Category:
1980s
1980s
Buried at the golf course
In 1989, a Canadian company tried to promote the idea of burying people at golf courses. They imagined that courses could add memorial walls made out of their patented "mod-urns" — hollow, cremain-filled building blocks that could be snapped together to make instant memorial walls.A company rep argued that this could be "a potentially lucrative business for golf courses, who could pack in up to 50,000 new 'members' per acre."
Ottawa Citizen - Sep 29, 1989
Posted By: Alex - Mon May 25, 2020 -
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Category: Death, Sports, Golf, Patents, 1980s
Removing cockroaches from the ear: a comparative study
Back in 1985, doctors at an emergency room in Pittsburgh were presented with a woman who had somehow got cockroaches in both her ears. The doctors immediately decided this presented a rare opportunity to do a comparative study on methods of removing cockroaches from ears. They reported on their results in the New England Journal of Medicine, "Removing Cockroaches from the Auditory Canal: Controlled Trial," 1985, 312(18): 1197.To the Editor: A recent case seen in an emergency department of a large urban hospital may have finally settled the tormenting and age-old question concerning the best method of removing Periplaneta americana, the common cockroach, from the ear canal. Numerous methods have been described in the medical literature, the most popular of which appears to be placement of mineral oil in the canal and subsequent manual removal of the creature. More recently, lidocaine spray has been suggested as a more effective approach to this problem.
A patient recently presented with a cockroach in both ears. The history was otherwise noncontributory. We recognized immediately that fate had granted us the opportunity for an elegant comparative therapeutic trial. Having visions of a medical breakthrough assuredly worthy of subsequent publication in the Journal, we placed the time-tested mineral oil in one ear canal. The cockroach succumbed after a valiant but futile struggle, but its removal required much dexterity on the part of the house officer. In the opposite ear we sprayed 2 per cent lidocaine solution. The response was immediate; the roach exited the canal at a convulsive rate of speed and attempted to escape across the floor. A fleet-footed intern promptly applied an equally time-tested remedy and killed the creature using the simple crush method.
However humble the method, and despite our small study population, we think we have provided further evidence justifying the use of lidocaine for the treatment of a problem that has bugged mankind throughout recorded history.
K. O'Toole, M.D.
P.M. Paris, M.D.
R.D. Stewart, M.D.
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
R. Martinez, M.D.
Louisiana State University
A patient recently presented with a cockroach in both ears. The history was otherwise noncontributory. We recognized immediately that fate had granted us the opportunity for an elegant comparative therapeutic trial. Having visions of a medical breakthrough assuredly worthy of subsequent publication in the Journal, we placed the time-tested mineral oil in one ear canal. The cockroach succumbed after a valiant but futile struggle, but its removal required much dexterity on the part of the house officer. In the opposite ear we sprayed 2 per cent lidocaine solution. The response was immediate; the roach exited the canal at a convulsive rate of speed and attempted to escape across the floor. A fleet-footed intern promptly applied an equally time-tested remedy and killed the creature using the simple crush method.
However humble the method, and despite our small study population, we think we have provided further evidence justifying the use of lidocaine for the treatment of a problem that has bugged mankind throughout recorded history.
K. O'Toole, M.D.
P.M. Paris, M.D.
R.D. Stewart, M.D.
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
R. Martinez, M.D.
Louisiana State University
A subsequent letter to the journal noted a limitation of their report. In many cases, cockroaches get stuck in the ear canal. In which case, they can't just scurry out when sprayed with lidocaine. However, the correspondents offered a method of dealing with this situation. ("Removing cockroaches from the auditory canal: a direct method" NEJM. 1989. 320(5): 322).
To the Editor: The excitement was unbearable. "There's a girl with a bug in her ear!" the nurse had exclaimed. "Looks like a cockroach to me!" It was all we could do to keep from running to the patient's bedside. "Grab the lidocaine!" we shouted. This was the moment we had been waiting for. We had seen the reports, but did it really work?
As we burst into the room, we could see the young woman writhing from the combined sensations of movement and pain in her ear canal. One of us tok a look, confirming the nurse's diagnosis, while the other filled a 3-cc syringe with 2 percent lidocaine solution. With hurried anticipation we sprayed the drug briskly into the ear canal and quickly jumped back, fully expecting the beast to come hurtling forth at first contact with the noxious substance.
