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From: werner@aecom.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.med
Subject: Medical Puzzle #4
Message-ID: <2160@aecom.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 1-Jan-86 20:35:55 EST
Article-I.D.: aecom.2160
Posted: Wed Jan  1 20:35:55 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 2-Jan-86 22:11:06 EST
Distribution: na
Organization: Albert Einstein Coll. of Med., NY
Lines: 22


[This week's puzzle is a tricky one suggested by John Wurzelmann.  It
is very tricky, but I am presenting it as a puzzle on two levels, only the
second of which requires Medical knowledge.]

	A patient comes into the Emergency Room extremely jaundiced -- that's
very yellow due to Liver failure. There are also other signs of liver failure.

	Since people's skin color varies, to determine the extent of jaundice,
you examine the whites of the patients eyes.  One eye is almost orange.  The
other is totally normal-looking, showing no signs of jaundice.  In addition,
the non-jaundiced eye is not responsive to light.

	Now the eyes shouldn't be different like that, so that requires an
explanation, and then and only then, can the liver failure be explained.
The latter, incidentally, requires a bit of medical knowledge that even I
didn't have when John suggested this problem to me.
-- 

				Craig Werner
				!philabs!aecom!werner
      "... Has Determined That Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous To Your Health"