Welcome to what may be the Medblogger version of Rathergate or the Eason Jordan affair.....
Although reported as a simple thing, Bill Clinton is having a complex surgical procedure for a severe problem. His left lung lining has filled with blood and fluid, become rubbery, and caused the underlying lung to collapse. Clinton's people claim this is a not unusual side effect of heart bypass surgery...
HOWEVER
This is not common and either the doctors missed this condition or they have been hiding it from the press for six months OR...There is something else entirely going on. Bill Clinton's surgery was six months ago. So either he has an unusually persistent post-operative effusion OR he has a delayed effusion.
The thinking around our office is that this is a "Celebrity Complication" caused by trying to discontinue the chest tube too early post-op to show better than average recovery to the press and public. Discontinuing the chest tube too early can cause a higher incidence of left pleural problems. However, they are right. Coming this long after CABG surgery, and being this serious could have a whole host of other causes underlying it - and none of them are good. Clinton has looked tired and drawn since his surgery, and has complained very consistently about his fatigue level - of which this syndrome is a classic symptom.
Now - before anyone goes and gets all conspiracy theory about this, I agree that the chronology is unusual, and the literature seems to support more investigation before this type of surgery. But I don't think Clinton's doctors are acting suspiciously -- they just know this patient, and this case, better than we do.
