Students undergo a conversion in the third year of medical school - not pre-clinical to clinical, but pre-cynical to cynical.

Geography is destiny.

Another day in paradise' was his inevitable pronouncement when he settled his head on his pillow. Now I understand what that meant: the uneventful day was a precious gift.

A rich man's faults are covered with money, but a surgeon's faults are covered with earth.

Life for the Italians was what it was, no more and no less, an interlude between meals

I joke, but I only half joke, that if you come to one of our hospitals missing a limb, no one will believe you till they get a CAT scan, MRI, or orthopedic consult.

The bottom line: health care reform is about the patient, not about the physician.