my wife's work, which isn't set up yet. Gotta work on that next, maybe over Christmas break.

Paraphrasing from a segment on NPR this morning, made by a Louisville, Kentucky public school principal:

. . . the ability to transfer is geat, because [example of one type of student, and then] there might be another student who would be removed[emphasis hers] because he would drive the teachers insane, because not only would he think outside the box, he wouldn't acknowledge that the box exists.

Indeed. Where, exactly, is this fabled box?

You've heard about it in class, so here's the list of the top 300 prescribed drugs (note, the url would seem to indicate it only lists the top 200, but the text swears it's the top 300. If you want to count, let me know what you find).
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Update: Gruntdoc reports 302 line items.

Found out about this fun programmer-turned-musician, Jonathan Coulton, on NPR today. Turns out he works with John Hodgman, of Apple and NPR fame.

Ah, the old on/off switch. So ubiquitous. So overdesigned and thought about in our day and age. It is presented on our computers as the ultimately obvious thing-to-do, fresh out of the box. "Push here". Even a two-year-old could figure that out, and they do. This is annoying with one computer, but when it's the power button for the uninterruptable power supply for a home network with all sorts of file-sharing going on, it's a major time sink to reconnect the network when it goes down. Solution? Put something between the toddler and the power button. How?

I used the cases from SD memory cards on each of the towers (Windows box, Linux box, and UPS box). Just dremel out an access hole in the back, and attach it to the case. Think about it: these cases are made to protect their contents. They are made to not open unintentionally. Speaking from experience, superglue, Testor's plastic cement, and epoxy all fail to adhere to that tiny translucent case. It's got a tortuous rim so it's even splash-resistant. Do I miss the cases? Not really. One card is always in each camera, and one is usually sitting in the reader on one of the computers, so that's three cases readily available.

This is also a nice example of layered security. There's really not that much more between my brilliant young son and the glowing green button, but it obliterates the interesting design of the button, tends to require more planning, and does require some manual dexterity and fine motor strength. All together, it is substantially less likely he will find it interesting enough, and be able to intentionally get to it, until he's old enough to understand that Mommy and Daddy really don't want him playing around with it, which will also be about the time he can remember the causal relationship between that button and the state of the computer.

While it remains entirely possible that he will shove a fork through the entire assembly tomorrow morning, it deterred him tonight (he didn't even go near the computers), and the probability of a two-year-old crashing the network has gone down quite a bit.

12 January 2007: No incidents to date.

7 March 2007: Still no incidents. This fellow pflammerstma on stumbleupon points out that the power button can be disabled in the operating system. Yes, it most certainly can be disabled, and, in fact, it is. The issue is with the UPS unit, and I haven't figured out how to disable the off function of that power button. It's certainly not an available option from the GUI. It was faster to put a hunk of plastic in front.

Doctor Leon Weisberg, neurologist and author of the first book on CT scanning of the human brain, seven other books and over 150 articles, is dead. I interviewed Dr Weisberg in Houston after Katrina. Here is the second interview, the essay that came out of those interviews, and, reprinted here, my note at the end of the essay.

Essay (pdf)
Interview (mp3)

As Allan Cormack was amazed to find no one had solved the CT problem, I was somewhat amazed when I looked for background information on Dr Weisberg and found nothing but his own scientific reports. I strongly encourage future History of Medicine Society writers to consider writing about the great doctors in New Orleans. It is more satisfying, more enjoyable, and more important than synthesizing secondary sources. I have found it immensely satisfying to learn about this man, his career, and his family. The personal interviews were far more interesting than library research, and library research was far more interesting when I knew some of the stories behind the writing. There is so much more to write and there are so many more questions to ask. I restricted myself to a brief overview and only addressed one aspect of Dr Weisberg's work. More importantly though, if we do not take the opportunity to learn about and write about the heroes among us, I am afraid their legacies may get short shrift. Our commercialized pop culture has made every effort to usurp our hero metaphor and tries to convince us heroes are actors who jump out of flaming helicopter props, save storyboard civilizations, and have a ready supply of snarky one-liners. The hero metaphor, however, was surely born in villages, communities of families knit tight to protect each other in an all too dangerous world. Their heroes were good people, people who demanded excellence of themselves, and were thus ready when challenges arose. In the cacophony of pop culture it may be only through our own efforts that we learn about the great doctors we see in the halls.

The family has asked that, in lieu of flowers, donations be sent to the Louisiana Stroke Association or the Louisiana SPCA.

Dr Cusick is collecting rememberences from past students if you would e-mail them to her at cusick*at*tulane*dot*edu.

Lawrence K Altman provides an excellent account of Grand Rounds in Socratic Dialogue Gives Way to PowerPpoint.

