The white coat is so synonymous with "Doctor," it seems they have been the medical uniform for centuries. In fact, the coat that carries with it so much prestige (and, it turns out, bacteria) has only been around for about 100 years. Is it time to let this tradition go?
Over the past year, we have started to build a library of helpful resources about healthcare topics ranging from hospital-acquired infections to patient advocacy. 92 posts and over 100,000 words later, here are the top six posts from our first year!
Around 248 million years ago, a mass extinction wipes out most life on Earth. Half of all animal families become extinct. Almost every single marine species is erased, including thousands of species of trilobite. Among the hardy survivors is a trilobite cousin, a 10-legged, 9-eyed, carapace-covered creature, living in the shallow waters of a ravaged planet.
Fast forward 200 million years, and our survivor continues to live in these shallow waters, a small creature surrounded by giant dinosaurs. When another mass extinction hits the Earth, these giants succumb, along with about half of marine invertebrates. But not our survivor, whose unchanged shape and size allow him to soldier on, even through several ice ages.
Who is this survivor, a living fossil that looks like a rock, moves like a tank, and chews food with its legs?