March 2024 – The Procrastination Pen

Sleeping With ASMR

I’ve mainly been editing older material of late because I had (have) developed quite a backlog of articles on an ASMR theme. It is therefore good to be writing something new for a change.

Welcome to the Procrastination Pen, which for several months now has been the home to a blog about ASMR, ASMR videos and ASMR playlists. However, I appreciate that only some people have any ASMR feelings at all. For this reason, from the outset, my emphasis has been on calming videos that anyone could use to relax and perhaps to drift off to sleep.

I have focused on ASMR videos that were designed to do something entirely different, rather than the ASMR videos produced professionally by ASMR artists. That is not to say that I may not write the odd article about such videos but I have limited experience of them as it stands (and there seem to be a vast great number to choose from).

The outcome of this endeavour has been a large playlist consisting of the videos I have reviewed so far that were worth listening to. There is also a set of playlists relating to each channel I have reviewed (if you like a particular channel).

I always include the details of the latest playlists at the end of each blog article, so if you’re not keen to read about the review process, you can scroll straight to the end and pick them up there.

The theme has tended to be about medical videos mainly because medical professionals seem to take a calm approach to their work and often therefore speak slowly and quietly, which is I believe fundamental to a good voice for ASMR.

This week an institution which we have featured before, and I have no doubt will be featuring again.

At that time, I picked up a video directly from the Stanford Medicine Channel on YouTube. This time I have come across the page in which they embed all of their videos, which is this one:

https://stanfordmedicine25.stanford.edu/videos.html.

As we can see there is a range of videos separated logically into subject areas and all referencing a location on YouTube. However, for our purposes logical is all very well but are they any good ASMR-wise.

Choosing at random we can see that Dermatology Exam is a subject area that has just four videos, which seems a nice small number to review in a concise Blog post, so let’s see what they have to offer.

The first video is this one:

Approach to the Dermatology Exam (Stanford Medicine 25)

which is just shy of eight minutes in length.

In common with a number of professional videos this one has notes, a précis of which is:

“22 Jan 2016

From our dermatology series, this video covers all the basics you need to accurately describe and diagnose any skin lesion.

The Stanford Medicine 25 program for bedside medicine at the Stanford School of Medicine aims to promote the culture of bedside medicine to make current and future clinicians and other healthcare provides better at the art of physical diagnosis and more confident at the bedside of their patients.”

From memory of the last article the notes tend to get a bit repetitive, so I will only feature elements which might be of interest.

Bravely they are permitting comments and as expected not all of the comments are positive. There are no obvious comments from ASMR fans which given how effective ASMR fans are at finding videos is possibly not a good sign.

The video starts with the bugbear of any ASMR video devotee, the peppy start up music, applied I’m sure more through branding or marketing considerations than anything to do with quiet relaxation.

The medical professional is Dr Justin Ko, (which the automatic subtitles render as “Justin Cohen”!). Straight away we realise we are not dealing with any Dr James Gill in terms of voice but the introductory piece is relatively muted. However it gets louder, I mean a whole lot louder. In addition the background music continues and persists throughout the rest of the video. In addition the subject matter is a bit distracting.

I think this prohibits this one from becoming a member of the Procrastination Pen playlist.

Approach to Multiple Rashes (Stanford Medicine 25)

The relevant part of the notes are: “22 Jan 2016

From our dermatology series, this video covers all the basics you need to accurately describe complex and multiple skin lesions.”

This is very short at a bit over four and a half minutes. Again, with the music, sigh. This time Bernice Kwong who is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Dermatology.

The video starts quietly and Bernice seems to have quite a good voice, relatively quiet and calm. However, again, the music persists throughout the video – why, why, why? This video is also not useful for us.

Approach to Nevi (Moles) – Stanford Medicine 25

At four and three quarter minutes it still isn’t a long video. The relevant notes are “22 Jan 2016

From our dermatology series, this video covers all the basics you need to accurately describe complex and multiple skin lesions.”

