"Physician, heal thyself"

[Agemegos]

There was a doctor (Evan O'Neill Kane) who removed his own appendix, amputated his own finger, and repaired his own inguinal hernia even though other surgeons were available. (They were stunts to promote local anaesthesia. He had shares in the company.)

The operations were successful and results satisfactory, though he died of pneumonia shortly after the last of them.

[Witchking]

Originally Posted by mook

This post has Kromm's thoughts on healing oneself.

Heh..so I am probably remembering the rule from GURPS 1e through 3e and did not even notice that it was not in 4e...and neither did the other six players in our group...lol.

FWIW I would recommend sticking with the "old" rule of -1 HP of injury as a yardstick for First Aid/Magical Healing. Then Surgury and Long Term Physician's Care I would take as GM Call per the circumstances.

I been at this a while and the original rule made a fair bit of sense to me...

YMMV.

[shivafang]

Reminds me of a recent episode of House where the titicular character tried to remove tumors from his own leg. Yikes!

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by shivafang

Reminds me of a recent episode of House where the titicular character tried to remove tumors from his own leg. Yikes!

A renowned diagnostician thought he was a renowned surgeon? That show has very little to do with real world medicine, doesn't it.

[doulos05]

I vote -1 per lost HP, plus perhaps any additional penalties resulting from the injury itself (anybody who has ever tried to open a bandaid one-handed can tell you what a trick that is, and that's probably the simplest operation necessary to treat a wound).

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

A renowned diagnostician thought he was a renowned surgeon? That show has very little to do with real world medicine, doesn't it.

He not a renown surgeon he almost does none of it himself in the show, it why he has a surgeon on his team.

However he is qualified for ER work, so while he not a surgery specialist he not totally lacking the skill.

[DonMoody]

Interesting discussion. Thanks everyone.

Originally Posted by doulos05

I vote -1 per lost HP, plus perhaps any additional penalties resulting from the injury itself.

As previously mentioned by others in this thread, I think this modifier is prohibitive.
I'd rather simply ban attempts on yourself than give a penalty that means (for any 'meaningful' injury level) the character is more likely to critical fail than succeed.

One point of damage? Bandaging will (automatically) take care of that.
Five points of damage? Banaging means it is 4 points left and a few days will take care of that.
Ten points of damage? Now that additional die+mods HP recovered would be a useful amount of healing. Oops sorry - you are at -10 to that attempt.

Adding any additional modifier "resulting from the injury itself" moves it even further into the prohibitive category.

Note: A -10 penalty means if unmodified skill is 15 or lower, more likely to crit fail than succeed. Ouch.


So for First Aid I think I will go with the simple pain modifier (-2/-4/-6, doubled for Low Pain Threshold; halfed for High Pain Threshold) plus possibly an additional modifier based upon circumstances/wound location (which may include, at times, an outright 'you cannot try that' prohibition on the attempt - e.g. both hands crippled).

For "under the care of a competent physician" (so as to get the +1 on natural recovery rolls), I think I'd go with being even more lenient.
That modifier is as much knowing (and telling) 'do this, do not do that' so the chances of getting better are, well, [slightly] 'better'*, which can easily be done for yourself (that is, if you're conscious & lucid, and almost regardless of the injury).

* Best case is a modified 9 becomes a 10 needed or a 10 becomes an 11 (either which is 12.5% improvement; any other [#] to [#+1] is a lower percentage difference).

For treating oneself under the "make a Physician roll to cure the patient", probably use a level of modifier similar to the one above for First Aid.

For surgery on oneself or the like situations (have not had that come up but best to be prepared - you never know what players will try!), I think I'd go with slightly harsher modifiers than for First Aid or "Physician roll to cure the patient".

I also think 'taking extra time' modifiers would be useful here ...

Thanks again for all the responses,

DonMoody

[Lord Carnifex]

Originally Posted by doulos05

plus perhaps any additional penalties resulting from the injury itself (anybody who has ever tried to open a bandaid one-handed can tell you what a trick that is, and that's probably the simplest operation necessary to treat a wound).

This is the critical point, I think. I tend to think that penalties for pain and shock and what not should probably top out at -4. The problem with First Aid and Surgery is reaching the affected area. Even if both hands are unimpaired, it can be devilishly tricky tying bandages to treat a wound on the back of one's shoulder, for instance. Cleaning wounds you can't see, tying splints one-handed, having to contort into improbable positions to get at inconvenient wounds, struggling with lights and mirrors to see... all of these are (I think) bigger penalties than pain at some point.