Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine - Sawbones: Medicinal Tattoos

Episode Date: June 2, 2017

Tattoos (usually) look cool, but did you know they've also been used throughout history to treat illness? It's true! This week, Dr. Sydnee and Justin explore the history of medicinal tattoos. Music: "Medicines" by The Taxpayers

Saubones is a show about medical history, and nothing the hosts say should be taken as medical advice or opinion. It's for fun. Can't you just have fun for an hour and not try to diagnose your mystery boil? We think you've earned it. Just sit back, relax, and enjoy a moment of distraction from that weird growth. You're worth it. that weird growth. You're worth it. Alright, time is about to books. One, two, one, two, three, four. We came across a pharmacy with a toy and that's lost it out. We saw through the broken glass and had ourselves a look around.

Some medicines, some medicines, the escalant macaque for the mouth. Wow! Hello everybody and welcome to Saw Bones, Marl to a Miss Guy to Medicine. for the mouth. Wow. Hello, everybody, and welcome to Saul Bones, Marl to Miss Guy to Medicine. I'm your co-host, Justin McAroy. And I'm Sydney McAroy. Well folks, the great that we're, Sydney and I find ourselves ensnared

in something of a parenting situation, currently. One of many. We did a live show. There are so many parenting situations. Yeah, this is an ongoing situation that we don't know how to extract ourselves from. There was a we went to the Austin Aquarium during our live shows in the beautiful city of Austin, Texas. We had a lovely time. Lovely time. And there was a mermaid at the aquarium who, if you gave her a gold coin, would give you a tattoo, a sparkly. Yeah, like a glitter tattoo, not an actual tattoo.

Now, Charlie got one of these and just fell in love with it. She just adored this tattoo, which of course is just, it's glue and glitter on her arm. Glitter on her arm, but she adored it and couldn't bear the thought of anything happening to it. So we got in the habit of wrapping her arm and ran rap when she got into the bathtub. So our kids got a dirty arm is what we're saying. Inevitably, when swimming time came around as it warmed up, this tattoo started to be removed.

And a city sister Riley got her self a glitter tattoo kit. So we could go over the old tattoo with a new tattoo. So now our daughter has to it all times have at least one, if not two glitter tattoos on her arms. Yeah. So we're there's no way out of it. And we can't get rid of it. We may just have to if there's a way to get a permanent better tattoo, I don't know about it. And if it's I don't think it's legal for a two and a half year old. Yeah, I'm pretty sure with it. Yeah, I'm not going to go that far. She might not want that shooting star that's pink and purple on her arm for always.

Mm-hmm. Maybe not. Maybe she will. I don't know. But Justin, what else do you know about tattoos? Well, as you probably would guess not much. I mean, I have a couple, but after I took care of them with tattoo goo, I just kind of stopped thinking about them.

Right. Well, and you might wonder why I'm talking about tattoos because what do they have to do with medicine? Nothing. No, that's wrong. People have been using tattoos for medicinal benefit for a very long time. Or well, let me say this, thinking they have medicinal benefit. Intended for medicinal benefit. I've never heard of this. I hadn't either. Thank you to everybody who suggested this topic. Olivia Jordan Caleb Russ, Cam Holly Susan and Devon who wrote us an email recently and said have they ever been used for medicinal benefit tattoos? I'm interested and I said, well, you know what? I don't know. Let me look into it. And it turns out they have. So this, this was exciting for me to learn too. So first of all, Justin, you probably know

how a tattoo is done. I mean, I was. I don't know why it works though. So basically there are, there are needles. I mean, when we think about tattoos, we're talking about now, Justin and I both gotten tattoos. We went to a tattoo parlor and there was like a gun and it had two needles on it and there was ink involved and that was kind of the drill. Obviously, there are many other ways of creating tattoos, not using needles and ink throughout history, but basically you got two needles. There's ink between them. The ink is kind of sucked down into your skin through capillary action as you push it down in. It's like creates a hole in a vacuum and the ink gets sucked down in there.

And then your body sends immune cells to try to heal the wound because you've created a wound and remove the foreign invader, the ink, except all these cells kind of eat up the ink and then just get stuck there in the dermis. Okay. And live there forever. All right. And you got a tattoo. It's a tattoo.

