AHSC librarian gains fame with doctors' peculiar names

Dec. 14, 1999


Mari Stoddard, a staff member with the Arizona Health Sciences Library educational services group, knows plenty about gathering information, computer technology and the Internet.

She spends much of her time sharing that knowledge with doctors and other health care professionals, administrative assistants and students. With that in mind, she never thought a mere list of names would become her claim to fame. But it has as Stoddard's Web site of peculiar doctors' names careens toward legendary status in and out of medical circles.

Her list, found on line at http://educ.ahsl.arizona.edu/mla/doctor.htm, includes
such fitting monikers as Dr. Skinner, the dermatologist, and Dr. Foote, the podiatrist. The more "unfortunate" include surgeons Drs. Pain and Slaughter.

The list, which now includes more than 160 names, began almost two years ago as a passing topic on a medical librarians Internet discussion site. Stoddard jotted the names down and posted them. She also took the time to register the site with the search engine Yahoo.

"That's what a librarian does," Stoddard reasoned, "collect information and make it accessible."

Within hours of registering the site, she said, people were making submissions of new names, and be assured, the names on the list are real. Stoddard checks the validity of each submission. She has yet to receive any complaints from doctors, not even from Dr. Smellsey or Dr. Kutteroff. In fact, Stoddard estimates that one of every 10 submissions comes from an M.D. Why, though, has a collection of silly names gotten as many as 500 Internet hits in a week?

"People just want to share the moment they heard that name and had to smile," she said. "It's funnier if it can be shared."

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