Robert Carruthers is a third-year medical student at Tulane. He recently provided this advise to the second-year class. It is reposted here with permission.

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Hey 2009,

Step 1 is still pretty far away, but I thought I’d pass on some of my own and others’ advice. Write back if you want clarification.

Good Luck,

Rob

What you NEED to have:

1) QBank, 2) First Aid, 3) BRS or other relatively high yield review books for most, if not all subjects. 4) BRS Micro Flash Cards and Clinical Micro Made Ridiculously Simple

Advice:

“You spend 20% of your time learning 80% of the material.” - Dr. Wiese

Don’t get hung up on minutiae. Details will get you nowhere without the big picture.

“Do QBank and First Aid and you’ll be fine.” – Maya Jones T4

Getting ready is actually pretty easy. There are excellent resources at your disposal. Below, I have some suggestions to maximize your return on these investments.

According to Dr. Markert, students will burn out if they schedule their Step 1 more than 3 weeks after they finish their shelf exams.

Burnout is something that should be respected. Three weeks of prep time is optimal. Trust me. You’ll go crazy with any more. 3 WEEKS.

Be humble. Do the work now so you can relax when you take the test.

Medical students are neurotic messes about this Step 1 thing and it gets ugly. Good preparation will make this a considerably less-painful experience.

Micro was not the strongest subject last year. Learn it yourself. Use the Clinical Micro book with the flash cards and you’ll be very well prepared.

Timeline:

Already you should be using your First Aid to help review for your block exams.

Working on current material is very important. Don’t cheat yourself out of learning the material well the first time.

Get registered for the Step in January. Plan a 3-4 day break after your shelf exams in June. Schedule your test day to give you 3 weeks to prepare for the Step.

In February, you should put together a schedule, giving yourself enough time to blast through a BRS in a week or two. Getting up to study is the hardest thing here. Make sure you spend time on your weaknesses!!!

Studying with a friend helps a lot as other people will constantly throw you great material. Don’t study with anyone who is overtly competitive or negative.

In March or so, start using QBank. There are pitfalls you can avoid: 1) using the “tutorial mode,” 2) doing short tests and 3) not checking answers. You MUST do FULL-length tests of RANDOM questions at the correct pace to build your stamina. Tutor mode and short tests give you a false sense of security. Checking the answers is essential because QBank tests 2,000 important factoids/concepts/buzzwords.

By April, you should be getting better results on QBank as you develop your test taking strategy (ie. get questions by eliminating wrong answers instead of knowing the right answer). Finally, use your QBank Percentage Right as a monitor of your improving test-taking strategy and knowledge. That Average Percentage Right means nothing.

Before your shelf exams, use the BRS books, and First Aid for Path and Pharm. Condensed material will help get through everything (remember Dr. Wiese’s advice).

AFTER the Shelf exams, take three or four days off. That’s right Turkey. You will need some rest.

If you finish QBank and are dying for more computerized questions, try USMLEasy.com. QBank is better, but these will help you on your test stamina and technique.

After a day off, take the Kaplan Full Length exam TWO weeks before your test day.

After a day off, take another full length test ONE week before.

Then blast through first year stuff you haven’t gotten to. Get through Pharm and Path again. In the last few days cram any memorization intensive stuff.

Take a day off before test day. Relax. Drive to your test center. Watch a movie. Have a good dinner. Get some sleep.

TEST DAY!!!! Bring some sandwiches, coffee in a thermos, fruit etc. Avoid things that will provoke a huge insulin surge. I suggest bringing 2 bottles of Fresh Samantha (the green stuff). Don’t stress on the first section as it’s notoriously difficult.

Robert Carruthers

I'm trying to draw a nutritional model that provides reasonable answers most of the time. Comments via e-mail would be much appreciated. Yes, there are four livers.

Note: Dr Todd Burstain from the University of Iowa points out this excellent article by Wynne, et al: The Gut and Regulation of Body Weight (J Clin Endocrinol Metab 2004;89:2576–82.).

5-8 January, MAA—AMS joint National meeting! Oh, I so totally want to go. And I was just browsing the R L Moore Legacy Project.

You may have heard about this on NPR: Robert Waples conducted a survey of economists and found they agree on a lot. Here's the NPR story and a link to the survey write-up (free with registration)

Sprint provides the WiFi at Houston's William P Hobby Airport, but as I sit here, I can't get a common laptop, a Dell, to connect with either of the most common browsers, Internet Explorer and Firefox. Every time I fill out the form I get kicked back for an invalid "CCV2, CVC2, or CID", though no field on the form is labeled thusly. Once, the first time I tried with Internet Explorer, I got a different error, that my username was either invalid or already in use. Between the two browsers, I've tried several different usernames and passwords; the credit card number is valid. Grrrrrrr.