That's it. So it's kind of a weird immune response that creates the tattoo. Interesting. Yeah. It's really interesting. Now, it is not probably surprising to you to hear the tattoos date back to as long as we... I've had things to stick in our skin, pretty much. Yeah, I mean, humans have been tattooing themselves

for all of history and throughout all different cultures for all different reasons in many, many different ways. Like I said, you can use needles, but, you know, sharp sticks and twigs and branches. What's the idea? Yes, have been used for this purpose. All kinds of different like reads and things depending on what was what plants grew in different areas.

And then the different kinds of inks have been made from, I mean, carbon-based materials and ash and so all kinds of different things throughout history. And they're done for many different reasons. The number one reason is probably cosmetic. Cause they look cool. They look cool. I mean, I think so. Most of them look cool.

I mean, you could definitely get ones that don't. I'm partial to them. Some people are probably, don't think they look cool in general. I'm partial to them. I like tattoos, but generally speaking, humans have like the look of them.

There are also religious reasons, spiritual reasons, rights of passage that are connected to different kinds of tattoos, but then there's also medicinal reasons. So our first evidence of this actually dates back to Oatsi the Ice Man who we have talked about briefly on the show before. So this he was found in the European Alps in 1991.

These remained that date back to 3,300 BCE. The weirdest thing he was fine. That's weird. We have a little a little sneezey, but otherwise not very good with phones and technology, but otherwise like fine. No, he was fine. No, no, he was not. But that's okay.

Oh, see, the ice man was fine. That's the, you know, the old children song. Uh-huh. Yeah, I love that song. I sing it to Charlie to good bed every night. So he was, he was examined thoroughly. And we found out a lot of stuff, you know, from examining these remains, but among this, among all of our findings, were tattoos, many of them, but specifically 61 tattoos on

the ankles, knees, lower back and wrist in different patterns, like there were some rings around his wrist, there was a cross behind one knee, there were some dots in different places and little lines on his lumbar spine area and his lower back. And they seemed a very specific pattern. So among the many many different studies that were done on these remains, X-rays of these various locations were done, and probably the rest of them, frankly. And they found evidence of arthritis and like degenerative discs and degenerative bones in these various locations that corresponded with these tattoos. The tattoos, what cause are you arthritis?

Well, that's going to do it for us here on solbona, that's not it. Now, many people began to wonder, could these tattoos have been attempts to relieve the symptoms he was having from the arthritis in those locations? Because you can assume that he probably had some pain there, some stiffness symptoms that you get with arthritis. Did he get tattooed to help alleviate that? Was it a thought that maybe this would fix the problem? I don't know. Why are you asking me? Well, this is the theory. And it was supported by the fact that these tattoos were so dark that it appeared they had been done multiple times. So like over a period of who knows, you know, months, years, whatever,

he had had these exact same tattoos repeated multiple times, which you would do for a medical treatment, right? If it, yeah, right. Yeah, if it was, especially if it didn't fix it, if somehow your medicinal tattoo did fix it the first time. Fix it the first time. So that was the beginning of this theory, like, well, maybe, maybe tattoos have been used Medicinally and as I'll get into in a little more depth This was supported by the fact as well that a lot of these points

Coinsighted with acupuncture points ancient Chinese acupuncture points Not all of them about 80% but but a lot of them did In 1995 there was a discovery of another body from the iron age in Central Asia, and they also found tattoos near the spine that same kind of just like dots and lines near the spine, and also behind the ear. And these were thought to be, again, medicinal tattoos corresponding loosely with some acupuncture points to relieve back pain and headaches. Was the original? was the thought. We've also found evidence of scarifications.

So creating like scars in the skin, like thick scars that would be used to create like a pattern or something. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah. And the pelvic region of mummies that were discovered in 1898, and this was thought to be some sort of maybe medical application for like a chronic pelvic infection

or pain, chronic pelvic pain, that maybe this was done in an attempt to alleviate whatever was going on. Not a 108. And that wouldn't a tattoo maybe necessarily but like intentional scarring. Yes, intentional scarring. Could you see that a lot?

