Sleeping With ASMR

Recently I have been thinking about the various ways that I have tried to assist sleep over the years. Some of those have, of course, been chemical and only one of those was truly effective.

For the briefest of occasions, I did receive genuine-prescribed-by-a-doctor sleeping pills. These definitely work and I seemed to have none of the side effects detailed in the included pieces of paper. However, I suspect they are addictive as the prescription covered a bare few days and then it was back to one’s own devices.

The night before days in the office, I commonly have problems sleeping. For that I have often taken Nytol. Nytol is odd stuff. Some nights I take it and I barely make it upstairs before my eyes are closing. Then I am zonko. Some nights it is as if I have taken a sugar pill and I am laid there counting the marks on the ceiling. I have often wondered if there is some circulation problem in the manufacturing plant and the odd pill has zero active ingredient in it. No doubt the manufacturers of Nytol would have a completely different take on it.

Some years ago, I saw a YouTube presentation by a UK sleep expert who recommended popping a melatonin pill about half an hour before sleep and there would be no need for counting sheep.

The problem being it is almost impossible to get in the UK. I have taken some when travelling in either North or South America (where it is widely available). I found it rather like the Nytol. Sometimes it is as if the doors of sleep have wanged shut all of a sudden and somedays it is as if I had an unhealthy caffeine habit. It has been recommended to take it in association with 5-HTP and I did try that. I’d say the efficacy is improved but marginally in my experience.

I have tried standard Kalms and night-time Kalms, Bach Rescue Remedy and the herbal version of Nytol. These seem to have limited effects other than sometimes the nature of my nightmares were much more vivid and therefore more nightmarish… (However, if you love a good nightmare, it is as nothing compared to St John’s Wort which could win records).

The issue with all such remedies to my mind (and was not shared by the genuine sleeping pills) is that they get you to sleep but do not keep you there. Marvellous being in zzzs land at 9pm. Not so marvellous when you spring wide awake at 3am despite feeling that you have done so from the bed of a river. Worse that, having thus sprung awake, no other remedy is available to get you back off to sleep before the inevitable alarm at 5am.

It was for this reason that I went in search of a soothing backtrack. If I have to lie awake in the early hours of the morning, better to do so calmly and in as relaxed state as I can possibly accomplish than to lie fretting about all the sleep I am not getting.

Most recently I have been using Calm, for this to a greater or lesser degree of efficiency. I am going to start making recommendations from there. I have hesitated only because it is a paid-for option and I hate to leverage people into paying for anything. I am no salesperson and have no ambitions to become one.

Of late, I am making the odd foray into professional ASMR artists in these articles, if only to contrast with the inadvertent ASMR that this blog has specialised in for so long. I haven’t been featuring the many that are frankly awful. (There seem to be a fair few of these). I have the bias that if you set yourself up as a professional ASMR artist, then your offerings should be excellent. At the very least, they should be consistently restful.

Of course, YouTube now has adverts shoehorned into every corner and most of them are about as restful as a thoroughgoing slap.

This video is a foray away from the medical theme that I have stuck with for a long time. Mainly because I am having trouble finding a good one on the medical theme. I thought the tone of this video rather good; you may not share my opinion on it.

ASMR | Night massage with gua sha, herbs, natural oils (soft spoken)

I am always nervous about anything massage in case that is a euphemism for some other kind of video (which hopefully I don’t need to define). Both participants have clothing, excessive skin does not seem to be exposed and there are no offers to see more on an OnlyFans site somewhere.

This is a bit breathy for me but at least it does not seem to involve fingernails on fabric, strange vocal intonations into a microphone or bizarre squelching noises coming from who knows where.

It eschews music (hurrah) but there are some noises coming from brushing hair. (Perhaps that is even your thing, who knows).

Itsblitzz is the channel and it has 840K subscribers and three hundred and eighty videos. I see that there are three playlists. However, beware, some of these videos actively promote certain products. I have made this an attribute which embargoes a video from featuring in this blog. They will start with “the sponsor of the video this week…”. At which point I just move on.

