WFC: Medicine for Writers
Nov. 8th, 2005 01:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eimarraThe second panel I attended, 3 p.m. on Thursday, was Medicine for Writers, with panelists Lisa Freitag (a pediatrician and program organizer for the con) and Angela Lathrop (a veterinarian). Their other title for the panel was "Maim 'em Right."
Lisa's pet peeve -- a movie, rather than a book -- was in LOTR. What really was wrong with Aragorn? Was it supposed to be a head injury? Makeup was all wrong, and he should've been experiencing symptoms for hours or days afterward unless he was mystically healed by Arwen -- in which case, why wasn't it instantaneous?
Angela's pet peeve involves anatomy and nomenclature. It's the carotid artery, not vein, and lots of other things would get in the way and get hurt too if you were cutting it.
There was some discussion of "flesh wound" being an undefined term.
Fighting with a dislocated shoulder: you can't. It's stuck, and the muscles won't be at the right angles to move.
Concussion: few seconds to a few minutes unconscious, some retrograde amnesia, nausea, headaches. (More discussion about Aragorn.)
They mentioned the existence of a Coma Scale, from 1 to 10. Angela commented it wasn't precisely the same because you can't ask animals questions like what the date is or who's president.
A question was asked about long-term memory loss and what triggers its return. "Weird stuff happens." No good answers. Joke about "trans-cranial magnetic waves"
How far can you fall and survive? Being feline helps. It depends on what you fall on, how you fall, whether there's something to absorb the shock, how limp you are, what the ratio of muscle to body size is . . . landing on the head is bad, though. They suggest trying for no more than 1-2 stories, though some kids have survived 3-4 story falls.
Recommendation for D. P. Lyle's Web site, where he answers questions on medicine/forensics (http://www.dplylemd.com).
Infection from a sword wound? Bacteria from the skin get pushed into the wound. Anything that pierces the gut allows the bacteria that are there to ooze out. How long to incubate? A couple hours for flesh-eating bacteria to several days. A person can pine away for a long time. Peeve of Lisa: sepsis. Sepsis is extreme condition that needs to be treated with long courses of antibiotics; don't have someone find the right herb in the wilderness, chew it once, and get immediately better.
Angela commented that chocolate really isn't as bad for dogs as they say -- more like having 5 cups of coffee. Arrhythmia, if bad enough, could kill. Can use this for not killing off an animal when would expect to. (Shucks! There goes my plan to get rid of werewolves by serving them mole!)
What about tetanus on swords? Tetanus has to come from somewhere. It's carried by spores, but they're not omnipresent. (Lisa comments that the best way to poison a sword is to poop on it -- and it has to be a deep wound, anaerobic.)
The Red Book, published by the CDC, describes illnesses, including incubation times. (Available on-line at http://aapredbook.aappublications.org)
Healing time for extensive second or third degree burns, if clothes on fire? First degree burns have red skin, no blisters, pain gone in a couple days. Second degree burns blister, peel off over a week, granulate from the edges, can take a couple weeks to heal -- need to keep covered to prevent infection and moisturized so the tissue doesn't dry out. Third degree burns ooze. If the skin is pink under the blister, it will grow back. If gray, need skin grafts. Watch for skin contractures -- need to keep pressure around joints to make sure skin grows right and joint can be moved later.
Catnip is effective on tigers. (They didn't say this, but from my grad school days, I know that catnip activates cat-specific serotonin receptors. Not all cats have tho same subtype of receptor, which is why not all cats are affected.)
Can treat wild animals at larger wet facilities. Angela told of a time they treated a mountain lion. They kept it in a horse stall that didn't go all the way to the ceiling. They realized the problem before it climbed up to get the horse put in the stall next door. They won't treat primates because they carry too many diseases humans are susceptible to, and they bite.
Adrenaline rush? Don't expect it to last too long, maybe a fraction of a minute. Lisa said she doesn't think there are any documented cases of mothers pulling cars off their children, etc. Can ignore injuries for a long time, though, unless bleeding too much.
"There is probably a reasonably medically accurate way to make what you want to happen, happen." (incapacitate, suffer, recover, etc.) Write it first, then get depth and detail by finding people it's happened to.
Lisa's pet peeve -- a movie, rather than a book -- was in LOTR. What really was wrong with Aragorn? Was it supposed to be a head injury? Makeup was all wrong, and he should've been experiencing symptoms for hours or days afterward unless he was mystically healed by Arwen -- in which case, why wasn't it instantaneous?
Angela's pet peeve involves anatomy and nomenclature. It's the carotid artery, not vein, and lots of other things would get in the way and get hurt too if you were cutting it.
There was some discussion of "flesh wound" being an undefined term.
