Dry Toast, Eternal Youth, and 
Let Us Do Breakfast

Peter Tong
November 24, 2001

"How can you eat that toast dry?" asked my mother-in-law one morning. She had come from San Francisco to lend us a hand since Connie came home from the hospital more than a month earlier.

Indeed, my regular breakfast these days consists of dry toast, no-fat milk and Vitamins. Regular staples, such as bacon, butter, marmalade, whole milk and eggs are now banned, because they are bad for one's health. By forego a few of my favorite things, I was hoping that would bring my marginal LDL level more inline with the good health standard set by NIH. Yet, according to my last physician, this sacrifice plus regular exercise would not be enough. In his opinion, at my age nothing short of cholesterol reduction pills would do. Side effects might be there but it was the lesser of the evils. Not willing to give in, I decided to find a new physician! 

These days, if a person reads the medical bulletins in our popular media or faithfully goes to periodic check-ups as recommended by the AMA, I am sure that person has similar experience regarding his diet, exercise and medication. Any day now, we will all be reduced to vegetarians, supplemented with one-a-day protein capsule and, yes, a daily glass of wine. Mind you, the wine is not for our pleasure; it is just another form of medicine to keep us living a little longer. This state of affair reminds me of Emperor Qin some two thousand years ago who sent a group of young kids and monks overseas to search for the fountain of eternal youth. Obviously, human nature has not change much in two thousand years just because we can venture into space or communicate over great distance with the flip of a switch. Nowadays, we are still searching for that elusive fountain much like the Emperor even though we no longer send parties overseas anymore, not even to outerspace. Instead, we do our search in cyberspace and in place of monks, we have our modern equivalent of medicine men in physicians who instruct us on what to eat, how to think, and how to spend our days. Unfortunately, their method, as far as I can tell, consists mostly of denying us various little pleasures of life. So, how much have we advanced in the last two thousand years? 

From medicine and medicine men, it takes only one small step to reach the subject of religion. That is because every time I need to see a doctor, I have a strong urge to pray. I remember reading St. Joan by George B. Shaw in college. In its preface, Shaw claimed there is no reason to think that our modern churches are superior to the temples and altars of our forefathers. After almost forty years, I have come to the conclusion that Shaw was at least partially correct. The rituals and ceremonies might have changed but the underlying reason for religion has not. Humanity, then and now, are always in search of immortality. Those hungry will look for food. Those that aren't will search for everlasting youth. Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, Judaism... without exception. Some believe in reincarnation, others in resurrection. They do differ in how to reach their promised land though. As recent events have proven, their believe can profoundly affect our well being. The hijackers of September 11 and their compatriots seemed to believe that destroying Americans is their ticket to eternal happiness. Religious freedom is the essence of our constitution but I surely don't want to be their sacrificial lamb. By nature, I am a coward and loathe fighting if I can avoid it. But even I can see the necessity of using force as well as other means to defend ourselves when the other side believes that the our destruction is essential to their salvation.

The events of 9/11 were horrific; their impact might be far reaching. The anthrax spores are scary. Nonetheless, we must put all these losses in perspective. Terrifying as it is, the number of deaths on September 11 is less than one tenth of the deaths on our highways in a single year and the number of deaths due to anthrax is less than one tenth of one percent of the yearly deaths due to the flu. If, as a remedy, we delay or reduce the production of flu vaccine in order to buy more Cipro, chances are that we shall increase the number of deaths due to the flu by a number far exceeding the deaths due to anthrax. Before we spend zillion of dollars buying X-ray machine to irradiate all the mail, shouldn't some one do a cost-benefit tradeoff study? Clearly, these expensive machines cannot be used as paperweights later.

As many of you know, my wife Connie had been rather ill recently. She was admitted to the hospital due to internal bleeding. We could not be sure how that happened but since the condition was detected in time, we had expected her home in a week or so. Instead, she spent six weeks in the hospital and for a few days, her condition was very grave. Her real problem was not the internal bleeding even though that had triggered the problem. Connie has had a fluid problem in her lung cavity even before the bleeding incident and she had been taking diuretics to control the fluid level. As she was recovering from her bleeding, both Connie and I noticed that she had increasing difficulty in breathing. We asked her on-call cardiologist for a pleurocentesis to remove some of the fluid from her pleural cavity using a needle. Her cardiologist and associates were against this procedure because they insisted that the fluid might return. Instead, heavier dosages of diuretics were prescribed. We had since learned that diuretics are not particular effective in removing fluid accumulated in body cavities. Exactly one week after she first entered the hospital, I had a phone call five in the morning from an ICU doctor informing me that she had effectively stop breathing during the night. Her fluid level was increasing so rapidly that her lung capacity was greatly reduced. She had to be rushed back into ICU and put on a ventilator. For the next four days, her condition went from bad to worse. It wasn't until a chest tube was inserted into the cavity to drain the fluid that her condition was stabilized and started her on the way to recovery. In the end, a pleurodesis procedure was performed that eliminated the pleural cavity and stopped the fluid going into the chest. Connie still has fluid due to her heart condition but the fluid no longer accumulates in the lungs where it could be life threatening. 

Connie has now been home for six weeks. She can walk, drive and shop. Had the doctor been more alert to her condition, I am of the opinion that her hospital stay would have been shorter and her recovery less traumatic. Through this experience, I come to the conclusion that her physicians were at least partly responsible for Connie's long hospitalization. Had her cardiologists ordered an X-ray of her chest cavity when we asked for the pleurocentesis, the fluid would have been removed and controlled before it could do more serious harm. The ventilator is a tube down the patient's throat. It helped Connie breath but at the same time, it caused her great discomfort. And the prolonged confinement to a hospital bed made her recovery much more difficult. Her voice is still hoarse as of this time. 

Throughout this difficult period, many of you from all over the world have shown your concern by emailing us, sending flowers and cards, and offering many prayers. Leepo and Victor came by the hospital and kept me company on weekends. My sister Susie took a week off to stay with me until Connie was out of danger. Verona Hung had been ferrying Connie to visit her physicians since her homecoming. Yonder Ong had a crab feast which we could not attend but she saved me the largest 'blue' crab that I had ever saw or tasted. We are forever grateful. Special thanks to my physician classmates for their invaluable advice. Too bad that none of you lives near us. We sure need someone we can trust and is willing to spend more than 15 minutes with us when we are sick. Last but not least, thanks to my good friend SS for keeping you all abreast of Connie's daily condition.

Let us have breakfast sometime, dry toast, non-fat milk and cholesterol-free eggs. A little friendly chitchat will always enliven even a dull meal.