What It's like to Survive an Electrical Injury

In my ongoing series of articles, which I call the "What is…" series, I describe all sorts of medical tests and experiences from a layman's point of view. I was inspired to start this series by a wry moment in which I was pondering the amount of money I have paid in HMO co-payments over the past year, and figured I could just write about the experiences I have been having during this incredibly expensive and frustrating year until I was even. The website Associated Content offers (a little) money for such articles, and thus, I decided that I would allow Associated Content help to foot my medical bills, albeit slowly, while I exorcised some medical demons. It was a tiny little justice, but it was mine.

But writing the "What is…" articles have become something more to me in recent weeks. I have been living with a confounding hodge podge of symptoms, diagnoses, and misdiagnoses for many years, and the more I have attempted to solve the puzzle, the more confusing my medical state�has become. I would have one test performed to dispel one diagnosis and get a new one thrown into the mix out of the blue. As my host of �ologists became more frustrating and frustrated, and my primary care physician admitted to feeling "in over her head" with my case, I began to research my symptoms as thoroughly as I could on my own. No one else would ever be as inspired to devote the time and attention, and certainly the interest, than I would. I decided to become my own test case.

I am fortunate, more fortunate than most experiencing a confusing illness, that I work in a major medical center in the city of Boston, which is one of the most prolific cities in the world for medical research. Due to the nature of my job, I have access to a database of medical journals that is second to none. I also possess the knowledge of how to conduct a thorough search of medical papers and gain access to information about studies performed on specific conditions. Still, I kept striking out. My array of diagnoses just didn't seem to fit any sort of pattern that I could detect.