The video is a little over forty-two minutes in length (hopefully enough to get you nodding off) and contains notes:

“29 Jan 2019 #guasha #massage #ASMR

In tonight’s video, I have brought back one of my favorite humans to experiment with some new techniques and tools (our other video can be found here:  ASMR | Head massage and energy healin…  ). This was a spur of the moment session, and I am happy that Elizabeth was free to come over. She is such an easy person to be around, and everything felt very natural and relaxed. I use some gua sha tools in our session as well as some natural sprays and oils. Gua sha is a skin scraping technique used in traditional East Asian medicine that can also be performed with a spoon or other smooth object. Typically, it leaves marks (petechiae) but tonight I will just be using the tools to aid in massage. I am using light to medium pressure to avoid abrasions. I will demonstrate and discuss other gua sha techniques in the very near future on my channel.”

There are of course comments, and as we have noted, where comments are permitted there shall ye find less than helpful comments. So here too.

Anyway, that was the distraction of the week, onto the main feature which takes us back to the world of YouTube medical videos.

MRCP Paces: Station 1, Neurology section (Upper Limbs)

This is fifteen- and three-quarter minutes long and surprisingly for a video from a hospital has no notes. Less surprisingly it has no comments either. I can probably by now guarantee that if it has ASMR content then ASMR fans have already discovered it.

It features Dr Shuja Punekar who straight away has a good voice. It also features air conditioning noises which are less welcome. It does not have start up music which is great.

The feedback section of the video which occurs at eleven minutes has air conditioning noises akin to the sound of the M25 at rush hour. It is actually loud and would have discounted the video had it been there from the start of the video. It also serves to partially mask the voices of the participants.

This one is from Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust YouTube channel. There are five hundred and fourteen videos, twenty-six playlists (one with one hundred and eight videos in it). So, there is hope that this channel might be an ASMR resource for us for a lengthy period of time.

MRCP Paces History

Again, this features Dr Punekar and is very similar at the start as the last video. If anything the background noise is higher and the voices of the participants sound more distant than in the previous video.

There are various background noises which sound rather like doors opening and closing (possibly in an adjacent room).

The participants voices are calm and measured, with just the air conditioning for company.

This time the post-mortem phase in which progress of the student is discussed does not appear to have any higher participation by the air conditioning.

MRCP Paces Station 4: Communication and Ethics

This is a bit over nineteen and a quarter minutes and features Dr Punekar again. Again, the introduction is calm and quiet. The air conditioning’s participation is not excessive.

However, this is really quite stressful, not the kind of video that I think we will want in the Procrastination Pen playlist.

There are a lot of videos in the MRCP Paces series and so I use this as a whet your appetite introduction and we can return in the future and hopefully do a few more.

The Blackpool Teaching Hospitals Playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Picture DeepAI.org

Sleeping With ASMR

For those who have stuck with this blog, well done and thank-you. You will be aware of the format that this blog has followed for over a year now and I thought that just for a treat we would have a change. Instead of focusing on inadvertent ASMR videos from YouTube as, by-and-large, I have done for a long time now, what if in between I take a look at a video from a professional ASMR artist and consider whether it is worthwhile.

The drive remains a mechanism for getting some sleep. The difference is that someone is deliberately setting out to be relaxing, so we should be disposed to have extremely high expectations.

Searching YouTube for ASMR material yields up a bewildering array of videos and quite a lot of them look unsuitable before I even give them a review.

However, this one:

ASMR Medical ROLE PLAY | Cranial Nerve Exam (personal attention for relaxation and sleep)

is by an artist who has been around for some time and who has her own entry in the online ASMR index.

This is one of many by Isabel on a medical theme and given this is just a diversion I am not going to explore the others here. This is just a taster.

Not unexpectedly, Isabel has a truckload of followers and enough videos to restock Netflix on a Friday evening.

This particular video is a little over thirty eight minutes in length and for me it’s a little on the breathy side. (But I imagine some ASMR fans rather like that).

There are also some jarring beeps at intervals which would not dispose me towards snooziness, I must confess.

I’m also not a fan of the scratchy noises. However, I imagine for some people they are the main appeal.

It has notes but given a lot of professional artists focus on the merchandising, I won’t repeat them here.

Comments are permitted and, boy, are there a lot of those. A quick review though indicates that they are predominantly positive which is unusual in comparison to the video comments we have become used to.

