Wednesday, January 17, 2018

A Fish Bone, and getting current with laryngoscope technology.

Yesterday my good friend Ed came over for dinner, and brought with him a couple of trout from a nearby lake.  Both in prime shape, cold water, well fed, looked great

For breakfast I thought one of these would be just the thing. Washed, dried, floured and seasoned, fried till skin crisp on both sides, potatoes and even a scramble egg.

When I finish frying the trout, and these were typical of what I have, 10" minus head and tail, just right 'pan size', I scoop them out on the plate, and lift the tail end of the spine, helping with the fork as I go, seperating the fillet frome the skeleton. Turn and repeat. Usually, this gets all, or at worst the vast majority of the bones.

Yes, I'm building up to something.

With what was I think the last bite of trout, potatoes and egg, I felt something lodge in my throat. I coughed many times, drank a bunch of water, still the same. Very quickly, though I was in no danger of immediate death, I knew somebody would have to get this little sucker out of there.



ER we went, stopped by the urgent care place, but as soon as they heard the words 'bone in throat' they wanted to call 911. I talked them into just hanging out, etc.

In the ER, I got to see a ENT guy a hell of a lot quicker than I would have thought: it was 11:30 and lunch time, so I was amazed when this guy showed up in 10 minutes. I should emphasize I was in no distress, breathing or otherwise.

Anyway, he had the offending little bone out in under 10 minutes.

Which brings us to Laryngopes........

Here's the ones I used to use back in the Plistoscene Era, to entubate people:



Here's the ones they have now.  Back then we had to peer down the curved blade, distinguish where the esophogus diverted from the trachea, get the tube down the right opening, etc.

Now, they have these with video screens, built into the scope, with a light on the end of the blade.


Jesus Judas Priest. The things I could have done with this.....the times we had to take someone to surgery because I couldn't see the vocal cords because of trauma, edema...I could have had an endtrach tube in in seconds.

Despite wolfing down breakfast and swallowing a small fish bone, it was a good day. I got a glimpse at the future.

Cheers, and swallowing carefully,
M.

8 comments:

  1. Sounds painful! I'm glad you're okay. Now onto the real issue....fried fish for breakfast?! Really? :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You ain't from 'round here, are you, darlin'? Hey, first place I fried trout for breakfast was before I was kindergarten, I'm sure. But....I lived in Asia for some time, I'ts common fodder there, Japan, VN, Thailand, etc....and excellent breakfast, smothered with chili sauce, or alongside fried potatoes and eggs....

      Delete
  2. Glad it allworked out well. The very thought of someone doing that to me makes me go rigid. Good thing you knew what they were doing and could help by being still...haha

    ReplyDelete
  3. Absolutely love your take on the day...Great breakfast and a look at the future. From my layman's view it seems the smart technology is a great step forward.
    I think back to the first time I covered the Ku Klux Klan at a street march in a midwestern industrial city. I had to schlep a reel to reel Wollensak console model tape recorder up the steps to the hotel room where the grand poo bah was holding a news conference. Long story short-it may have saved me from a broken bone. They didn't like the nature of my questions or my refusal to shut up so I was "escorted" from the room and pitched toward the steps with my giant wollensak--which I rode down the stairs. It was banged up, but our chief engineer was able to patch it up and it worked. With in a year we had been issued the new portable casset recorders--they were a lot better of course, but they could't break a fall like the old wollensak.
    BTW-you are driving us nuts with those beautiful trout!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yikes. Fish bones and other throat lodgers...another scary thing I worry about. I'm glad you're ok.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Kippers are a favorite English breakfast dish. The advice given to avoid eating the bones is that the fish should be eaten tail first pulling each forkful of flesh slightly towards you, which should release the flesh but leave the bones behind.

    Glad you're okay and amazed too to see the brilliant new tech.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh my and here I though all soft trout bones were pretty harmless. Of course my inept filleting of hammerhandle pike over the years led to some minor emergences. As to down the throat my recent endoscopy mad me aware of how small TV cameras can be these days...:)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow, that's a fantastic advance in technology. Sorry about the fish bone, butt hose trout sure look good.

    ReplyDelete