Fighting with a dislocated shoulder: you can't. It's stuck, and the muscles won't be at the right angles to move.
Concussion: few seconds to a few minutes unconscious, some retrograde amnesia, nausea, headaches. (More discussion about Aragorn.)
They mentioned the existence of a Coma Scale, from 1 to 10. Angela commented it wasn't precisely the same because you can't ask animals questions like what the date is or who's president.
A question was asked about long-term memory loss and what triggers its return. "Weird stuff happens." No good answers. Joke about "trans-cranial magnetic waves"
How far can you fall and survive? Being feline helps. It depends on what you fall on, how you fall, whether there's something to absorb the shock, how limp you are, what the ratio of muscle to body size is . . . landing on the head is bad, though. They suggest trying for no more than 1-2 stories, though some kids have survived 3-4 story falls.
Recommendation for D. P. Lyle's Web site, where he answers questions on medicine/forensics (http://www.dplylemd.com).
Infection from a sword wound? Bacteria from the skin get pushed into the wound. Anything that pierces the gut allows the bacteria that are there to ooze out. How long to incubate? A couple hours for flesh-eating bacteria to several days. A person can pine away for a long time. Peeve of Lisa: sepsis. Sepsis is extreme condition that needs to be treated with long courses of antibiotics; don't have someone find the right herb in the wilderness, chew it once, and get immediately better.
Angela commented that chocolate really isn't as bad for dogs as they say -- more like having 5 cups of coffee. Arrhythmia, if bad enough, could kill. Can use this for not killing off an animal when would expect to. (Shucks! There goes my plan to get rid of werewolves by serving them mole!)
What about tetanus on swords? Tetanus has to come from somewhere. It's carried by spores, but they're not omnipresent. (Lisa comments that the best way to poison a sword is to poop on it -- and it has to be a deep wound, anaerobic.)
The Red Book, published by the CDC, describes illnesses, including incubation times. (Available on-line at http://aapredbook.aappublications.org)
Healing time for extensive second or third degree burns, if clothes on fire? First degree burns have red skin, no blisters, pain gone in a couple days. Second degree burns blister, peel off over a week, granulate from the edges, can take a couple weeks to heal -- need to keep covered to prevent infection and moisturized so the tissue doesn't dry out. Third degree burns ooze. If the skin is pink under the blister, it will grow back. If gray, need skin grafts. Watch for skin contractures -- need to keep pressure around joints to make sure skin grows right and joint can be moved later.
Catnip is effective on tigers. (They didn't say this, but from my grad school days, I know that catnip activates cat-specific serotonin receptors. Not all cats have tho same subtype of receptor, which is why not all cats are affected.)
Can treat wild animals at larger wet facilities. Angela told of a time they treated a mountain lion. They kept it in a horse stall that didn't go all the way to the ceiling. They realized the problem before it climbed up to get the horse put in the stall next door. They won't treat primates because they carry too many diseases humans are susceptible to, and they bite.
Adrenaline rush? Don't expect it to last too long, maybe a fraction of a minute. Lisa said she doesn't think there are any documented cases of mothers pulling cars off their children, etc. Can ignore injuries for a long time, though, unless bleeding too much.
"There is probably a reasonably medically accurate way to make what you want to happen, happen." (incapacitate, suffer, recover, etc.) Write it first, then get depth and detail by finding people it's happened to.
Re: A couple comments
Date: 2005-11-09 03:32 am (UTC)This definitely falls into the "depth and detail from people it's happned to." Thanks.
Oh--memories are sort of LJ-only bookmarks that you can access through your profile page. So if there are posts from your friends that you think you might want to refer to again (or even your own posts that you don't remember when they were), you can add them to memories.
Re: A couple comments
Date: 2005-11-09 10:25 am (UTC)And as to his shoulder, it really depends on whether he damaged or stretched the muscles. I'm sure a doc could give you a better idea on feasibility, but I can tell you all through puberty that the docs decided it was all in my head when I would be walking along and collapse to the floor cause a knee gave way (bones growing faster than muscles can keep up. In most people, it's painful cause the ligaments hold everything together. In me, the ligaments were happy to stretch, leaving nothing to hold the joint together :p) but a joint specialist did some rotation on me and said I have hypermobility. It has a fancy name, but that's the part that was memorizable :).
However, this really speaks to plausibility and truth is stranger than fiction. That worked for me because I have the type of body where it would work and so saw it as plausible. Mine is a rare condition. Doesn't matter if it CAN happen, it matters if you set up the situation so the reader believes it DOES happen :).
Re: A couple comments
Date: 2005-11-09 10:36 am (UTC)Re: A couple comments
Date: 2005-11-09 10:38 am (UTC)