Friday, January 25, 2008

Medical Geeks

Here's something amusing a friend in the medical field sent me once:
So a few days ago we were talking about "E codes" (codes describing how a person has died). Here's what I found
E845 Accidents involving spacecraft
E928.0 Prolonged stay in weightless environment
These two are are bonus codes I found these interesting because on is specifically for "acts of war".
E926.0 Death by Laser
E997.0 Death by Laser during Wartime.
I too find it interesting that the World Health Organization decided the ICD-9-CM needed a code for "Death by Laser during Wartime". The pentagon would have us think this doesn't come up too often. Perhaps they were just planning ahead? I wonder if they have a e-code for "Death by overly-aggressive Aliens administering Anal Probes repeatedly during Wartime." That'd be a statistic you'd wanna track, and find out whether or not the public was at risk.

Anyhow, my wife just started a blog to document and relate her experiences as a medical coder. She invited me to post there as well, though I doubt I'll really have a lot to share that's on-topic. I posted the above "e-codes" quote there, 'cause it was something I could actually "help" with, so-to-speak. Since I don't know yet how professional she intends the blog to be, I left off the bit about anal probes.

I know that a variety of geeks and medical professionals frequent repeated expletives, so I told her I'd link over there from here. She doesn't have a whole lot of content on the site just yet, but she's a very clever lady and will no doubt have many amusing anecdotes in the coming weeks.

2 comments:

digital_sextant said...

I had two friends who loved to tell their stories of codes.

One was a security guard at the small Liberal Arts college I went to. I don't remember them well, but he had a series of numbers that he could call over the CB to dispatch. I'm pretty sure Code 17 was "I have found a dead body."

Another friend worked at an amusement park that had its own similar codes. I shit you not, the code for "Someone is having sex in the park" was assigned exactly the number you would expect it to get.

rbbergstrom said...

Hey Dig, were you working at the Theatre back when we found the prom dress, or was that before your time?