For those who may not know, I have continued residency at the same place where I went to medical school, UAMS. In case you don't know, the only real thing UAMS is well known for is the myeloma institute. All moral issues aside, it is by far the most prominent myeloma center in the world - and that is not an exaggeration. Patients come from all over the world to see the specialists there.
What is myeloma? It is a malignancy of a particular subgroup of cells in the hematopoietic system. I won't go into any further detail other than to say the typical treatment involves a bone marrow transplant. This ultimately leads to prolonged periods of immune system suppression, which is how they often end up in our clinic or on our consult list - to rule out infection or bleeding within the eye.
Here's the problem. These patients, for reasons I don't know much about, have a very peculiar *bad* smell about them. I'm sure it's related to the cocktail of chemotherapy they have received, but I have no confirmation of that. Some people have likened it to the smell of sweet corn. I will never eat sweet corn smelling like that. And when they leave the clinic room, the smell lingers for quite some time. Whatever it is making the unique scent must be emanating from every pore on their bodies.
How do they do it?
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