Tuesday, July 13, 2004
Extreme doctoring
Kevin Fong was dubbed "Spacedoc" by Esquire magazine's list of "most influential men under 40." From Everest to orbit, Fong studies how the body reacts to extreme environments. He hopes his research on trauma will help physicians treat all critical care patients. New Scientist has a long interview with Fong:
"When you get down to the nuts and bolts, critical care is chiefly about one thing - getting oxygen molecules and putting them into the cellular machinery so that they can be used to make energy. At high altitudes, for example, you have healthy people who have extremely low levels of oxygen in their bloodstream by virtue of their physical environment. And somehow they manage not just to be alive but to climb mountains. If you show measurements of the blood oxygen and carbon dioxide levels in a mountaineer on top of Everest to a critical care physician, they will say: "When did this patient die?" The numbers don't look compatible with life. How someone can go to the edge of human survival and come back to live a healthy and productive life is what critical care is all about. I've begun to regard intensive care as another extreme environment."Link
posted by David Pescovitz at 08:33:24 AM permalink | Other blogs' comments
