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Barolo tap
“Weird, guess we’re using wine glasses not test tubes…”

ATLANTA, GA – Internal medicine intern Timothy McDuffy’s quest to perform a lumbar puncture (LP) in which there are zero RBCs in the first and last tubes, the so-called “champagne tap,” continues in failure as today’s attempt was not even remotely close and, in fact, would be more accurately described as a Barolo tap.

“Tim is an intern and this year he hasn’t had many opportunities to perform LPs, so he was already at a disadvantage,” said McDuffy’s internal medicine attending Lidia Nebbiolo.  “Though he gave it his all, he unfortunately ended up on the other side of the spectrum: CSF tubes full of such frank blood it had not the characteristic of champagne but that of a full-bodied red.”

Given the deep dark red color of the CSF, Nebbiolo was initially concerned for subarachnoid hemorrhage.  Thankfully, CSF analysis revealed RBCs < 2000 and no xanthochromia, more in keeping with a traumatic Barolo tap.

McDuffy was obviously disappointed he fell well short of his intended goal of a champagne tap.  However, Nebbiolo told him not to sweat it and reassured him that this was not the boldest red she has ever seen.

“When I was an intern over a decade ago, I had some pretty terrible traumatic taps myself,” Nebbiolo confided in her young intern, “there was the Cabernet Sauvignon tap, the Syrah tap, and then the worst and most full-bodied of them all: the Tannat tap.  To this day, I can’t drink Tannat wines because of all the flashbacks.”

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Dr. 99
First there was Dr. 01, the first robot physician, created to withstand toxic levels of burnout in an increasingly mechanistic and impossibly demanding healthcare field. Dr. 99 builds upon the advances of its ninety-eight predecessors by phasing out all human emotion, innovation, and creativity completely, and focusing solely on pre-programmed protocols and volume-based productivity. In its spare time, Dr. 99 enjoys writing for Gomerblog and listening to Taylor Swift.
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