Published 11 November 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4647
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4647

Views & Reviews

Medical Classics

Operation

Andrew Baldwin, final year medical student, Brighton and Sussex Medical School

baldwin@doctors.org.uk

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

I held the forceps firmly and gently tried to tease out the butterfly from Cavity Sam’s stomach while keeping my own nerves at bay. Any slip of my hand would cause Sam’s nose to light up, and a shrieking buzzer would indicate his pain, as well as a failed procedure. My brother sat poker faced in front of me, but I knew he was willing me to fail. He held the "specialist" card for this operation and would be rewarded with twice the money if he succeeded where I had not. But, success! After such an assured performance I was certain I could now set about fixing Sam’s broken heart. Yet this really did present a dilemma: I held the specialist card for this procedure—should I purposefully botch my first attempt so as to gain more cash?

Operation has been a top children’s game for more than 40 years. It . . . [Full text of this article]


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