This was emailed to me recently, and I have the writers’ permission to publish it, with names changed to protect, well, whatever.

To put this into perspective, the writer and I have never met.

What Would GruntDoc Tell Me To Do?

Or, Mrs. X?s little boy Billy learns not to be afraid of looking stupid.

Short story, (the other day) I felt like crap, borderline nausea all day, upchucking a little but not a lot which I blamed on coffee (caffeinated, ran out of de-caf so I borrowed some of the ?leaded? stuff from my wife, I?d forgotten how jittery caffeine can make you.)

Finally, around 20:00, I decided to go to bed and sleep it off. Laid down, felt pressure in my chest, not much, but noticeable, shortness of breath, sweating profusely in seconds. Sat up, pressure eased, not much, but was lighted headed. Laid down again, got the same result, more pressure, more breathing problems, and sweating, lots of sweating.

At that moment two thoughts and two questions went through my head.

Thoughts
I?m 50ish, 20 lbs overweight, the only exercise I get now is walking the dog and all available data indicates I?m a candidate (maybe prime candidate) for a heart attack.
I KNEW I was experiencing at least 2 or 3 classic symptoms of a heart attack.

Questions
Should I do something about it? I didn?t want to look stupid, embarrass myself yadda, yadda, and yadda. It?s not that bad, I can?t be having a heart attack blah, blah, blah, and it?s only 2 or 3 symptoms, deny, deny, deny, and,

What would GruntDoc tell me to do?

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In the mail:

I’m hosting grand rounds next week, but I’m afraid people might have a little difficulty finding me. I’m now on a group blog and, even if submitters knew to come to me, my email is not listed on the page. Anyway I was wondering if some of you wouldn’t mind, sometime this week, posting a reminder with my email address
(trentmcbride_gk8155@yahoo.com). It would be much appreciated.

Consider it done!

Nice to see old friends, one of the reasons to attend meetings.

Learned: Just get the CT, get the MRI if you think you need it (individual case problems guide, obviously).

Don’t write “Obese” on the chart, record height and weight, let the reviewer do the math. As the speaker said, “Your jury will be made up of non-tall, non-thin people, and they’re gonna hate you!”. Noted.

San Diego traffic is painfully dense, doubly so when it rains. We wanted to go visit my brother tonight, and in One Hour we’d moved less than two miles toward the Interstate. Cancelled, local dinner, back to the hotel.

Not much from today. Not that there’s nothing to get, just me.