It's not tattooing, but it's a very similar idea. You'll see in some various cultures where scars are created. There's specifically one, one tribal people that still creates these crocodile scars along their back. And it looks like crocodile skin. And it's a very specific like cuts are made. And then river mud has to be rubbed into it. And then it gets infected

and it heals in this thickened way that looks like crocodile skin. So you see that alongside tattooing in some cultures. There's also what supported this further is there were these circles, these circular tattoos that were found on the neck of a thousand-year-old female mummy from Peru. And what was interesting is that this mummy had multiple tattoos on her body. But the tattoos in other locations, one were more ornamental. They looked prettier. You know, they looked like something you would get for cosmetic reasons.

And they were made from Sutt or Ash, which was most of the tattoos. The carbon material that was found in the circular tattoos around the neck was slightly different. So these appeared to be made from a different material, a different ink, and were just these circles, so not nearly as hormonal. Like more intentional to try to fix something specific. So that's exactly what the theory is

that these were more related to probably having to do with neck pain or relaxation or strengthening the neck muscles, something to that effect, specifically because while they're not entirely certain what plant this may have come from that's still under investigation, some of the theoretical candidates were medicinal plants used for eating or saves or topical application, that kind of thing at the time.

So you'd think if you used a medicinal plant for a tattooing, it probably has a medicinal purpose. Yeah, that makes sense. And the idea that this doesn't just come from nowhere. I mean, why would you see tattoos and assume what in the world does that have to do with medicine? People have been attempting some sort of medical tattooing for a long time. And I'll get into there are certain places that that still existed a, but Gailan attempted medical tattooing. Oh, yeah. He saw these white opacity, so white cloudiness of the cornea and some patients and thought

you probably need that out of the way. Oh, no, Sid. So that you can see better. And so he would actually take like a heated style and apply. I don't know why you were going to say after heated that I would have been like, oh, good. sounds good. And he had like an ink that was like, either pulverized, pomegranate bark that was mixed

with a copper salt or some other powdered substances mixed with iron. Super fruit, yeah. And he would, and so that would be the kind of the ink and take the heated silet and then cauterize the surface of the eye. Blinding them, right? Yeah, I'm assuming this never worked out, particularly.

I can't imagine. Well, yeah, that seems so bad. But this wouldn't be, I mean, yes, you're trying to remove that. That would seem so bad. I mean, like, you should know that one, Galen. Come on, man. I just think if you don't know that's a big stretch big jump Yeah, if you don't know you should know that one though like should I burn it? No, probably not well

I mean these were probably patients with a lot of visual issues anyway, so so they didn't see he was like I'm just gonna it's like when the dentist used to pretend they were counting my teeth and they're really scraping them It's like I'm just gonna Brush your eye with this brush I have No, I mean, I mean that you know, I mean this was not the right era, but you see this all throughout medical history You have a problem. It's bad. I don't understand it and I certainly don't know how to fix it But whatever I do can't be worse than the problem you already have, so I may as well try. What I'm contesting here is, Sydney, this one is defa worse than the what preexisting condition.

This is definitely first duno harm. It should be, but actually before that, don't burn eyeballs out with super hot style eye. Galen should have known the first d on harm's egg, you know. But I mean, you could say that all throughout medical history. So we won't we won't first shade just at Galen. I am specifically throwing at Galen. Get at me, bro. In the 1800s, there was a German physician named Pauli who used tattooing to cover things like.

I'm not judging sure. Yeah, exactly. Who knew he was into this? You trusted that cat with theoretical health, and that's on you. He would try these medical tattoos to cover. Again, this was more of a pseudo-cosmetic kind of procedure. I mean, it is medical. It is not just cosmetic, but in the sense that patients had these huge congenital moles that had a vascular component to them and might be very large or just figuring and