Again, the comments are not at all helpful. So far, so YouTube. The start-up music remains. This time Jennifer Chen is the medical Professional; a Clinical Assistant Professor.

The start is promising, a quiet beginning but again continuous background music – how frustrating. This video is just not for us.

Diagnosing Acne vs. Rosacea (Stanford Medicine 25)

Just over three minutes so the shortest so far and featuring Jennifer Chen as in the previous video. The relevant part of the notes is: “22 Jan 2016

From our dermatology series, this video covers all the basics you need to accurately differentiate between regular acne and acne rosacea.”

The comments are nearly totally irrelevant or unhelpful but there are clues that some of the listeners are ASMR fans. mostly, it turns out, frustrated ASMR fans due to the background music.

So we know what is coming sadly. Unfortunately, Dermatology is a strike-out ASMR wise despite some great presenters. The decision to have music throughout is really very distracting.

However, all is not lost – there are those other videos to draw on, of course.

I think a visit of the Ankle Brachial Index category is worth a try particularly as it contains only two videos.

Ankle Brachial Index (ABI) Test: How to Perform

For once, the comments appear to be universally upbeat, positive and supportive (wonders will never cease). The video is close to seven- and three-quarter minutes and sadly still incorporates that music at the start. This time the medical Professional is John Cooke who actually seems to have a good voice and a very relaxed style of presentation – heaven be praised.

In addition, the muppet with the music mania has not decorated this with background noises. In fact it is marvellously quiet and calm. Unfortunately, there are some additional noises coming from an handheld doppler device, employed as part of the video. I don’t think these will exclude this video from the Procrastination Pen playlist, but it might mean that the video gets dropped to the archive list on subsequent review.

Venous Testing

This is just over five minutes so not long. It starts with the familiar music (spit spit). John Cooke and again he starts with a good delivery well measured and low toned. The doppler device is heard as before. I’m not certain if that might not prove noisy of a night time. I’ll include the video in the playlist but it may suffer transfer to archive if it proves excessively distracting.

So the Ankle Brachial Index category came to the rescue, (marginally).

The Stanford Medicine playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The Procrastination Pen playlist (which is no-doubt what you have all been reading this in order to locate) is found here:

I have been listening to this playlist most nights and some of the videos that were members have now been removed. If any of your favourites are missing from that main playlist you can find them here in the archive list:

Quite often the videos getting removed have no faults other than occasional intrusive noises.

The playlist of items that are great for ASMR (but contain an age verification function), usually a great way to interrupt your listening in the middle of the night, is here:

I hope that you find the playlists restful and that you get a good night’s sleep.

Hope to see you again back here for the next blog article.

If you liked this blog item, why not subscribe to this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Shona Macrae

Sleeping With ASMR

As at today’s date the Procrastination Pen playlist has one hundred and sixty two videos and, of late, I have not felt the need to migrate any of them to the archive list due to strange noises, background buzzes or sudden alarming thuds of equipment.

I probably need to be a great deal more critical of this list. However, I always welcome feedback so if you find the playlist to contain items that it should not contain, by all means, tell me. I might even agree and make the changes.

Welcome to the Procrastination Pen. For several months now the site where reviews of “inadvertent ASMR” videos happens. I have been focused mainly on YouTube (because that’s where the playlist is). The idea is to create a playlist of videos that you can listen to when you desperately need to sleep and when no sleep is coming.

If you’re a person who gets ASMR feelings from videos, then welcome. If you don’t get such feelings, welcome too. The idea is that the videos should be relaxing enough that anyone can use them to relax to.

The mission so far has been to find videos that were not designed for the relaxing content but cause relaxation despite their original intent. This has meant that the majority of videos covered so far have been to do with medical examinations. People undergoing medical training seem to be as gentle, careful and thoughtful as they are reputed to be. This greatly helps when you’re looking for an ASMR video.

However, there are other avenues out there and I will always take suggestions, anything that appears sensible I may even try and see how it fits.