I’m always a little concerned by professional ASMR videos in that predominantly the artists featured are, shall we say, a little too attractive to be considered average. In such cases I am suspicious that fans are attending not because of the quality of the sound…

The sound quality (as we would expect) is sublime with no weird background noises, no loud equipment noises and it just shows the incredibly high bar that an inadvertent ASMR video is aiming for (and habitually misses).

In any case, as this is a diversion, I am currently not disposed to set up an Isabel playlist on the Procrastination Pen (unless there is call for such a thing).

I will instead add such videos to the Sweetie Jar playlist on the assumption that a subset of readers might use such material to fall asleep to (as opposed to the inadvertent ASMR videos which have been the focus of this blog to date).

So returning to the main theme.

Today we go back to a channel which has been an old favourite which is the University of Leicester

Regular readers will know that we have been here before and whilst the videos on this channel may not be quite the ASMR standard of Isabel it has consistently delivered some restful videos.

The video featured today is this one:

Respiratory Examination – Demonstration

Again it is a professional video and so as we expect it has some notes:

“257,959 views 14 Dec 2011

A second more detailed video can be found at; http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/msce…

This is a real-time demonstration illustrating technique and patient interaction involved in the Respiratory Examination.

The film was produced by practising clinicians to aid the teaching of clinical examination skills. It starts at the point when the clinician has finished taking the medical history and begins the clinical examination.

Presented by Dr Jonathan Bennett MD FRCP Consultant Respiratory Physician. Produced and Directed by Dr Irene Peat FRCR FRCP, Dr Nicholas Port MBChB BSc and Jon Shears.

More Clinical Examination materials can be found at; http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/msce…”

This leads us to suspect that there are more videos out there on a similar theme and so it is worth taking a while to try and identify them.

This one is a little over six minutes and so it barely has time to take a run up before it is all over.

There are comments and as usual a number of the comments are as helpful as a leg iron.

This though may help us identify the others in this series:

“@UniversityLeicester

12 years ago

There is a second video in which the Doctor does explain the procedure. All the videos in this series can be found in the Clinical Examinations Playlist on the University of Leicester Channel.”

The video starts without music, how delightful, but it does have the constant background accompaniment of air conditioning, sadly. The pace and tone are both ideal, there is an absence of offensive noises and even some light humour. What is not to like.

The “patient” is Mr Jackson, the medical professional is introduced only in the notes Dr Jonathan Bennett MD FRCP Consultant Respiratory Physician.

This is a great Procrastination Pen playlist candidate.

The Clinical Examinations playlist mentioned in those comments appears to be this one:

Looking at that playlist, there would appear to be only one other video which features the same “patient” and the same medical professional, and it would be this one:

Respiratory Examination – Explanation

This one is hardly enormous as it is only just over ten minutes in length.

There are, as expected, notes “482,017 views 28 May 2012

This is a detailed explanation of the Respiratory Examination illustrating technique and patient interaction. The film was produced by practising clinicians to aid the teaching of clinical examination skills. It starts at the point when the clinician has finished taking the medical history and begins the clinical examination. Presented by Dr Jonathan Bennett MD FRCP Consultant Respiratory Physician. Produced and Directed by Dr Irene Peat FRCR FRCP, Dr Nicholas Port MBChB BSc and Jon Shears. More Clinical Examination materials can be found at; http://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/msce…

There is no music to start and, again, the presentation is calm and quiet. I also love how polite everyone is in this video.

Some of the explanations are a little on the off-putting side. (I’m not sure that discussions of sputum pots are that restful).

By and large though, this one is as delightful as the last one.

The University of Leicester Playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Akshat Vats on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

I am still surprised that it is feasible to keep on writing a weekly blog on one specific subject and, thus far, to have not run out of material to base it on.

In fact, I am getting to the stage now where the overall playlist is getting so large that I will shortly have to make decisions about starting all over again.

It is already so large that playing it will take quite a bit longer than any average person would be resting for.

That was not the intention when commencing.

I also notice that I have been on the subject of medical examination videos for well over a year now, and whilst there have been no complaints, I have not appeared in the years top ten most interesting bloggers either.

I think there will need to be some changes, but for the moment, let’s not fix something that is not broken.

