Word: patient
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...duplicate that miracle, Staffieri made a small slit in the esophagus of a laryngectomy patient. Then he flapped part of the esophageal wall over the top of the trachea, forming a valve linking windpipe and pharynx. To speak, the patient simply placed a finger over the external breathing hole in the neck. Exhaled from the lungs, air was forced through the internal esophageal slit, allowing the pharynx to vibrate and create sounds. But the valve could open only when air from the lungs forced it open. When food or liquid came down the esophagus, the valve remained closed...
Staffieri has performed the operation on 137 patients, with a success rate of 90%. At first, his technique did not get much attention in the U.S., partly because American specialists did not know much about it. But in 1976, at the urging of U.S. Air Force Surgeon Frederick McConnel, who had seen Staffieri's work, Northwestern University's Dr. George Sisson tried the operation on a throat cancer patient deeply depressed at the prospect of losing her voice. The results were remarkable, as were those of another early patient, Bessie Parello, who could speak 20 minutes...
Before the plug is pulled on this dialysis patient, be sure someone is around to answer the question of whether society can afford not to have me around just because my kidneys don't work...
Largely at the urging of a lay member, Rose Kushner, herself a breast cancer victim, the panel also recommended another reform. At present, most suspected breast cancer patients sign a paper upon admission to hospitals giving the surgeon blanket authority to undertake whatever treatment is deemed necessary, even if the initial intention is to do only a biopsy-taking a tissue sample from the breast to see if any cells are cancerous. To their great distress, many women have found upon awakening that the surgeon has taken a breast as well as the sample. Kushner persuaded the largely male panel...
...difficulty with which he said it. Ambassadors in a receiving line compared notes afterward on the Soviet leader's flaccid handshake and his shuffle as he mounted the steps to a speaker's platform. Brezhnev's public appearances are becoming primarily chances to examine the patient...