the patient would ask, hey, can you help me? Is there a way to to reduce the, you know, the way this appears and he would use certain tattoos utilized like mercury sulfide and white lead and things like that to try to help with the appearance of the the congenital lesion. So I don't know, I wouldn't call that purely cosmetic. It's therapeutic, there is a way that cosmetic and therapeutic I think can coincide. I think that's fair to say. As an example of that, there was a brief moment in US history when we considered in US history when we considered using tattoos, not so much from medicinal purposes as, I guess, a medical reason, the idea was that everybody should get their blood type tattooed on them. That makes sense. So our population would just be like a giant walking blood bank. Okay. Right. Not bad idea, actually. So it was, it was real popular, especially like in the 50s during the Cold War, the thought

that if we have this information tattooed on us, we can quickly help people and respond to whatever bad stuff didn't happen, but we thought might happen. But people just didn't like this idea. I think a lot of people just thought, hmm, I don't really want to be forced to get a tattoo and I don't want my personal information. And a lot of doctors were skeptical hmm, I don't really want to be forced to get a tattoo and I don't want my personal information. And a lot of doctors were skeptical saying, I don't know. So somebody shows up and instead of asking them and double checking and typing and screening

their blood, I'm just going to assume this tattoo is totally fine and use their blood or transfuse them some blood at the risk of what if it's wrong. I mean, that's a life threatening interaction. Yeah, no, I got this is a grade I got in school and I was super proud of it. So I just got it tattooed on me. And it's nothing to do with my blood. So I was just, you never know.

Super proud. It would have to be regulated. You'd have to have like regulated medical tattoo artist. It would be a whole thing. That would be it. Everybody kind of said, you know what? That sounds nice in theory, but we're not. We're not.

Also bad for vampires. If they have a specific type that they like, you're just turning yourself into a walking billboard. Turn yourself into a juicy juice, just walking around. You will type, oh, delicious. My favorite. Thank you for the advertisement. Do vampires have specific blood types they prefer? Yeah, they have the looks like flavor. It just tastes different. I didn't know that. That's true. Do you know your blood type? No, not a thought in my head, but I don't want a vampire to be able to torture it out of me.

Minds a positive, which I remember because I got a lot of A-pluses in school. That is how I remember that. All right. Anyway, going back to some of the tattoos that were done for medicinal reasons, as I alluded to, does the location of the tattoo matter? If you're going to get a tattoo that's supposed to heal you, cure you, the location has to be a part of it, right? Yeah, I assume that was important. Yes. And I'm going to tell you all about that after we go to the billing department. Let's go. The medicines, the medicines that ask you let my God for the mouth.

I'll skillet my cards for the mouse. What's Ben Affleck and or Drake up to? What show should I be watching right now? Should the Rockman for President? How about Oprah? What's a great French film about Lady Cannibals? Who's stronger? Luke Cage or Iron Fist? For answers to these questions and so much more, come on over to Pop Rocket, a pop culture roundtable discussion that always has a fun, diverse panel

talking about the stuff we love. Catch us every Wednesday on MaximumFund.org or wherever you decide to get your podcast. I'm not gonna judge. So as I already alluded to, it's really interesting that a lot of these medicinal tattoos line up with some Chinese acupuncture points. And if we, if you tried to draw some straight line through history of this is where we, you

know, this was the moment where acupuncture first started and these points were, you know, located as this is the, this is where you should put a needle to relieve the pain wherever. And then then you saw it in this part of wherever. And then you saw it in this part of the world, and then you saw it in this part of you wouldn't be able to do that. The theory with this is that the medical tattooing and the idea that there are certain parts of the body that you can put a needle into. And then in this case, put the needle in and actually leave ink behind that it arose throughout the world independently, which I always think is fascinating. The idea

that multiple cultures, multiple locations in a time where obviously they weren't posting pictures on Instagram to check out each other's medicinal tattoos all came up with these similar ideas for relieving pain or whatever. Now I say pain because a lot of these have to do with like arthritis and muscle pain and that kind of thing, but there are other ailments that will get into that they covered as well. So you see that these tattoos were thought to be like the same principle as acupuncture except more sustained, like a longer acting, because then the ink stays there and continues to create the effect that the acupuncture needle can create in that moment.

