The story of our purchase of a Radiometer blood gas machine in 1973.
Back in 2004, the day I arrived in Copenhagen, while visiting my wife Lucrecia at the Bolivian Embassy, I called Prof. Poul-Erik Paulev whom I had contacted before my arrival. He was Prof. of Physiology in Exercise at the Panum Institute in the Department of Physiology of the prestigious University of Copenhagen.
I was surprised that on that call we carried on for about 2 hours talking of the scientific subjects of our common interest. One of them was Acid-Base and I was delighted to know that he was also working with Ole Siggaard-Andersen who had many years back developed the Siggaard-Andersen Nomogram for Radiometer. we finished the conversation with his invitation to visit him next day in his office at Panum.
Next day, the moment he opened his door we were linked and he after a brief talk opened another door in his office and said “This is your new office and lab where we will do research together”. Not only did we collaborate for almost 4 years, writing 6 papers jointly, but we also became very dear friends. It was “great fun”, as he always used to say.
The first paper we wrote was the “Essentials of Acid-Base Disorder and its high altitude application”. I had told him that the Siggaard-Andersen Nomogram did not work for the city of La Paz. He had been working on a review paper on the extraordinary achievements of the Danish scientists on acid-base equilibrium. I exposed to him the need to make high altitude corrections for the adequate interpretation in all high altitude cities of the world, a knowledge that would save lives. He became immediately interested and when I finished the calculations and the graphs, he decided to include a section in his review article and changed the title to “Essentials in the diagnosis of Acid-Base Disorders and it’s High Altitude Application“. He offered to put my name as first author and I refused as he had been so kind to receive me at Panum. Then, I came up with the idea of tossing a coin, that upon flipping in the air and dropping to the ground, favored him. We laughed and carried on and wrote in all, 8 papers together.
Many years back when had I finished the Freshman year at the University of Arkansas, upon coming to La Paz, my father had asked me to buy him a blood gas equipment from the London Company in US. I did so and packed my bags in order to bring it to La Paz, with the help of my American parents: Dr. Purcell Smith and Joan Smith, the most wonderful and collaborative people. I was 17 years old, back in 1973. United Airlines was the transporter. I checked-in my bags and although they were somewhat overweight, the airline agent, understood my American Mother’s request and they did not charge me overweight and so I was on the way home.
When I arrived in Miami, it suddenly dawned on me, that I should check if the airline had transferred to the Branniff Airlines flight to La Paz. I approached the front desk and they said they could not find my bags. They told me to go down some side stairs to the landing field and find someone to help me locate my bags. I immediately ran into a very nice guy with a tractor to pull bags and he said “hop-on and hold yourself in my shoulders”. I was actually standing in the Y connector to the tractor so each leg went to each side. Furthermore, I was travelling with a nice navy blue tropical suit coat and a white, red and blue hook-on bow tie that I had “inherited from my American brother “Purcell Smith III”. He is now a well known hand surgeon in Dallas, but in 1973, we went together to the high school senior 2nd semester at the famous De-segregation Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
It is also interesting to point out that, at the time, America was free from terrorism so I could go and ride underneath the huge airplanes holding on to the kind young tractor driver, with whom I am forever grateful (wish I could find him now; boy, would I give him a great present!!). My father had given me all his savings to buy that Acid-Base Mk2 Blood Gas analyzer from the Copenhagen Radiometer Company. It was around 9000 US$. Those were all his savings so if I had lost the equipment, our loss would have being immense. Needless to say that the experience gained running blood gases for all hospitals in La Paz and above all for our High Altitude Pathology Clinic, founded in 1970 by my father, would have been incalculable…..
We looked for my bags in several big hangars. They were nowhere to be found. Then he said: let’s check that last one. It was a dark place place at the very end. There they were both bags “suspiciously placed there”. I well recall the deep breath I took in relief. We loaded the bags onto the cart and we took them to my Braniff airline where I watched them go in the plane baggage compartment, elated and relieved.
They were many years of runing to all hospitals and clinics in La Paz, Bolivia.
You can read some more on how we arranged to publish our paper “Essentials of Acid-Base Disorders and their High Altitude Application“
And sometime later I will write how I arrived to La Paz and found my father had bought a beautiful 1952 Chevrolet pick up, where I then placed my bags……