Today we are once again in the environs of videos created by students to satisfy some sort of course requirement. I am entirely thankful that colleges and universities keep demanding this of their students, and that the students then forget to take the videos down again long after their course has concluded.

Today’s follow the head-to-toe format that we have seen again-and-again on this blog but is none the worse for that.

PART TWO HEAD TO TOE

At a little over eight and a half minutes it isn’t going to hang around for long. It starts without startup music which is a rare and welcome situation. There is air conditioning noise and it is actually pretty loud, if not ultimately that distracting. The medical professional has a nice quiet voice; however, the presentation at least initially is a little on the fast side. Perhaps as a consequence of in front of camera nerves. The format is landscape which is rather welcome for one of these but, as I often comment, makes no difference at all if you are using the video to get to sleep.

The location appears to be domestic, in fact a bedroom, with a chest of drawers. One of the items that are probably not regularly found in a medical establishment.

The identity of the participants is not given and there is no clue as to the location of the institute for which the video was made. There are no notes and we can see it was posted 05/04/2023 (April) so it is conceivable that the course it is for is still running.

There are few comments ranging from the unhelpful to the ASMR fan. ASMR fans as is usual having tracked this one down way before I ever have.

Part way through we discover that the “patient” is called Amber (that may not be the spelling). We also find out that the instruction heel-to-toe is not necessarily as descriptive an instruction as it needs to be.

The channel is Kristin Colton and despite only having two videos it has one hundred and sixty-four subscribers which does not seem to be at all bad for that small number of videos.

The remaining video is a little more substantial at fifteen minutes and looking at it I can see that I have reviewed them in the reverse order.

PART ONE HEAD TO TOE

It starts with a yapping dog which is a bit off-putting. We now find that the “patient” is Amber Colton and so, in all likelihood, sister. The start is similar in other respects to the previous video – air conditioning providing the background, the voice is great but the presentation a little fast.

No startup music.

Like before it settles down and is quite calm. This time there are no helpful comments, but I think we can be certain if an ASMR fan found part two in this set, they absolutely certainly have found part one.

The presentation (if a little fast) is quite methodical. I tried the playback speed adjustment, it stands up well at 0.75, perhaps a little less so at 0.5, but you may find that it is worth a try as well. For me a little slower play speed certainly helped things.

There are some sounds of a child and people talking in an adjacent room. This is fairly normal for student videos as we have found before.

Kristin appears to have no other YouTube presence (another channel for example) so I’m afraid that’s it for Kristin and indeed for today’s blog post. Should give you time to catch your favourite television programme.

Definitions:

TMJ Temporomandibular joint

Gray309-en Gray310

TMD a soreness in the Jaw that usually clears up on its own.

The Kristin Colton Playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Shona Macrae

Sleeping With ASMR

Re-reading some sleep advice that I had knocking around, I notice that one is supposed to sleep the same number of hours every night and if you don’t, then there will be a reckoning to come.

Added to this is the requirement that you go to bed at the same time, every night and awaken at the same time, every morning.

That sounds a great discipline and I would love to recommend it. However, I find myself utterly jiggered by close of play on a Friday and I take to bed and sleep till the gods have made off to find another planet (or for a very long time anyway).

I always found that this was my little weekly restorative and I’m sure that for many years it was. However, it does not seem to be as effective any longer and I am moderately convinced that is to do with ageing.

In the absence of changing my sleep pattern completely (and for those of you who also feel unable to do so), I’ll stick to finding restful videos that may encourage you to make the most of whatever sleep you are able to get. If you do find yourself crashing on a Friday night, desperate to make up for any lost time during the week, you now know I will not be judging you.

Today’s video is, again, taken from that deep well of videos which seemingly has no end on YouTube; the student assessment video.

Head-to-Toe Physical Assessment

The medical professional is Vivian and from the start has a very good voice. Vivian has on a top which identifies the college where presumably this is filmed but, sadly, I cannot make out what it says.

There are no notes with the video; there is one unhelpful comment and only two subscribers. This is either a journey to something new or a warning that this is not going to be that useful.

In fact, the sound is quite muted. The air conditioning is ever present (as we are used to by now) the patient is Lindsey Preston (probably misspelled), D.o.B. 03/03/97, whichever date system you use. I make that March.