Okay. That makes sense. Yeah. So, um, you see some examples of this on St. Lawrence Island off the coast of Alaska. They do something called skin stitching, which is similar to tattooing, except, yeah, except like it's skin stitching. There's needle, there's thread, there's ink. There you go. Yeah, that sounds like it would look cool, though. When it was done, doesn't it? It does look cool. We got pictures of it. It does look cool. A lot of these things look very cool. I don't know that I'm going to go get them, but they look what cool? Skin stitching is still done, by the way, by very few people.

A lot of these different traditions are fading. There are very few people who are still practicing it, but you can find it if you go to different locations in the world. You can find people doing them. But skin stitching is still done therapeutically, especially if it's placed near like a painful joint or a muscle, you know, so conflicted when we talk about stuff like this, where these practices are still happening.

Because on the one hand, I definitely want to be, like, I want to continue to be respectful of like culture. And I never know where menacein necessarily fits into that culture. Because like, on the one hand, it's like, wow, that's really cool part of your culture. On the other hand, it's like, if it that's really cool part of your culture. On the other hand, it's like, it's not effective and it doesn't actually work. Like, how do you, how do you celebrate that, you know, without sort of, I think, I think what you've got to remember in this situation, because I, I very much in hoping to share this information because

I think it's fascinating. I think again, if you look at the pictures, some of these tattoos are just amazing and they are not just I'm not just talking about this to kind of slam a medical treatment that I don't think works. I'm certainly not that's not my purpose at all. These are part of cultural, spiritual beliefs. These, this is much deeper than just here's the treatment for that ailment. A lot of these things are linked to deeply held like religious traditions within this specific culture. And that, that transcends just a medical treatment. So I think that the people who are getting these tattoos are getting them for a lot of reasons beyond my knee hurts. I'm gonna go to the doctor and see what they think. They go expecting the tattoo, they go wanting the tattoo.

And I don't think that I didn't find evidence that this is being done in lieu of seeking out medical advice. I think that especially now in the modern day, when people have access to medical care, they're probably gonna go get it. It's just also part of their culture is they'll get these tattoos. Or there are some other important locations.

Yes, so by the way, by the way, with these tattooers on St. Lawrence Island, you can use things like gun powder is used for tattoos sometimes graphite urine is is commonly part of the You know, I'll pray to think Soot seal oil and then you take thread and you take needle and then you put a tattoo near the joint Again, the idea is that it works similarly to acupuncture, but leaving the pigment behind protects the the soul and the body from outside forces. So the thought is that

evil forces, similar acupuncture, some of the beliefs of acupunctures that you can get, like, evil forces that enter like the mouth. Well, in some of these traditions, evil forces were thought to enter through the joints, through the limbs. And so putting ink at these specific locations would block that entryway. It was like a physical block. And these evil ink at these specific locations would block that entryway was a very, it was like a physical block. And these, and these evil spirits were thought to cause ailments, you know, joint pain, rheumatism, that kind of thing. This was especially important after the death of someone, because the death of either like a big game animal or a human in the community was thought to bring the possibility

of evil shades coming into the body. You could also get tattoos over your sternum for heart problems. You get marks over each eye for vision issues. And it's important to know too, part of the medicinal benefit of this was thought to be the bleeding. You know, we've talked about before bloodletting as a therapeutic, that was again part of the thought that why this was thought to be the bleeding. You know, we've talked about before bloodletting as a therapeutic. That was, again, part of the thought that why this was helpful. Again, the idea of relieving joint pain, we find evidence of this in Japan, different

areas of North America. There's also some parts of North America where we've seen medicinal tattoos used for tuberculosis, heart disease, lack of breast milk to help someone stimulate the production of more breast milk, two thakes. There's also some people in Greenland who have used facial tattoos for someone who has had a stroke and maybe part of their face is paralyzed, a facial tattoo to try to combat the paralysis. A lot of this, a lot of my information on this,

by the way, comes from an anthropologist named Lars Kruhtalk, who has devoted his life to studying this. And it's fascinating. He has a website that you can check out if you just wanna see all the articles he's traveled all over the world. He's gotten a lot of these traditional tattoos himself.