Nothing. "Increase the dosage," we shouted, filling a 10-cc syring. Still nothing. "Get that sucker outa my ear!" the patient screamed. What a brilliant idea! We grabbed a 2-mm metal suction tip and attached it to a wall suction apparatus with a negative pressure of 120 cm of water. Then we gently passed the tip into the ear canal, taking care not to occlude the canal and risk tympanic-membrane barotrauma. Shloop! "Got him!" we exulted. Sure enough, there he was, plastered to the suction tip like a fly to flypaper. After a repeat examination of the canal and a few drops of Cortisporin solution, the patient was on her way.
We recommend suction as a safe and efficacious method for removing insects from the ear canal when other methods fail.
Jonathan Warren, M.D.
Leo C. Rotell, M.D.
State University of New York
Health Science Center
As we burst into the room, we could see the young woman writhing from the combined sensations of movement and pain in her ear canal. One of us tok a look, confirming the nurse's diagnosis, while the other filled a 3-cc syringe with 2 percent lidocaine solution. With hurried anticipation we sprayed the drug briskly into the ear canal and quickly jumped back, fully expecting the beast to come hurtling forth at first contact with the noxious substance.
Nothing. "Increase the dosage," we shouted, filling a 10-cc syring. Still nothing. "Get that sucker outa my ear!" the patient screamed. What a brilliant idea! We grabbed a 2-mm metal suction tip and attached it to a wall suction apparatus with a negative pressure of 120 cm of water. Then we gently passed the tip into the ear canal, taking care not to occlude the canal and risk tympanic-membrane barotrauma. Shloop! "Got him!" we exulted. Sure enough, there he was, plastered to the suction tip like a fly to flypaper. After a repeat examination of the canal and a few drops of Cortisporin solution, the patient was on her way.
We recommend suction as a safe and efficacious method for removing insects from the ear canal when other methods fail.
Jonathan Warren, M.D.
Leo C. Rotell, M.D.
State University of New York
Health Science Center
Posted By: Alex - Wed Apr 29, 2020 -
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Category: Insects and Spiders, Medicine, 1980s
Mating Call of the Humboldt Penguin
Buy our speakers because they sexually excite penguins!
Posted By: Alex - Mon Apr 27, 2020 -
Comments (2)
Category: Advertising, 1980s
Chi Pants
Chi pants promised to allow your Chi energy to flow better. They were created by Laurence Ostrow of Santa Cruz, CA in the 1980s. Their distinguishing feature was a "gusset crotch," which was a patch of material under the crotch instead of the usual cross-seam construction.But for $5 extra, you could also make them "crystal powered." The Chi Pants catalog explained, "We sew a very small, perfect crystal in the back seam of your pant, right above the base of the spine. You won’t feel the crystal; you’ll just feel the energy."
Ostrow said, "We’ve had a very good response from people who have (crystals) in their pants. They feel a certain bubbling, tingling sensation up the spine. It’s not just a big lump in your pants."
Apparently the Chi Pants sold well and had a loyal fan base. But ultimately the company went under, even though Ostrow made several attempts to revive it.
Posted By: Alex - Thu Apr 09, 2020 -
Comments (2)
Category: Fashion, 1980s
One Crazy Summer: The Animated Bits
The movie's Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Mar 26, 2020 -
Comments (4)
Category: Anthropomorphism, Movies, Cartoons, 1980s
The man whose blindness, deafness, and baldness was cured by lightning
We've reported a few cases on WU of people who have experienced accidental (and improbable) cures, such as the woman whose deafness was cured by a sneeze. One of the most famous examples of this phenomenon is the case of Edwin Robinson, who claimed that being struck by lightning cured him of his blindness and near-total deafness.The lightning strike occurred on June 4, 1980 when he ventured outside of his home in Falmouth, Maine to rescue his pet chicken from the rain. After lying unconscious for 20 minutes, the 62-year-old Robinson awoke to find himself cured of the ailments that had plagued him since a road accident nine years earlier. An ophthalmologist who examined him, Dr. Albert Moulton of Portland, said: "There is no question but that his vision is back. He can't move his eyes, but his central vision is back... I can't explain it. I don't know who can. I know some of my peers in Washington, maybe, will say it's hysterical blindness. I can't see it. It couldn't have lasted this long. From the physical findings originally, he was definitely blind."