I’ve been reviewing ASMR YouTube videos for a while now and given I have predominantly been on one subject (inadvertent ASMR deriving from videos designed for medical tuition) one hazard is that I start to re-review videos that I have reviewed previously.

This has happened once or twice. In one case, I prepared two articles on the same video and they got all the way through editing before I realised my mistake.

Today’s video has the worrying feel of familiarity about it. If anyone spots that I’ve prepared something on this one before please let me know.

Macleod’s examination of the cervical spine

This is very brief at just over 2 minutes.

The introduction screen states “Video taken from Macleod’s Clinical Examination 13^th Edition By Graham Douglas, Fiona Nicol & Colin Robertson.”

Given this is a professional video it also has some notes associated with it:

“New! Macleod’s Clinical examination 13th edition

This video demonstrates clinical examination techniques as described in Macleod’s Clinical Examination. The textbook with access to the full set of videos is available at www.elsevierhealth.co.uk/macleod”

Comments are permitted but there are few of them.

The two participants communicate in a very stilted manner and I think this might be a video in which the audio is machine generated, possibly the video as well. Alternatively, the audio of the participants was dubbed on afterwards without much reference to the video itself. The commentary is the main feature of the video and this starts a little loud.

The Channel is Farsight Channel and we have encountered this one before.

There are fifty-nine videos and five playlists. The playlist: “New! Macleod’s Clinical examination 13th edition” contains twenty-four videos. The safest way to narrow these down to the number we can cover in one blog article is to select them based upon the participants in the video. In this case, the “patient” occurs in a number of the videos and so does the medical professional.

Therefore, I will select videos where both the medical professional and “patient” appear.

The patient is “Omar” but in a number of videos he is examined by another medical professional (perhaps we’ll come back to those in a future blog post). The medical professional in the above video is “Ben”. There are relatively few videos in which both Ben and Omar appear.

Macleod’s examination of the shoulder

Another brief video, just less than five minutes. The audio of the participants is again a bit strange. The narration is quieter and more suitable to the purpose we are looking for, i.e., getting some rest.

Macleod’s examination of the hip

The theme with this set is that they are all brief. They all have a stilted strange feel to the interaction style between the participants.

This one is a little over six minutes.

The narrator sounds a lot more like a normal human being. It’s hard to describe the problem. The intonation and the timing seems all wrong as if created artificially rather than recorded from an actual interaction.

Definition:

Lumbar lordosis inward curve of the lower back.

Macleod’s examination of the thoracic and lumbar spine

This one is a little under five and a half minutes.

Definition:

Lipoma a fatty lump growing under the skin.

Dimples of Venus, a picture seems best for this:

Macleod’s examination of the motor system of the upper limbs

The one advantage of videos prepared professionally is that they are quite consistent. In this case there is no background noise, no people wandering across the camera and no noises coming from the camera operator.

This video is again brief at just a little over six minutes. This seems to be a feature with this particular set. The advantage is that when watching on YouTube and using the shuffle option you will not get a continuous repetition of videos with similar content (which otherwise might get a little trying). The disadvantage comes if you do not choose this option in which case these occur one after the other in the Procrastination Pen Playlist. It may quietly drive you mad.

I recommend you choose the shuffle option.

Macleod’s examination of the motor system of the lower limbs

Definition:

Clonus – condition causing involuntary muscle contractions.

Here we end the videos featuring “Ben” and “Omar”

The channel seems fairly uniform in terms of quality so I’ll be back in the future with another set of videos from this channel.

The Farsight playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The Procrastination Pen playlist (which is no-doubt what you have all been reading this in order to locate) is found here:

I have been listening to that playlist most nights and some of the videos that were members have now been removed. If any of your favourites are missing from that main playlist you can find them here in the archive list:

Quite often the videos getting removed have no faults other than occasional intrusive noises.

The playlist of items that are great for ASMR (but contain an age verification function), usually a great way to interrupt your listening in the middle of the night, is here:

I hope that you find the playlists restful and that you get a good night’s sleep.

Hope to see you again back here for the next blog article.

