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My weird blog for weird people full of weird stuff

"Being weird is not a bad thing. What's bad is thinking weirdness is bad."
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A Body Struck by Lightning
Lichtenberg figures (aka “lightning flowers”) appear on the skin of lightning strike victims. These are reddish, fern-like patterns that may persist for hours or days. They are also a useful indicator for medical examiners when determining the cause of death. Lichtenberg figures appearing on people are sometimes called lightning flowers, and they are thought to be caused by the rupture of small capillaries under the skin due to the passage of the lightning current or the shock wave from the lightning discharge as it flashes over the skin.

Tardieu spots are a sign of asphyxiation.

Conjoined fetal skeleton with heart preserved in situ.

Hand deformity with fingers webbed together. Doctors believe this ‘frog hand’ deformity, could be a result of the parent’s both working in factories around chemical adhesives.

Known as the ‘thalidomide catastrophe’, the newly invented thalidomide drug wrecked havoc throughout the 1950’s. Prescribed to many women as a cure for morning sickness, the drug’s effects on the fetus had never been studied. Although thalidomide was never officially licensed in the United States, many doctors received thousands of samples as part of a clinical trial. One third of women on this drug during their first trimester from the United States gave birth to babies with limb deformities as seen above. The catastrophe prompted the strict regulation of drugs given to pregnant women.
On August 31st, 2012, the head of the company who created the drug officially apologized and acknowledged responsibility for the deformities. It is estimated that at the time of his apology (generally considered to be “too little, too late” by victim advocacy groups) around 5,000 persons affected by the drug were still alive.

Elephantiasis of the leg of a young man, date unknown.

Typical cleft hand. Note the deep V-shaped cleft and the adjacent clinodactyly. Clinodactyly is a term used to describe a bend or curvature of the fifth fingers.

This engraving from 1525 demonstrates the act of trepanation. Still practiced in modern medicine, trepanning refers to drilling or creating a hole in order to relieve pressure. In pre-modern Europe, trepanning referred to drilling a whole into the patient’s head in order to relieve epilepsy or other similar afflictions. Strangely, trepanation was rarely fatal and the patient generally recovered without infection.

Young woman with elephantiasis, 1877 - At a time when infant mortality and childhood infectious diseases were far more common than today, this girl contracted diphtheria and scarlet fever at age 5. By age 17 she had developed elephantiasis documented here. The childhood sickness had infected her body’s lymphatic system and closed the lymph vessels at the top of her legs, causing the fats usually transported by that system to stay put, swell, and harden. Five days after this photograph was taken, the girl died of complications from the infection at New York’s Bellevue Hospital.

A suicide by beheading via a train accident in Baltimore. The deceased was likely a patient at a nearby psychiatric hospital. Picture credit to officer Tony Pentralia.

Facial sloughing as a result of syphilis, pre penicillin era. Sloughing refers to dead tissue quite literally sliding off.

Genoese Medicine Chest; Genoa, Italy (1562-1566)

A typical case of poor oral hygiene associated with methamphetamine use (“meth mouth”).

A bullet trackin the heart of a murder victim.