pump head

pump head
 n.— «Clinton stands a good chance of fully rebounding from the bypass surgery, in which doctors replace clogged arteries to the heart with veins and arteries taken from elsewhere in the body. But many people who undergo the procedure…find that their brains don’t function as well as they did before.…In the medical world, this effect is commonly referred to as “pump head,” reflecting the widespread, though unproven, belief that the condition is caused by the heart-lung machine.» —“Heal the heart, hurt the mind?” Los Angeles Times Oct. 4, 2004. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Further reading

Diamond Dust (episode #1585)

Diamond dust, tapioca snow, and sugar icebergs — a 1955 glossary of arctic and subarctic terms describes the environment in ways that sound poetic. And a mom says her son is dating someone who’s non-binary. She supports their relationship, but...

It’s All in a Dezzick

The word dezzick is defined in an 1875 dictionary of the Sussex dialect as “a day’s work.” This is part of a complete episode.

Related

Recent posts