Fun Meeting

It is generally agreed that meetings are boring, and usually useless. But if the meetings are involving different people that you usually do not get to see and hear, they could be fun. We had a meeting to finalize details of suture materials to be purchased for hospitals run by the civic body. Heads of various departments and their representatives were present, because the letter of invitation had categorically stated that they better be present. Different suture materials were being discussed one by one. “Let us have uniform standards. Let us write at the beginning of the specification of each suture, whether it is absorbable or nonabsorbable.” I found that funny. “We do not have to say it. It is the property of the suture concerned. When we name a suture, such description becomes superfluous” I said. They argued on it a bit. Finally the chairperson said, “let us state if it is absorbable or nonabsorbable. A lot of people are involved in the process of the purchase, and all of them do not understand these things.” I do not believe in shrugging shoulders, but I did anyway. The chairman was not a surgeon, was not very familiar with suture materials. Then they started discussing ‘polyglecaprone’. It was spelled as ‘polyglocaprone’. “Correct the spelling to ‘poly..’ er ‘polycaprone’ suggested a senior surgeon. “Yes, ‘polycaprone’ it should be” said another surgeon superspecialist. “Excuse me” I said. “I know there is ‘polyglecaprone’. I don’t know anything called ‘polycaprone’. Have you?” I asked a cardiac surgeon. He shrugged his shoulders. It seemed to be a day of shrugging shoulders. Good exercise for the trapezei. I looked at both the ‘polycaprone’ fellows. “Let it be ‘polyglecaprone’ they said one after the other. So it was ‘polyglecaprone’ in the final list. Then they started discussing another suture material, where the specifications described everything but the name of the suture. It just said ‘absorbable’. After great deliberations, it was decided that it should have a name. The proposer of that item was absent. They gave it some name. The next suture was suggested by ophthalmologists. It was to be 0.2 metre 30 cm 3” without any indication as to what these figures were to be. “There is some error here” I said. “0.2 meter is 20 cm. How can it be 20 cm 30 cm?” The proposer was more confused than warranted. Perhaps the work of writing the specification was delegated to someone else. “Remove 0.2 meter” she said. “What is 3”?” someone asked. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the show despite approaching night. “It is the needle size” suggested the ophthalmologist. “A 3 inch needle for an eye surgery” a lot of people roared. “Get the correct specifications and give them to us” she was instructed. Then we reached ‘polydioxanone’, which was spelled as ‘polydiaxanone’. “The ‘a’ has to be replaced by ‘o’ in the name of the suture” I said. ‘polydioxanone’ is fine was said by most others. It being a democratic meeting, ‘polydioxanone’ was accepted. Then they had ‘Mersilk’ on the agenda. “We cannot write ‘Mersilk’. It is a trade name. We have to write generic name, as surgical silk” I said. They agreed to it. “Also write ‘nonabsorbable’ as you had decided awhile ago” I said with a straight face. At this moment the surgeon who had spelled ‘polyglecaprone’ as ‘polycaprone’ suddenly woke up, and said “we cannot write ‘Mersilk’ because it is a trade name. That is the main error.” “I have already said that” I said patiently. “Everyone understands it is nonabsorbable” he said. “That need not be written down.” “I had said that a long time ago. That time you all said it was necessary” I said. “We should write ‘black silk’ instead” he said. I shrugged again. Either he was sleeping periodically, was slow to pick up conversation, or was doing it to get even for having his spelling error pointed out. Perhaps he was irritated because they did not offer tea or coffee. It did not matter which one was the right cause. Wiser course was to ignore aXXholes and move on, so that the meeting would get over and I could reach home by nightfall, about three hours later than usual.