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Thursday, April 08, 2004
More from the medical book In response to the question "What causes acute pancreatitis?": More than 80% of cases are due to alcohol or gallstones. Other causes include hypertriglyceridemia, viral infections (mumps, coxsackie virus), trauma, hypercalcemia, peptic ulcer disease, medications (steroids, azathioprine), and, of course, scorpion bites."Of course scorpion bites"? It seems kind of a random and prosaic thing to toss off at the end of a list of clinically precise disease and medication names. And it makes it sound like scorpions are everywhere, the way the alcohol and the steroids are. ("What could have caused the acute pancreatitis in this person who lives in Alaska?" "Well, check inside his snow boots for scorpions!") (Okay, I'm easily amused at this point.) (And anyway, scorpions don't bite; they sting.) [ at 2:52 PM • by Abby • permalink • ] |
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