Death and Injury

Wolf J, Curtis N. Brain abscess secondary to dental braces. Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2008 Jan;27(1):84-5. Blum-Hareuveni T, Rehany U, Rumelt S. Devastating endophthalmitis following penetrating ocular injury during night sleep from orthodontic headgear: case report and literature review. Graefes Arch Clin Exp Ophthalmol. 2006 Feb;244(2):253-8. Fact: Orthodontic devices of all types are the spawn of the devil. Some go straight for your brain, while others prefer to wait until you are fast asleep and then poke your fucking eyes out.

McIntosh BC, Strugar J, Narayan D. Traumatic frontal bone fracture resulting in intracerebral pneumocephalus. J Craniofac Surg. 2005 May;16(3):461-3. Some college-aged kid got smacked in the face with a golf club, breaking a bunch of stuff that required a fair bit of surgery to repair. Kid shows up a couple of weeks later leaking spinal cord juice from his nose and complaining of headache. He is diagnosed with intracerebral pneumocephalus (IP), which is doctor-speak for having air inside your brain. Back to the OR he goes, where they somehow get the air out of his brain. Perhaps…

Oh look, a blog that hasn't been updated in almost a month. Heh. When it comes to suicide, you've got a fairly standard list of methods to work with: firing a bullet into your head, consuming copious amounts of highly toxic drugs/chemicals, jumping in front or off of something, hanging your neck from something, slicing your wrist (vertically, of course), and drowning. Then you have the weird approaches to offing yourself, which is where I come in. Sauvageau A, Yesovitch R. Choking on toilet paper: an unusual case of suicide and a review of the literature on suicide by smothering,…

Let's be morbid, shall we? Van de Putte D, Ceelen W, Gillardin JM, Pattyn P, de Hemptinne B. Attempted Suicide by Auto-Injection of Polyurethane (PU) Foam: Report of a Case. J Trauma. 2007 Jun 1; [Epub ahead of print] No abstract available. I'm not sure how this would work. Where exactly did it get injected? Ear? Mouth? Belly button? --- Panourias IG, Slatinopoulos VK, Arvanitis DL. Penetrating craniocerebral injury caused by a pneumatic nail gun: an unsuccessful attempt of suicide. Clin Neurol Neurosurg. 2006 Jul;108(5):490-2. Man, I really want to play Quake for some reason. --- Burd A,…

Thakur D, Pocha M. Pneumothorax after a roller coaster ride. Arch Dis Child. 2006 May;91(5):421. No abstract available. So riding a roller coaster can potentially cause your lung to deflate like a balloon. Now that's a ride! --- Roldan-Valadez E, Facha MT, Martinez-Lopez M, Herrera-Mora P. Subdural hematoma in a teenager related to roller-coaster ride. Eur J Paediatr Neurol. 2006 Jul;10(4):194-6. Epub 2006 Sep 1. A subdural hematoma occurs when veins in your brain rupture for some reason (usually a head injury), resulting in blood pooling underneath your skull. The pressure created by the…

Kunz J, Gross A. Victim's scalp on the killer's head. An unusual case of criminal postmortem mutilation. Am J Forensic Med Pathol. 2001 Sep;22(3):327-31. Dude must have watched him some Con Air. Sweet movie, BTW. John Malkovich and Steve Buscemi as murderous badasses, and Nic Cage with greasy dreads. What else do you need? Don't you dare say a script. --- Ropohl D, Scheithauer R, Pollak S. Postmortem injuries inflicted by domestic golden hamster: morphological aspects and evidence by DNA typing. Forensic Sci Int. 1995 Mar 31;72(2):81-90. Sperhake JP, Tsokos M. [Postmortem bite injuries cause…

So the word is on the street that if you fire a bunch of bullets up in the air, they eventually end up falling back to earth at speeds capable of killing people. Great way to celebrate, eh? Celebratory gunfire injuries occur worldwide, and represent the ultimate in preventable injury. Incorvaia AN, Poulos DM, Jones RN, Tschirhart JM. Can a falling bullet be lethal at terminal velocity? Cardiac injury caused by a celebratory bullet. Ann Thorac Surg. 2007 Jan;83(1):283-4. Some dude was out celebrating New Year's in East Lansing, Michigan, and ended up in the hospital with a bullet in his…

Chodorowski Z, Sein Anand J. [Internet as a means of persuading a patient to commit a suicide] Przegl Lek. 2002;59(4-5):375-6. Polish. So apparently this lady in Poland trolled the internet for a depressed student, found one, and then proceeded to badger her into committing suicide by sending her near-daily memos on how to efficiently off herself. A great reminder (in case you needed one) of how fucked up some people are, and how dangerous the Internet can be sometimes.

Frey FJ. [Microwave-induced heating injury] Ther Umsch. 2004 Dec;61(12):703-6. German. This one's in German. Though I no spreken ze deutch, the translated abstract tells the sad medical tale of a diabetic who was burnt by a warm-up pillow that was overheated in a microwave. The burns lead to amputation followed by infection with MRSA (a super-antibiotic-resistant bacterium) with subsequent heart attack and death. Total bummer. --- Dixon JJ, Burd DA, Roberts DG. Severe burns resulting from an exploding teat on a bottle of infant formula milk heated in a microwave oven. Burns. 1997 May;23(3):…