Giving Doctors Orders

Maureen Dowd's column in the New York Times this morning begins as follows:

When my brother went into the hospital with pneumonia, he quickly contracted four other infections in the intensive care unit.

Anguished, I asked a young doctor why this was happening. Wearing a white lab coat and blue tie, he did a show-and-tell. He leaned over Michael and let his tie brush my sedated brother’s hospital gown.

“It could be anything,” he said. “It could be my tie spreading germs.”

I was dumbfounded. “Then why do you wear a tie?” I asked. He shrugged and left for rounds.

My answers to her question:  (1) ego, (2) dogma.

You can read the rest of her column here.