The charming physician (El médico encantador): neurological conditions in a short story by Silvina Ocampo

ABSTRACT The Argentinian author Silvina Ocampo (1903-1993) left us a vast body of works which are considered outstanding in many ways. In 1960, she published a short story, entitled “El médico encantador” (The Charming Physician), in the renowned literary magazine Sur. The central character of this piece is a family doctor named Albino Morgan, who had a secret truth: in any house he visited, all variety of disease also entered. He brought with him the viruses he disseminated. The narrator of this short story—one of his patients—describes four of Morgan’s diseases. These imaginary neurological conditions allowed Ocampo to explore improbable situations in everyday life. Keywords: neurology; medicine in literature; medicine in art; agnosia; sleep initiation and maintenance disorders RESUMO A autora argentina Silvina Ocampo (1903-1993) deixou-nos uma vasta obra que é considerada excelente de várias maneiras. Em 1960, publicou um conto, intitulado “El médico encantador” (O médico encantador), na famosa revista literária Sur. O personagem principal desta obra é um médico de família chamado Albino Morgan que possuía uma verdade secreta: em qualquer casa que ele visitava, também entrava toda a diversidade de doenças. O narrador deste conto -um dos seus pacientes- descreve quatro das doenças de Morgan. Estas condições neurológicas imaginárias permitiu a Ocampo explorar as situações improváveis da vida quotidiana. Palabras-Clave: neurologia; medicina na literatura; medicina na arte; agnosia; distúrbios do início e da manutenção do sono

Korotkoff Sounds - The Improbable also Occurs

Poucas descobertas tiveram um impacto tão grande e tamanha relevância para a Medicina clínica como a medição não-invasiva da pressão arterial diastólica. Vários fisiologistas e clínicos talentosos estavam, sem sucesso, em busca de um método não-invasivo para determinar a pressão diastólica. No entanto, a quantificação da pressão arterial diastólica não foi conseguida por qualquer um desses pesquisadores clínicos ou fisiológicos, mas por uma figura improvável e inesperada: Nikolai Sergeevich Korotkoff (1874-1920), um jovem cirurgião do exército russo, trabalhando em condições precárias sob as dificuldades de diversas guerras. É fácil descartar o feito de Korotkoff como uma descoberta fortuita semelhante à de Alexander Fleming na descoberta da penicilina. No entanto, a recente teoria do cisne negro de Nassim N. Taleb pode servir para ilustrar sua descoberta de uma nova e, talvez, surpreendente, forma

A case of tactile agnosia with a lesion restricted to the post-central gyrus

Tactile agnosia has been described after lesions of the primary sensory cortex but the exact location and extension of those lesions is not clear. We report the clinical features and imaging findings in a patient with an acute ischemic stroke restricted to the primary sensory area (S1). A 73-year-old man had a sudden onset of a left alien hand, without left hemiparesis. Neurological examination showed intact primary sensory functions, but impaired recognition of shape, size (macrogeometrical) and texture (microgeometrical) of objects; damage confined to the post-central gyrus, sparing the posterior parietal cortex was demonstrated on MRI. An embolic occlusion of the anterior parietal artery was suspected as mechanism of stroke. Tactile agnosia with impaired microgeometrical and macrogeometrical features′ recognition can result from a single lesion in the primary sensory cortex (S1) in the right parietal hemisphere, sparing other regions of the cerebral cortex which presumably participate in tactile object recognition

The charming physician (El médico encantador): neurological conditions in a short story by Silvina Ocampo

ABSTRACT The Argentinian author Silvina Ocampo (1903-1993) left us a vast body of works which are considered outstanding in many ways. In 1960, she published a short story, entitled “El médico encantador" (The Charming Physician), in the renowned literary magazine Sur. The central character of this piece is a family doctor named Albino Morgan, who had a secret truth: in any house he visited, all variety of disease also entered. He brought with him the viruses he disseminated. The narrator of this short story—one of his patients—describes four of Morgan's diseases. These imaginary neurological conditions allowed Ocampo to explore improbable situations in everyday life

Review Article - The articles of Babinski on his sign and the paper of 1898

In 1896 Joseph François Felix Babinski described for the first time the phenomenon of the toes; nevertheless in this first paper he simply described extension of all toes with pricking of the sole of the foot. It was not until the second paper of 1898 that he specifically described the extension of the hallux with strong tactile stimulation (stroking) of the lateral border of the sole. Babinski probably discovered his sign by a combination of chance observation and careful re-observation and replication. He also had in mind practical applications of the sign, particularly in the differential diagnosis with hysteria and in medico-legal areas. Several of the observations and physiopathological mechanisms proposed by Babinski are still valid today, e.g., he realized since 1896 that the reflex was part of the flexor reflex synergy and observed that several patients during the first hours of an acute cerebral or spinal insult had absent extensor responses. He also found that most patients with the abnormal reflex had weakness of dorsiflexion of the toes and ankles and observed a lack of correlation between hyperactive myotatic reflexes and the presence of an upgoing hallux. He discovered that not all patients with hemiplegia or paraplegia had the sign but thought erroneously that some normal subjects could have an upgoing toe. Between 1896 and 1903 Babinski continued to think on the sign that bears his name and enrich its semiological and physiopathological value