Lucky

For more than once my friend VW noted that he got the lion's share of emergency endoscopy. (See http://vwswong.blogspot.com/2011/08/unlucky.html for the most recent example.)

And, probably not by coincident, many of my outstanding colleagues also remark that they are particularly busy and unlucky (for them, but certainly lucky for our patients) while on emergency call. Some of us even conclude that there must be a higher power behind the clouds (or the curtain) who takes a close eye on us and manipulates the work load.

Of course our professor of hepatology is a scientist, and he goes on to review the situation by mathematical means. I must, however, say that he was not doing the calculation in the most meticulous manner, and, from what he showed, one could not conclude whether he was exceptionally poorly treated (or well-treated, as he tried to convince himself).

The problem could be examined in an entirely scientific manner.

Let me show you tomorrow.

PS. Of course you may not need to be too scientific. A knowledgeable doctor could pick up problems that an ordinary one miss; a responsible colleague generally would be more proactive and do things eagerly; and, above all, only those who know what they are doing would remember what happened during a call !