Neurotoxicity of Anesthesia in Children
Anesthesia when administered properly has over the years been a resounding success, enabling surgical and other complex procedures to be performed routinely that otherwise would not be possible. Indeed, it’s difficult to think of modern medicine without thinking of the vital role that anesthesia has played. In recent years, there’s been one aspect of anesthesia […]
Litigation Strategy and the Einstellung Effect
Those who handle accident cases are routinely called upon to answer a simple question: how can we establish through admissible evidence that our side of the case should prevail? Each case we accept can be seen as a new and previously untested problem that requires certain steps to be taken before a successful outcome can […]
An Abiding Presence
Depression as a serious medical condition – and not as an easily managed and self-chosen state of mind – has in recent years finally gotten the attention it deserves. There’s a large and growing body of medical literature on depression, its causes and effects, and there’s some promising new approaches on the horizon, including transcranial […]
Aeriform vs. Incompressible
The air that surrounds us we can breathe easily and without effort due to its gaseous state. Our lungs are perfectly designed to inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide. While many areas of the human body are protected with multiple layers, the lungs are a study in exquisite diaphanous design—the barrier between the inhaled air […]
Overcoming Optimism Bias
Complex tasks require sustained attention and coordination of skills over long periods of time. Distraction and inattention, even momentarily, can result in accidents. Over-the-road commercial truck drivers, for example, have explicit dictates in their CDL Manuals to avoid distractions while driving. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations impose similar requirements. And in 2011, the US […]
The View from Outside
The clearest thinking emerges with a sense of perspective, from a distance as if seen through a looking-glass. The angle of approach can be adjusted; the focus fine-tuned. It’s natural for young people to strive for outstanding results in a particular field so that they may be invited into an elite group. Once accepted into […]
Thought as Design
Patterns exist in nature, in ideas and thought, as well as in human affairs. The trick is to recognize these patterns and make sense of them. Nature’s abundance, though seemingly chaotic, conforms to certain laws. It has long been recognized, for example, that Fibonacci sequences can be seen in the pattern arrangement of flowers and […]
Constitutional Harm as an Element of Damage
Disability affects more than just the physical. It also affects one’s ability to exercise various rights guaranteed under the Constitution. In many respects the efficacy of a constitutional right is intimately linked to one’s physical ability to carry out the right. The right to peaceably assemble, to vote, to free speech—none of these can meaningfully […]
Triumph of Principles
“There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his […]
Mild Traumatic Brain Injury and Neuronal Degeneration
Mild traumatic brain injury is underreported in car accidents. Very often in the blur of events drivers and their passengers will not describe to the emergency personnel the exact mechanism and mechanics of a crash. Hours and days later they will begin to experience symptoms. Forgetfulness. Headaches. Pain. Disorientation. Inability to concentrate. Brains scans such […]