Edwin Robinson reads about his miraculous recovery
Later, Robinson even claimed that new hair had begun to grow on his bald head. He remarked to the NY Times, "I'm all recharged now, literally... It's coming in thick. My wife is all excited about it. I was bald for 35 years. They told me it was hereditary."
Los Angeles Times - July 5, 1980
Later, Timex took advantage of Robinson's fame to feature him in a 1990 ad. Although the messaging seems a bit confused. Once broken, but now miraculously fixed?
Also, it's hard to tell, but he doesn't seem to have a full head of hair. He must have lost it again.
Source: AdsPast.com
St. Louis Post Dispatch - June 7, 1980
Posted By: Alex - Tue Mar 24, 2020 -
Comments (3)
Category: Health, 1980s, Eyes and Vision
The use of blood to make concrete
In 1980, Charles Laleman of France received a US patent (No. 4,203,674) for a technique for making concrete by mixing together cement with blood. His patent described a variety of different recipes one could use to create this blood concrete. For instance:
EXAMPLE 1
A light colloidal concrete is prepared by using:
a commercially available cement (cement CPA 400), a silico-calcareous sand graded no higher than 0.8 mm (the cement/sand mass ratio being equal to 1), whole blood powder of animal origin, a colloid, and mixing water in variable proportions.
The various constituents are mixed by means of a mixer working between 100 and 600 r.p.m.
A light colloidal concrete is prepared by using:
a commercially available cement (cement CPA 400), a silico-calcareous sand graded no higher than 0.8 mm (the cement/sand mass ratio being equal to 1), whole blood powder of animal origin, a colloid, and mixing water in variable proportions.
The various constituents are mixed by means of a mixer working between 100 and 600 r.p.m.
The advantage of using blood, Laleman argued, was that the oxygen in it produced a lighter concrete.
Curiously, Laleman acknowledged that the idea of using blood to make concrete wasn't in any way new. He cited a variety of earlier patents, such as US patent 1,020,325 from 1912 which described mixing blood into concrete. And, in fact, the technique of using blood to make concrete was even practiced by the ancient Romans.
What made Laleman's technique unique (and therefore patentable) was apparently that he used it specifically to lighten the concrete, rather than to color it or to make it more porous. That seems like a rather fine distinction to me, but it was enough to earn him a patent.
Laleman's list of earlier patents includes another oddity. He refers to US Patent No. 3,536,507 (from 1970) which describes making concrete by combining cement with "an admixture which is derived from the fermentation liquor resulting from the aerobic fermentation of liquid carbohydrates, e.g., molasses from beet or cane sugar, corn, wheat or wood pulp." That sounds like a fancy way of saying they were mixing cement with beer.
Posted By: Alex - Sun Mar 15, 2020 -
Comments (4)
Category: Engineering and Construction, Inventions, Patents, 1980s, Blood
Just Can’t Put My Finger On It
Who knew this was a technique? See a more recent incident after the first story.DOCTOR MAKES A DRAMATIC RESCUE
Karen Dillon
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Dr. Wendy Marshall was jolted awake at 5 a.m. by an urgent phone message: Doctors at a Joliet hospital were using nothing but their fingers to plug two bullet holes in a man`s heart in a last-ditch effort to save his life.
The doctors at Silver Cross Hospital ''said they had their fingers in the holes and couldn`t stop the bleeding,'' Marshall recounted Thursday.
In an age when sophisticated medical equipment can keep patients alive for months, this most basic technique ultimately saved the life of Tommy Lee
''Tony'' Hairston, of Joliet.
Before the night was over, Marshall, a cardiac surgeon and director of the Loyola University Medical Center`s Trauma Center and the Air Medical Service, would be flown to Joliet and use her own fingers to dike the holes. At the same time, Marshall squeezed the 29-year-old man`s heart to force it to pump when it stopped three times for a total of eight minutes.
Eventually, Hairston was taken by helicopter to Loyola where open heart surgery was performed. Thursday night he was listed in critical condition, but was expected to recover.
The drama began Wednesday night when Hairston, a landscaper shot after an argument with a neighbor over missing property, was taken to Silver Cross Hospital in Joliet.
Silver Cross physicians immediately operated on Hairston, but did not open up the victim`s heart. ''The surgeon found blood in the chest and a couple holes around the heart. At that time, he didn`t open up the heart,''
said Dr. Robert Freeark, chief of surgery at Loyola.