If you liked this blog item why not subscribe to this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Shona Macrae

Sleeping With ASMR

The search for ASMR related content (mostly on YouTube, to date anyway) goes on today and this time no deviations into other subjects.

Those who read this blog frequently will now be aware that each one of these articles reviews another YouTube video for its suitability. If it turns out to be relaxing (or preferably it can produce ASMR effects), it gets added to the Procrastination Pen playlist. If it turns out to be noisy or distracting, well, there just won’t be an article about it at all.

As part of the process, I explore the YouTube channel where the video was located and determine if there are other great videos in there. If the other videos on that channel are noisy or distracting, they get a passport out of the playlist, forever to be forgotten. If they are also relaxing, they get added to the playlist as well.

Over time I keep reviewing the existing playlist and some that do not stand the test of time get removed and added to an archive playlist (in case any readers rather liked them and want to hear them again).

Hence the Procrastination Pen playlist grows only slowly but one hopes it retains its quality.

That being the background, onto today’s video which continues the theme of medical examination videos. So far, I have rarely strayed into professional ASMR territory. Therefore, most of these blog articles focus on videos that were produced for another purpose but just happen to be relaxing as well (commonly where one of the people featured in the video has a great, relaxing voice).

In this case, we have mined the rich seam which is medical student videos. These have been featured before and are distinctly variable in sound quality (commonly the voice is accompanied by background air conditioning, equipment noises and even people wandering into the room where filming is taking place).

However, every once in a while, a good one pops up, so I keep on checking them.

Head -to -toe assessment

There are few subscribers, three hundred and thirty-five as at today’s date. Many of the channels we have been looking at had substantially more. Although comments are allowed there are few of them. As is usual in YouTube, comments (those that are there) are not all helpful.

In common with most student videos there are no notes with the video, so we get no clues for example as to where this is filmed. It is posted in January 2018 and so we can guess that this is an assessment video, somewhere, perhaps in the final year of a nursing qualification so probably a course that ended in 2018 then.

Tamara introduces herself as the student nurse. The patient is Caitlyn (I think). That could easily be misspelled.

Caitlyn (I’m sticking with that spelling now) appears to have the better voice (very quiet indeed). However, sadly, Caitlyn does not get a lot of speaking opportunity.

Thankfully, there is no roaring air conditioning accompaniment, no nasty clanging noises, crashes or onset of Beethoven at one hundred and forty decibels.

It isn’t “top of the pops” in terms of ASMR, but in my view is suitably relaxing so it is going forwards to the playlist.

The channel is Tamara Nosa which has eight videos in it as at today’s date. Two videos are posted ten years ago and five of them five years ago. One video is a “short” – so far there have been no reviews of shorts on this blog.

There is a single playlist entitled “Favourites” which includes videos external to the channel so it isn’t going to be useful to us. The playlist was updated more recently in 2022.

The short which is entitled:

IV Vitamins Infusion. We have 10 different IV cocktails for which your body will thank you!!!

Is loud funky and about as relaxing as having needles poked in somewhere sensitive. So we’ll move on.

The older videos are entitled in a different character set:

Вітання українських дітей в Палатайні ч.1

The character set appears to be Russian and the translation via Google translate is “Vetting of Ukrainian children in the Palatine part 1”

It is very home video-y and no doubt is of interest to the parents of said children, less so in terms of ASMR I think.

Вітання українських дітей в Палатайні ч.2

“Vetting of Ukrainian children in the Palatine part 2”

The same comments apply as to the previous video – this also will not be in the playlist.

Both of these videos are posted to the channel ten years ago.

Head – to – toe assessment

The patient appears to be Jessie (probably misspelled). She does not appear to be delighted to be in a video. There are no comments, no notes, no clues about the institution. In this way it is very like the first video in this article. This is potentially a theme starting.

It is posted in 2017 which appears to be the same year it was filmed (according to Jessie anyway).

Tamara seems to be keen to follow a script. There are comments, by Jessie, which Tamara seems to rush past. So far, so normal assessment video.

At intervals this is a bit chattier than the first video featured in this article. This is unwelcome (for us rather than for Jessie) but I do not think it is excessive.

Foley insertion

This is strange in the extreme and does not strike me as conducive to sleep for a number of people watching. There are no comments and no notes but I’m not putting it in the Procrastination Pen playlist in any case.

Subcutaneous injection

This is very brief. There is no patient as such, no notes, no comments, someone wanders across the camera repeatedly. All in all, not really at the level for the Procrastination Pen playlist so it’s not going to be in there.

One video appears to be hidden as eight videos are listed but only seven appear, therefore this next is the last video on this channel:

Head-to-Toe Assessment

Olga is the patient in this one. This one actually has some comments and thankfully not of the trolling variety.

From this we get that it was filmed in Chicago. That is helpful

We therefore obtain that Tamara was in South University in 2020 and in Dominican University in 2018 (the date of the first video we featured).

South University is in Savannah.

Dominican University is in Illinois.

As expected both have their own YouTube channels https://www.youtube.com/@southuniversity and https://www.youtube.com/@DominicanUniversity perhaps these will be worthy of further examination in the future.

The process is similar to the previous head to toe videos featured in this blog post.

I will include it in the Procrastination Pen playlist (but it maybe subject to future weeding). The Tamara Nosa playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The Procrastination Pen playlist (which is no-doubt what you have all been reading this in order to locate) is found here:

Quite often the videos getting removed have no faults other than occasional intrusive noises.

The playlist of items that are great for ASMR (but contain an age verification function), usually a great way to interrupt your listening in the middle of the night, is here:

I hope that you find the playlists restful and that you get a good night’s sleep.

Hope to see you again back here for the next blog article.

If you liked this blog item, why not subscribe to this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Shona Macrae

Sleeping With ASMR

Long term readers are now very familiar with the way this works. Each week I seek out a YouTube video that might have some ASMR “triggers”. Usually, I choose ASMR videos that were not designed for ASMR effects but that is in no sense a golden rule. So far, I have found that medical videos contain many of the desired elements; quiet, gentleness, paced, and methodical. I have found great voices from men and women. I have also found a many loud ones.

If I find a video that is suitable, I add it into the Procrastination Pen playlist and I look for further great ASMR videos on the same channel where the first one was located.

Some channels contain many videos in which case I select a single playlist from the channel, videos with the same participants, or some other characteristic to narrow the selection.

Where the set of videos has been consistently good, I may in the future return to the same channel looking for more.

The Procrastination Pen playlist unfiltered would grow like Topsy (and indeed it has grown). However, I continue to listen to that playlist – daily in fact – and if I find one of the videos is more irritating than was first hoped I dispatch it to the archive list.

In this way the Procrastination Pen playlist keeps being honed. The result should be a playlist of a consistent quality that any listener would like to hear whenever they are in need of relaxation and/or sleep (whether they enjoy ASMR effects or not).

This week’s video remains on the medical theme and from the title sounds a bit uncomfortable.

HEENT ear pain

This time the video has notes associated with it: “8 Nov 2018

Nicki FNP student health assessment HEENT Ear Pain”

But at least they are not the encyclopaedic notes we have seen associated with some professional videos.

Rather bravely comments are permitted but fortunately there are few of these – we have seen some nasty comments in the past.

We have defined HEENT before of course, but, just in case there was an international emergency that kept you from reading this vitally important blog on that day, here it is again:

HEENT a HEENT (head, eyes, ears, nose, and throat) exam.

Nicki is the medical professional, she does tell us her surname which sounds to me like Myer. That maybe incorrect and even if correct maybe misspelled. At the time of filming, she was a Nurse Practitioner Student.

It turns out that it is Meyer. Additionally, although Nicki is in fact Nicki, she is also Adrianne. It looks like Nicki may have been studying at the Research College of Nursing at the time this was videod. The Research College of Nursing is in Kansas City Missouri.

