The Diagnosis

The casualty was crowded when the patient was brought in,

The students gathered around him, their faces all a grin.

The patient was unconscious and they rushed all round the place

To examine and percuss him - to diagnose his case.

Each gave his own opinion of the patient's present state

I'll quote you just a few and leave the patient to his fate.

One shouted to his partner, - "oh come and listen Charles,

He's got whispering pectoriloquy and lots of crackling rales.

His stomach is dilated, his clavicles are straight.

His PMI is beating at a rate of twenty eight.

He's got a haemic murmur at apex and the base.

I think I see a palsy on the right side of his face.

His pupils are unequal which suggest a case of tabes,

But he's foaming at the mouth which makes me think of rabies".

Another spoke of syphilis, with principle no doubt,

And said a dash of iodide would drive the symptoms out.

Some spoke of laparotomy and tumor of the brain,

While others bet on typhoid fever, haemorrhage and strain.

The seniors condescended to express their views thus-wise,

"The man's got meningitis, you can see it in his eyes".

But one thing puzzled all of them, `it was pitiful to see,

His arms and legs and body were as rigid as could be.

They eliminated tetanus and poisoning by degrees,

And spastic paraplegia by the straightness of hos knees.

At last in desperation, with sad and downcast face,

They asked the Senior Physician to diagnose the case.

At first he too was puzzled by the rigid form in bed,

But soon his face lit up with smiles and loftily he said,

"this case is very difficult in very many ways,

The man's got rigor mortis, he's been dead about three days!"

-The Leech 1931; 3(2): 35-