Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

makezine.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 149 posts

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#121

Post by parennoob »

entropydude wrote: post #118
nhstanley wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It really is no wonder that the softer sciences have a reproducibility problem. Even Further, I think it's also indicative of medicine being full of people that have a fatalistic, passive attitude towards their patients and medical care. Medicine and health is really hard, and so many health professionals essentially believe that the only thing they can do is wait until something horrible happens before doing anyth…

I'm a doctor and former software programmer, so let me offer a counterpoint: I would disagree with your statement that medical people have a fatalistic passive attitude. In this case the decision is between 1) watching and waiting to see if the tumor grows and 2) acting immediately to take it out. The tumor in question is a meningioma, a relatively common tumor of the skull (meninges, to be precise) whose natural beh…

I understand your rationale for the "wait and watch" option, and agree fully with it.

> "well maybe they do, but it is out of carelessness rather than a problem with there software."

I think this statement precisely illustrates the point that the parent commentator has with much of the medical community. Think about what the "carelessness" of a radiologist that you're talking so flippantly about means for a family – the anguish, sleepless nights, and feeling of morbidity and helplessness.

I may be overreacting here, but I would be extremely worried if a radiologist can be careless and ruin a year or more of someone's life, possibly forcing them into opting for a highly risky surgery. If you think there is a chance that your radiologists are not measuring things properly, wouldn't it be beneficial to start a double-checking procedure of some kind whereby each MRI is checked by 2 radiologists and a doctor (or something of the kind)?

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#122

Post by digi_owl »

tsax wrote: post #70
jkokenge wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems that health care professionals don't have a nuanced problem solving attitude. They make a diagnosis, see how this diagnosis fits into a preconceived treatment bin, then just solve from that position without understanding what's different, what's unique to each case. And, in their defense, they probably just don't have the time for that extra work. That's where I see technology as most useful....how to automa…

I come from a long line of docs, though I'm a software dev. Let me tell you that the vast majority of patients can easily be sorted into these pre-formed category bins. Rare conditions are rare by definition. Most of medicine is dreary repetition.

Or rare variant of common issues. Got told a story by a relative in the health care profession about a patient that complained about pains. But their location etc didn't match anything fitting the the age etc. Eventually they discovered that it was a heart condition...

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#123

Post by digi_owl »

JacobJans wrote: post #111
tsax wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I come from a long line of docs, though I'm a software dev. Let me tell you that the vast majority of patients can easily be sorted into these pre-formed category bins. Rare conditions are rare by definition. Most of medicine is dreary repetition.

It's exactly this attitude that turns me off of a lot of doctors. It dehumanizes the experience of being a patient. First you are put in a bin, then the doctor basically runs you through a check list. It's really unfortunate that nearly 100% of the bins are disease or a disorder. A typical interaction with a doctor involves finding out which disease bin you should be in, and then putting you in there. Once you're the…

I think it is not so much the doctor that is at fault, as the system of checks and measurements that make up modern health care. The boxes are there for the convenience of management, insurance, etc, as much as it is for the doctors.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#124

Post by tomohawk »

Shinkei wrote: post #114
tomohawk wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This guy did exactly what he should have done. He harnessed his experience and passion to ensure the continued health of a loved one. The first thing to keep in mind is that you own your body. If you're not comfortable with a prognosis or course of treatment, then don't settle. No doctor is going to care about how things turn out for you more than you. You're the one who's going to have to live with the outcome. Don'…

Patients should be informed and the process should be open and honest. And also, any physician who would balk at a 2nd opinion is not confident in his or her own course of action. That said, it's very easy to get caught up in a situation that is over your head: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect I can tell you that it took 3 years of medical school (not to mention my heavy science undergrad) t…

I completely agree that finding the "right" doctor can be very difficult. The large academic hospitals are often a good bet, but there are also, depending on what ails you, specialist hospitals that can be much better, as they tend to see many more of the specific case. You may very well be sent to the resident expert at that hospital, but that expert may be far from expert when compared to other facilities.

In one case I am familiar with, someone with an acoustic neuroma was offered treatment at a few very well known, large, academic hospitals, but those hospitals only treated about 25 or so of these cases a year. It was amazing to me that a general neurosurgeon would offer treatment when they only had ever done 20 of the relevant surgeries in their career, and not mention that there were facilities with vastly more experience. Going with a specialist hospital, the patient found a team that did a few hundred of the relevant surgeries each year and achieved a good outcome.