So he studies tattoos from all perspectives, not just medicinal, but he's done a lot of the original research on medicinal tattoos and the fact that they did exist and they're still practiced today. And he's gotten a lot of very painful tattoos in his travels. And he has a buddy, Colin Dale and Denmark, who does these medicinal traditional tattoos today, who's been even though he's not part of these traditions who has tried to learn and gain that knowledge. And as an experiment, he tattooed the joints of a patient dealing with chronic pain and headaches and snoring and asthma and tenetists and all kinds of other issues. And he used an acupuncturist to guide him to points that are important in acupuncture. And the tattoos were kind of similar in appearance to the ancient tattoos we've talked about, like,

Otsis. And the result, according to this one patient, so we have an N of one. We have this study has one patient in it that he said, yeah, my symptoms improved. They came back a little bit after a year, but yeah, they got better. All right.

There it is. And again, the rationale is that it's sort of like getting 10 to 15 acupuncture treatments all at once. So you get the effect of 15 acupuncture treatments in one shabang, which is, yeah, I know. Okay. We haven't done a show on acupuncture. I've got to do more research there. There's some studies.

I'm not going to, I'm not going to, I gonna I'm not gonna I'm just saying the idea that like Like they could just sit you it out under a big needle machine and be like well, okay, and Done good good good like you should feel great now just get dry through going Is that the case? I think a lot of these things are interesting I think that like the patient I just gave you example example of, it's an interesting concept for things like chronic pain, acupuncture especially. I find this very intriguing and I would like to see more research on it before I come down hard

one way or the other, but asthma, obviously, I would have huge issues with, I do not believe that you can cure asthma with any of these. Let's not get off top here. We gotta stay tassied focused. So, I think there's stuff to talk about. So, in Borneo, the Kayaan people still put dots over swollen or painful joints. It's actually like if you twisted your ankle or your knee or something,

you would go to a specific woman in the village whose job it is to tattoo that joint and then it'll be better in a week. So that's just, you can just keep doing it repeatedly for injuries. The Kalinga tribe and the Philippines used to tattoo three dots on their next to prevent goiter. Goiter was a huge problem with these people. You see that with a lot of different tribal populations, goiter being a big problem, lack of access to iodine. And so they would tattoo these dots on their neck to try to prevent it. Now, today, we have other ways to do that, so you don't see it as commonly done,

but you can still see people who have that on their neck from back when they did. And tattoos were also used to increase fertility. So if you had someone who was having difficulty becoming pregnant, you could tattoo them in an attempt to increase their fertility. Today we do use medicinal tattoos in a sense. I mean, I think you can definitely call them that. So after a mastectomy, for instance, if someone has reconstruction done specifically, nipple reconstruction,tooine is used to create the appearance of the original nipple. So, you know, and that can, I mean, that's a huge thing for

somebody who, you know, when you talk about the psychological effects of a mastectomy, for some patients, the idea that you could reconstruct and it would, you know, things would look like they did before can be very therapeutic. So, I think yeah, I think that that's a that's a big deal. Hiding different like scars from burns. This has been used in like, especially like acid burn victims and things like that to help hide those scars with medical tattooing. Or for people who have congenital lesions that they're more concerned about, like big areas of hypopigmented skin or hyperpigmented skin or like we talked about vascular lesions, that kind of thing. Tattooine has been used for that. We use tattooing in cancer patients when we're going to do radiation therapy.

So, you may have seen that before, like tattoos on somebody in the locations that we want to focus the radiation. And the reason for that is that if we have that tattoo permanently on your skin, then every time the radiation oncologist does a treatment, they know exactly where to go. And it minimizes the damage to the surrounding tissues because there's no guesswork. We don't have to relocalize every time we know where it goes. And of course, as I mentioned, you could use it for things like blood

type. There are people who use it for things like blood type. There are people who use it for code status, meaning tattoos, something like a DNR, like a do not resuscitate on their arm, leg or wherever to communicate if they were unconscious, what their wishes would be. You could put it as a work. It is not a legal document. It has been challenged in court and found that it is not legally binding. So that's signed it. There's another chapter. And that wouldn't, I mean, maybe this is just a, maybe there's just a lag.

