Heart Center of Shit Happens?
   Maybe they should call it the Heart Center of Shit Happens – as opposed to Broward General Hospital's Heart Center of Excellence.
   Why?
   Because a Heart Center nurse re-used the same bags of saline solution and tubing to inject fluids into the bodies of more than 1,800 cardiology patients undergoing a chemical stress test..
   Naturally, like maggots to rotten road kill, South Florida's new media has been all over the story.
   However...
   I've yet to see the any explanation of what's involved in a chemical stress test by our local media – which is yet another shameful example of today's superficial Journalism Lite.
   Thus and so for the journalistically challenged...
   My sources say hooking up to a used  saline bag and IV tubing is no more dangerous than drinking from the same brown bag wine bottle with a dozen total strangers in an alley behind the bus station.
   In short, while what happened at Broward General's Heart Center may be yucky and pose the risk of infection, it probably ain't gonna kill anyone.
   Not that this will be of comfort to the 1,800 heart patients receiving an OOPS letter from the Bad News bears running the giant tax-funded health care conglomerate. – Center of Excellence or not.
   Like many are probably still shaken by the horror they experienced when the nurse started pumping used saline into their body to test the workings of their heart.
   Consider how it was for Charlotte Kuchinsky who wrote about her chemical stress test
in a series of articles for the health care website at Associatedcontent.com:
   “Most of us who have done stress tests in the past are familiar with the one where the patient is hooked to electrodes and monitored as he or she walks on a treadmill. The walk starts off slowly and gradually builds to a fast pace, Sometimes the treadmill is set to simulate uphill and/or downhill walking in order to gage if the heart reacts any differently under those situations.
   “While that (test) certainly can be an uncomfortable experience for those who do not walk on a regular basis, or those significantly out of shape, it in no way compares to the agony of its chemical sister. That particular test borders on medieval torture.
   “A chemical stress uses an isotope medication that is inserted into the body via an IV. Its purpose is to take the heart to its highest extremes of stress, This is accomplished d by forcing the arteries of the body wide open (with fluid) so that blood is allowed to flow at maximum volume.
   “Opening the arteries (creates) certain symptoms, which include, but are not limited to hot flashes, tingling or burning throughout the body, sweats, severe headache, nausea and possible vomiting.
   “I personally thought that nothing could hurt as much as a heart attack itself. I was wrong! This (test) is as sever if not more so. Although it only takes about six minutes, the agony and the pain of the test make it feel more like six months.”
   Or as my dear old Quaker Grandma used to say, "Sei Gundsund!"