This leads me to think that neuro and other surgery might be better off following the regional heart hospital model so that expertise gets concentrated.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#125

Post by digi_owl »

Nagyman wrote: post #68
jkokenge wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems that health care professionals don't have a nuanced problem solving attitude. They make a diagnosis, see how this diagnosis fits into a preconceived treatment bin, then just solve from that position without understanding what's different, what's unique to each case. And, in their defense, they probably just don't have the time for that extra work. That's where I see technology as most useful....how to automa…

I agree with you and also believe this extends to the majority of professions. Even within software development, there are a significant number of people that will only solve the immediate problem in front of them in a stepwise manner, rather than using lateral thinking to evaluate if the problem should be solved in the way that's most familiar to them, or to look at it from a different perspective and solve another…

This depends also on the person having the organizational position and time to do said thinking.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#126

Post by digi_owl »

parennoob wrote: post #121
entropydude wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a doctor and former software programmer, so let me offer a counterpoint: I would disagree with your statement that medical people have a fatalistic passive attitude. In this case the decision is between 1) watching and waiting to see if the tumor grows and 2) acting immediately to take it out. The tumor in question is a meningioma, a relatively common tumor of the skull (meninges, to be precise) whose natural beh…

I understand your rationale for the "wait and watch" option, and agree fully with it. > "well maybe they do, but it is out of carelessness rather than a problem with there software." I think this statement precisely illustrates the point that the parent commentator has with much of the medical community. Think about what the "carelessness" of a radiologist that you're talking so flippantly about means for a family –…

Welcome to modern society. Likely the radiologist etc see so many people that caring about each and every one would result in a early retirement for exhaustion or similar.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#127

Post by ashark »

learc83 wrote: post #109
ashark wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of school administrators have PhDs, but get one to tell you how they learned about some really cool experimental results at some conference (probably publicized by someone trying to sell them something, incidentally, but that's another problem) and are trying to reproduce them at their school(s). You'll be in for a treat. A "treat". Fun bonus anecdote: One of my wife's principals was convinced the prayer jar sh…

>One of my wife's principals was convinced the prayer jar she provided for the staff was effective because over half of the prayers the prior year had been answered. Depending on the prior probability of the prayers that were answered (and those that weren't), 51% could be plenty to support the efficacy of the prayer jar.

I know, the problem is that she was evidently entirely unaware that without knowing something about the probability of "answered prayers" absent the prayer jar, the simple "over half of all wishes came true" was entirely meaningless. Without more information any number could, potentially, support either conclusion (did/did-not work). This wasn't said in jest, either, if you're wondering (I did).

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#128

Post by cowsandmilk »

Karunamon wrote: post #77
stefantalpalaru wrote: post #32

Alternate title: Man encourages his wife to go through unnecessary surgery for a benign and symptomless meningioma after she had an unnecessarily complicated thyroid removal in order to avoid a 4cm scar on her neck. Oh, he also made a shitty 3D model of her skull in the process.

Did we read the same article? The neurosurgeon discovered that the tumor was starting to entangle her optic nerves, and told her that if she had waited six months, she would have had severe, and possibly permanent, degradation of her sight. Because I'd really like to think you're being this insensitive out of ignorance, rather than malice.

Alternate Title: Surgeon willing to perform experimental surgery oversells the necessity of his surgery.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#129

Post by ceejayoz »

_almosnow wrote: post #22

What's alarming is that a guy in his spare time can come up with a better diagnose than a 'certified professional'...

The doctor spends all day getting other cases right, which doesn't make for as interesting of an article. Expecting them to be infallible is unfair.

Re: Man saves wife’s sight by 3D printing her brain tumor

#130

Post by Karunamon »

Gatsky wrote: post #97
Karunamon wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did we read the same article? The neurosurgeon discovered that the tumor was starting to entangle her optic nerves, and told her that if she had waited six months, she would have had severe, and possibly permanent, degradation of her sight. Because I'd really like to think you're being this insensitive out of ignorance, rather than malice.

I have to say that MRI is usually very good at detecting optic nerve impingement, so this 'crucial' point which is reported third hand deserves some skepticism.

Skepticism, or casting aspersions? The first is smart, the second is just jerk behavior.
Post reply on HN