Maybe there's a cultural ag. We need to get there. But right now it's not legally binding. But, but it would be information you could give to family and friends that maybe you're having to make quick decisions. But it's tattooed on you. Like you get it tattooed like, hey, I may read this and really take it seriously. It's got me a long time to get.

Well, you got a tattooed on your skin. Yeah. You clearly feel very seriously about it. I do. I do. Other ideas like, what if you have a pacemaker? And people need to know that you, you know, if you're going to get it like an MRI machine or something, that can be a big deal.

So presence of a pacemaker can be a tattoo. You could get allergies. If you have some sort of life threatening allergy that you want people to know about, people get those tattoos. Or even a chronic disease state. You see tattoos for things like diabetes or asthma to inform other people, should you be so ill

that you can't communicate that? Same idea as a bracelet. We've seen like medical alert bracelets and necklaces. It's the same concept, just something that's never gonna fall off. You're never gonna lose. You're never gonna decide not to wear.

I want to get attached to you that says, doesn't do great with lactose, still drinks it occasionally. Do you think that would help? I don't know. I can't say like, get some milk and then someone's like, no wait, don't, no no, actually, okay, no, no, it's fine. It's fine. How long has it been since he's had any?

I don't know, they are so okay, fine. Stop. Clear. There are also tattoos done endoscopically, like inside the bowel. If you know, if you go in with a scope and you say like, oh, we need to take this part out, we're going to have to do surgery. You can tattoo exactly where we need to take this part out, we're going to have to do surgery. You can tattoo exactly where you need to take out some costumes about tattoos. Most people probably know this.

You can get infections from tattoos if they it is an open wound. And so if you don't take proper care of it, bacteria can get in there and you get nasty skin infections. So you have to take proper care of them. Make sure that whoever's doing the tattoo is using appropriately sterilized and cleaned instruments so that you're not exposed to any bloodborne infections because you can get those from needles if they are not properly sterilized and not reused and so on. Healing issues, so that's one thing if you're going to get a tattoo, for instance, some diabetic patients

might have problems with healing. Okay. And so you want to be careful about where you might get that tattoo. And then some tattoos can burn inside MRI machines. Ah! Depending on which pigments they use. Move the dude. You can have like a light stinging or burning of your skin

when you're in an emergency. Like that's already so pleasant to be in an MRI machine. Oh, oh, oh, that's rough. Also, it's there forever. What? I mean, hold the phone. You can get it removed, but it's a big deal. So it's there.

So if you're going to get a tattoo, I mean, think about it first. Yeah. It would be my advice. But I mean, I don't have to glitter tattoo that is for all intents and purposes permanent. That is there forever. That is there forever.

So anyway, this is, again, I just think this is fascinating and I'm not, like you said, Justin, I'm not thorough and shaded these, at these cultural, you know, traditions at all. I think that they're really interesting to learn about and read about and find out something like this that arose across the globe throughout history independently. It's an amazing thing to think about and learn about and hear about. I am not advocating that when you twist your knee, you go get a tattoo on your knee. I'm advocating you go get checked out by a doctor.

Right. But I think that it's a really fascinating thing to learn about. Well, thank you so much, Sid, for presenting this information to me, Justin McAroy, and also other people if they want to listen. that's fine. But I'd be here without the mics, just so you know, thanks, honey. I would probably do this a little later in the day, though. Just give me time to wake up, you know, get my ducks in a row. It's 11. We're adults. So thank you so much for listening. Thanks to the taxpayers for let us use their song medicines is the intro and outro of our program. Thanks to the maximum fun let us use their song medicines as the intro and outro of our program.

Thanks to the maximum fun network for having us as part of their extended podcasting family. We've got a new podcast come into the network. It is called Reading Glasses. And it's gonna be out very soon. So I hope that you'll check that one out. It's about reading. So that's a plus during that sort of thing. I am reading. Yeah. I think it's a great thing to do. And I think

that's going to do for us. Oh, that show, by the way, launching June 8th. So check it out then. And that's going to do for us folks. So until next week, my name is Justin McRoy. I'm Sydney McRoy. As always, don't drill a hole in the end in your head. Alright! Maximumfund.org Comedy and Culture, Artistone, Listener Supported.