But then after surgery, Hairston started bleeding again. ''This time the surgeon opened Hairston up and and found two holes in his heart . . . and he couldn`t stop the bleeding,'' Freeark said.
The physicians did the only thing they could-stick their fingers into the holes in Hairston`s heart.
Marshall arose, dressed and was taken by helicopter to Silver Cross, accompanied by a paramedic, Kent Adams, and Laurie Dudek, a flight nurse. They arrived 23 minutes after the call.
At Silver Cross, Marshall found a hole in the front of the heart and one in the back. The location of the one in the back was in an area where it couldn`t be repaired without stopping the heart, she said, and Silver Cross didn`t have the equipment for such specialized treatment.
So it meant transporting Hairston to Loyola Medical Center-with Marshall`s fingers in the holes.
Before the night was over, Marshall, as her fingers plugged the holes, squeezed Hairston`s heart to force it to pump when it stopped three times for a total of eight minutes.
Marshall said she used the first two fingers of her right hand to plug the back hole and her right thumb to stop up the front hole. ''When the heart stopped, I kept my fingers in the holes and squeezed my left hand against the right.''
During the flight, Adams, the paramedic, forced Hairston to breathe by squeezing a bag attached to a tube that was shoved down his trachea.
Four intravenous tubes were attached to Hairston, feeding medicine to stimulate his heart beat-one into a large vein near his left collar bone, two to his left arm and one in his right arm.
When the team finally arrived at Loyola, cardiac surgeon Henry Sullivan had been alerted. The patient was placed on a machine that circulated his blood while the heartbeat was halted and the organ repaired, Freeark said.
Adams shook his head in wonder Thursday afternoon. ''It was dramatic,''
he said.
Adams said Marshall was steady as a rock during the flight. ''She was so calm. She just let us know what was happening, and then we did our part.''
Hairston allegedly was shot by Robert Knox, of Joliet, after an argument over some items reported missing from Hairston`s apartment, Joliet police said. Knox was charged with attempted murder, armed violence and unlawful use of a weapon, police said.
By Thursday afternoon, Hairston had awakened a few times, which is considered a positive sign, Marshall said.
Hairston ''is lucky to be alive today,'' she said. ''When the heart stops, most people are basically brain dead within three to four minutes.''
Freeark and another Loyola heart physician, Dr. Bruce Lewis, said that saving Hairston`s life by plugging the holes in his heart was amazing.
''To my knowlege it was totally unprecedented,'' Freeark said. ''Nobody has ever been transferred with a finger better.''
''Very, very amazing, and very rare to see someone survive after that . . . especially with the size of the hole (in the back of the heart),'' Lewis said.
Marshall took the praise in stride. ''Anyone who has got a blood pressure can be saved. So you go for it.''
Source.
Heroic military veterans and police officers put their training to use during the deadly mass shooting at a Las Vegas music concert — even “plugging bullet holes with their fingers,” according to a report.
“You saw a lot of ex-military just jump into gear,” witness Russell Bleck told the “Today” show on NBC. “I saw guys plugging bullet holes with their fingers.”
“While everyone else was crouching, police officers (were) standing up at targets, just trying to direct people, tell them where to go,” he added. “The amount of bravery I saw there, words can’t describe what it was like.”
The practice of plugging gunshot wounds helps to kick in the body’s defense mechanisms that prevent rapid blood loss, according to a Wired report.
Severe wounds, especially on the carotid arteries of the neck, must be quickly plugged with the fingers or packed to temporarily stop the hemorrhaging, according to Gould and Pyle’s Pocket Cyclopedia of Medicine and Surgery.
Source.
Posted By: Paul - Mon Mar 09, 2020 -
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Category: Body, Blood, Death, Guns, Medicine, Superheroes, 1980s, Twenty-first Century
Virgin Prunes, “Theme For Thought”
Their Wikipedia page.
An even earlier version of the song here.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jan 09, 2020 -
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Category: Antisocial Activities, Beauty, Ugliness and Other Aesthetic Issues, Music, Avant Garde, 1970s, 1980s, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults
Exerlopers
The inventor of exerlopers, Gregory Lekhtman, believed that "we are not designed to run." Apparently he thought it would be better to leap around like antelopes instead.
Indiana Gazette - May 3, 1988
Posted By: Alex - Sat Jan 04, 2020 -
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Category: Exercise and Fitness, 1980s
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |