Boobies! Boobies! Boobies!

Nota bene: there are no boobs in this post. The title line is merely an attention-getting device.

A nice guy came in a couple weeks ago with a huge tumor. This particular huge tumor is growing in his chest, wrapping around his spinal column, compressing his lungs and heart, and dropping down to involve one kidney. His symptoms started about five months ago and got steadily worse; he's lost the use of his legs and bowel and bladder control.

He came to us through a relative of a friend of a former patient who *also* had a huge tumor. She had heard somehow of the guy's predicament and called her relative's friend's former surgeon, who said to bring the guy in.

His predicament, to wit: being discharged from a charity hospital because the only surgeon who was not willing to operate gratis demanded full payment for service up front. This particular wanker apparently works on contract with The Other Hospital, so there wasn't a lot anybody could do. He was also apparently the only surgeon willing to attempt a tricky and complicated resection, so my patient was screwed. To the wall.

Now, as in all great Suthun states, we have one city which continually congratulates itself on its international appeal, its liberalism, its ability to absorb people of all ethnicities and cultures into a huge melting pot/salad bowl of wonderfulness. This particular guy emigrated from his home country during a time of, shall we say, political unrest, and landed in That Great City.

Whereupon, after working and paying taxes and so on for umpty-ump years, he was told by one nurse to "go back to your own country to get your surgery". Yeah, I'll bet the Khmer Rouge established *great* surgery programs in its medical schools. Then there was the accusation by a doctor at the hospital that the patient was over-playing his symptoms in order to get free treatment for himself and the presumed ten kids he had, because, as the doctor pointed out, people like that come here to take advantage of the system.

And then there were the nurses and nurses' aides who pulled slanty-eyed faces and spoke with fake Chinese accents to him and his family.

Lovely crowd, that. There is something to be said for a well-aimed tornado or six, eh?

At any rate, he's with us now, and he'll get treatment for free. He had his first surgery over the weekend, an anterior resection of the bulk of the tumor, in order to allow him to breathe. The neurosurgery and kidney stuff will come a little later in the week. I think he's glad he left Self-Absorbedville and landed with us, poor sot.

It still amazes me, even after (*cough*) years of being on this planet, that people can be outright viscous hateful bigots. Especially people who have a professional charge and a moral responsibility to be better than everybody else when it comes to their job. There don't seem to be enough tornadoes to go around.