Of course, it has its own YouTube channel with fifty two videos and sixty nine subscribers, but these are not high numbers in terms of university YouTube channels we have previously seen.

As expected, this channel is more about promoting the college than any medical procedures which might be interesting for ASMR purposes.

Onto Nicki’s video which is under eleven and a half minutes. It’s not huge in terms of videos that we have previously seen (and reviewed).

Initially there is a spoken introduction which is not loud, there is no oppressive background noise and a complete absence of equipment noises. There is no funky start up music so all in all the kind of introduction we look for in a relaxing video.

The tone is low-key and quiet. The initial interview with the twenty-six-year-old “patient” continues at a relaxed pace and this has the feel of a very professional approach to a standard student assessment video.

Nicki (or Adrianne) has a good voice for our purposes with good intonation and a measured delivery.

There is the occasional clunk which distracts slightly.

Nicki appears to have become Simspon (I thought Simpson but that really is the spelling) and went on to work in St Louis.

From our purposes it is a shame that she did not produce a great many more videos. The channel is Adrianne Meyer and it has only four videos and eighty-three subscribers.

Given there are just four, I think we can go review them all.

The ear pain video has proven well worthy of inclusion in the Procrastination Pen playlist so I have high hopes for the remainder.

The next video is this one:

FNP Asmt Musculoskeletal Module 4 Nicki & Melissa

The video includes notes “28 Sept 2018

Nicki and Melissa Shoulder pain eval FNP” as before it also includes comments (although, thankfully, there are few of these).

It starts without music and has a nicely muted introduction. There is limited background noise. However, at intervals there seem to be noises which are either traffic or distant aircraft. It is slightly less than twelve minutes so not substantially longer than the first one in this article.

At intervals it could get a bit monotonous. I’m not going to dismiss it from the Procrastination Pen Playlist on this basis but it might be subject to subsequent review.

Definitions:

FNP Family Nurse Practitioner

ASMT American Society of Medical Technologists

Nicki Neuro Assessment Lab

Notes as before “18 Sept 2018

Neuro Assessment with differential diagnosis”

As before a spoken introduction which is similar. There is a twenty-five-year-old “patient” called Molly. This time there are ASMR comments including some less than helpful ones, which indicates, as expected, that ASMR fans are all over this channel.

It is lovely and calm and deliberate in approach, nothing is rushed or stressed about it.

At thirteen and a half minutes it is the longest so far. Despite this, I think it will be a good candidate for the Procrastination Pen playlist.

Nicki M. -Basic Head to Toe Proficiency

The last video of the set and the longest at just over eighteen and a quarter minutes. As before there are notes although, this time, they are a bit cryptic: “23 Aug 2018

Assmt. FNP Fall 2018”

There are no comments, although comments are permitted. Whether this is a good sign…

This time the background noise seems a bit more intrusive. The patient is Steven or possibly Stephen Simpson. There’s a strange coincidence there in that Adrianne or “Nicki” seems to have become Mrs Simpson some way further along the line. Of course, that could be an entirely different Mr Simpson. This is making the assumption the name change is due to marriage of course.

Again, the delivery is nicely level and not excessively loud. The attention is gentle. The approach is deliberate and methodical there is nothing rushed about this. There are occasional moments of hesitation but given this appears to be an assessment video that is expected (a lot is probably riding on it).

I see no reason not to put all four of the videos this week into the Procrastination Pen playlist. Of course, I review that list every day so the odd one may get weeded in the future if it turns out not to stand up to protracted review.

The Nicki Meyer playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The Procrastination Pen playlist (which is no-doubt what you have all been reading this in order to locate) is found here:

Quite often the videos getting removed have no faults other than occasional loud noises.

The playlist of items that are great for ASMR (but contain an age verification function), usually a great way to interrupt your listening in the middle of the night, is here:

I hope that you find the playlists restful and that you get a good night’s sleep.

Hope to see you again back here for the next blog article.

If you liked this blog item, why not subscribe to this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Shona Macrae