Bad day to golf!!

This head X-ray was presented in our Head Trauma lecture earlier this week. Apparently this guy golfed a little too much for his wife's liking. She found a better place to store his 9 iron.

Pumpkins

I'm on the home stretch for neuro, but before I finish one final post on the brain. These images are from www.pumpkingutter.com in the 2000 gallery:

Michael J. Fox on Stem Cells

Russ Limbaugh accused Michael J. Fox of faking his symptoms in his political ads supporting candidates who favor stem cell research, including Maryland Democrat Ben Cardin. Quoting Limbaugh:

"He is exaggerating the effects of the disease. He's moving all around and shaking and it's purely an act. . . . This is really shameless of Michael J. Fox. Either he didn't take his medication or he's acting."

Russ Limbaugh is a jackass. The writhing you see is dyskinesia, a common side-effect of the medications used to treat the disease. Michael J. Fox was telling the truth when he responded to Russ Limbaugh by saying:

"I’m kinda lucky right now. It’s ironic, given some things that have been said in the last couple days, that my pills are working really well right now."

Functional Neuroanatomy

I discovered this program, Functional Neuroanatomy, at the University of Toronto website. It's an amazing program for learning neuro structures. It has sagittal, axial and coronal images of the brain, angiograms, tracts, and spinal cord sections. Structures light up when you pass your mouse over them and a brief description appears on the right. You can switch back and forth between anatomical features, functional areas, and vascular territories. In each of the views, you can do self tests to aid you in naming things. It's a remarkable program and a great aid for med students who are slogging through neuro. Hope it helps

The Brain on the brain

Homunculus

Studying neuroanatomy, I have come across pictures like these representing the relative areas of the brain associated with sensory input or motor output. Our mouth and hands require very fine movements to speak and write. They also have a great deal of sensory input. These Homunculi are essentially how our brains view the rest of the body.

From this image one can deduce that, in sensitivity terms, a large mouth ulcer could be more significant than ones tackle - not a pretty thought.
-- From the Mouth Ulcers Homepage

(sensory homunculus on left and motor homunculus on the right)