don't fuck with the pancreas

[rone]

Posted without attribution because i can't find it:

Surgery has three rules.

1. Eat when you can
2. Sleep when you can
3. Don't fuck with the pancreas

I'm not kidding.  Google it: these are established rules.  You don't fuck with the pancreas because it's a poorly-encapsulated organ that, when inflamed, can't hold a stitch worth a good God damn, is a slurry of cells and enzymes that are trying to digest everything they can inside the body, is intimately involved with the superior mesenteric artery and vein, the celiac plexus, overlies the aorta, has a ductal system that must remain intact, is prone to form high-output fistulas, can trigger fatal systemic inflammation and —and— is so anatomically crucial that removal of the head of the pancreas can only be accomplished if you also remove part of the duodenum, gallbladder, part of the biliary tract and half the stomach.

Surgerizing the pancreas is like trying to remodel a house full of gasoline.  And the house is made of Jell-O.  And sits on top of a kindergarten.  And it's on fire.  And filled with bees.  Don't fuck with the pancreas.

Insert standard Intelligent Design joke here.

Comments

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

I'll say it again: my favorite puzzler for the "Intelligent Design" idiots is the simple phrase cephalopelvic disproportion. NO sane, intelligent designer would deliberately build a reproductive system with that kind of epic fail built into it...

[en-ki.livejournal.com]

Er, this is one of the rare bits that is actually properly documented in the manual. Per Gen 3:16 [Knuth 1991 (http://www.amazon.com/3-16-Bible-Texts-Illuminated/dp/0895792524)] and surrounding text, God intelligently designed the universe to include:

* human beings who are not supposed to eat from trees of knowledge
* serpents to convince them to eat from trees of knowledge anyway
* trees of knowledge
* punishment for human beings who are descended from human beings who ate from trees of knowledge (e.g., heads bigger than hips; jobs; death)

OTOH, it's not clear why animals die; maybe they ate from the tree of knowledge too, but then why don't they also have jobs and giant heads?

God hasn't yet submitted a revision to the manual to address this; he apparently attempted to just supersede the whole thing, but it didn't take, presumably because the scope of various successive documents was not consistent and the style changed a little too much for everyone to be comfortable with. I've sent email to his supervisor about it but I haven't heard back yet.

Personally, I think he should just use the MediaWiki like everyone else, but you know how those guys over in Supernatural are. And the turnover with tech writers has just been ridiculous; it's a wonder anyone knows anything.

[dr-strych9.livejournal.com]

Properly documented, my left testicle. Not only is the production equipment completely bolluxed, the fault analysis presented in the design process post-mortem, as presented in Genesis 3:16, is further proof of the mental incompetence of the designer.

p.s. it's possible that God hasn't submitted any revisions to the manual because he can't get through the goddamn change authorization procedures.

[en-ki.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah, the CA has been down for a couple eons, so everybody's certs are expired or self-signed at this point. It's a real mess trying to log in when you want to patch stuff. But you'd think the dude could at least show up, right? I can't begin to tell you how many meetings he's missed.

[vrbtm.livejournal.com]

I fucked with MANY organs in my belly, but even I know to avoid the panc'. Gall bladder? Kidney? No sweat. Pancreas? I'll think twice.

Remember, you haven't known life

[notr.livejournal.com]

until you've fucked death in the gall bladder.

[xlerb.livejournal.com]

So... napalmed kindergarteners covered in bees? Sounds like fun!

...

I'm going to hell again, aren't I.

[mskala.livejournal.com]

You need the napalm to get the bees to stick.

[plorkwort.livejournal.com]

I eat my bees with napalm-b
It makes a perfect partner
It may make me feel qualmy
But it keeps them on the kindergartner

[some_other_dave]

I thought that was what the Jell-O was for?

Oh, wait--it doesn't get really sticky for quite a while, does it...

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

I considered that, but he did say he didn't want any more attention. But now you've RUINED EVERYTHING.

[waider.livejournal.com]

shazam. now you have a hanging followup. I have DOUBLY RUINED EVERYTHING.

You could've left out the "posted without attribution" comment, or put in something else to indicate your intention to PUBLICLY RIP THE GUY OFF in a NICE WAY.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Bah, what has he done for me lately? Nothing!

[doctroid.livejournal.com]

Funny (not ha ha) you should mention this, because Monday we found out Heather's father had been hospitalized since Thursday, and was in the ICU, sedated, with pancreatitis. Nothing to do with surgery, but I guess surgery sometimes isn't necessary for the creation of a fucked with pancreas.

He might pull through. Might not.

We had a cat and a dog

[notr.livejournal.com]

both get through it quite well, once diagnosed. Hope he's as lucky.

We lost two friends over about 10 years to pancreatic cancer, which is a cruel game of trying to kill the cancer without infecting anything around it. After the second, we learned that another friend we hadn't seen in a while had lost two adult children to it in the same year. I can't even imagine.

More Than ONE of your friends has Issues....

[drieuxster.livejournal.com]

I am just SHOCKED!!!

Shocked I tell you at the blatantly absurd way people are responding to your completely Unamerican God hating Bashing and other forms of post-korn shelling of lesser known organs of the state of chaos.

We'll JUST have NONE of that.

Stop IT!

This is just Silly!!!

[tau-iota-mu-c.livejournal.com]

Hey, that sounds like a Solaris server at work.

Hey, but at least you can't declare the pancreas obsolete, and then have a moron surgeon move its services over to a slightly newer slowaris pancreas that is also being wound down because, well, it's a peice of shit maintained by a moron.

[eb-oesch.livejournal.com]

Well, that's good to know.

By the way, if you wake up with three extra pancreases, you'll know that prayer works. Especially if they all itch.

[anavolena.livejournal.com]

I just sent this to my friend who is finally recovering from having a pancreatic cyst removed.

It was the size of a football.

I kid you not.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Glah.

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

Ah ha. That explains my surgeon's comment after my my successful lap chole (http://www.doereport.com/article_cholecystectomy.php).

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

What did he say?

[thnidu.livejournal.com]

That it was a particularly difficult extraction: the g.b. was soft and pulpy and ready to fall to pieces, and that most surgeons would not have been able to take it out through a laparotomy but would have had to open the patient up. He was boasting, but he was entitled to it.

Stopping by

[fortuna-juvat.livejournal.com]

Just found this by googling "Don't Fuck with the Pancreas" as I was trying to explain to someone exactly why we don't.

Well said.

Even we, the medical folk are scared of it - because we've all seen that really bad pancreatitis case in the ICU. (Mine was auto-digesting his peripheral fat...)

Cheers!

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Thanks for stopping by! And we even have a common friend; what are the odds?

Heh heh, prevaricol. Love it.