There are the usual questions officially designed to check the person vs their record, but of course no record exists so it is, as usual, acting.

Lindsey (I’m sticking with that spelling now) announces that she is at Valencia Memorial Hospital (well I’m pretty sure that is what she says – it is a bit quick). Lindsey has a top on with the same appearance as that worn by Vivian it appears to say Valencia College nursing which might confirm that.

The tops worn by the nurses on that website do appear similar if in a different colour.

The college of course has it’s own YouTube channel.

Apart from the air conditioning there are no nasty intrusive noises. Vivian even seems able to move equipment around without the loud clangs that have punctuated some videos now in the Procrastination Pen archive list.

Her approach is methodical and gentle.

The video is just a short one at a little over six minutes.

The channel is Vivian Tran it contains just this one video uploaded in 2018 which is about the same date that it was filmed.

So, I’m sorry people, but that is all for this time.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Francesco Ungaro on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

A week in which I have had sympathy for those who are struggling to sleep and, in which, I have been quite dependent on the playlist for a restful breathing space. I’ve been active in weeding activity every time I happened across a more jarring moment.

I am researching the idea of trimming videos without actually hosting them. I haven’t made progress yet, but I live in hope that I may soon despatch funky startup music.

Today’s video another one properly designed for tuition of future medical professionals. Not the longest we’ve seen at a bit more than sixteen and a half minutes.

Neurological Assessment

There are moments of humour at the start including knocking on a surface to mimic entry. The patient is introduced as Mr Hoffman – which probably isn’t the correct spelling. The medical professional “Nancy” is from Harper College.

As we’d expect Harper College has its own channel the duty of which, I suspect, is to tell you that Harper College is fantastic, which no doubt it is.

Our purpose though, is the pursuit of restful videos. This one starts well by ignoring funky startup music. The Air conditioning noises are de rigueur for this sort of thing now, it would almost be rude to have a video without them.

Surprisingly for a professional video, there are no notes at all. There are plenty of comments, lots of strange comments as expected, but no obvious ASMR comments. Sometimes this does not bode well for the video.

Nancy does not have a classically restful voice; in fact, Mr Hoffman seems to have the better voice here. Thankfully, Mr Hoffman gets a fair amount of talk time in this one. The air conditioning is obviously a session musician paid by the volume, it is more intrusive even than we have come to expect.

The president at the time is Obama, so sometime between 2009 and 2017. The video was posted in 2015, so possibly shortly after it was filmed.

I think he refers to the medical professional as Nancy Haborector, that is so unlikely to be correct but it is what it sounds like. I think it is more likely Nancy Haberichter apologies Nancy if you are reading this.

Mr Hoffmann also talks to “Amy” who is behind the camera. That is a slightly off-putting event, in that I am used to dismissing the camera person from consciousness as if the filming was automatic and the interactions just between two. Amy, from that point onwards, makes a few contributions.

There are loud equipment noises in this as well.

Watch out around fifteen and a half minutes. Mr Hoffmann is obviously extremely ticklish and eventually the camera woman (Amy), Mr Hoffmann and Nancy are all taken up with laughter which fortunately brings the video to a conclusion.

The channel is Nursing Assessment and Skills, there are thirty-two videos and no playlists at all. So the normal mechanism of thinning out videos under review by using a convenient playlist is not available.

It turns out that Nancy is in the majority of such videos and Mr Hoffman is in a fair subset of them. So thinning by that mechanism isn’t looking too great either.

I notice that it appears that Mr Hoffmann is in thirteen of the videos and this is just too many for one post. So arbitrarily I am going to limit this post to three videos and we can come back again in a future blog post.

Basic Patient Assessment

This has the same two participants and is just over fifteen minutes. However, it is much more recent and it has notes “8 Jan 2019

This is the basic assessment that nursing students will perform at the bedside.  You will notice that the lights go out when upper extremity assessment is started.  So just keep watching.  Nurses must be able to adjust the plan when necessary.”

Again, there are a variable set of comments around the video, but no obvious ASMR comments.

Here the volume seems to be more appropriate, and the air conditioning is keeping it in reserve for the last music set. This time, Mr Hoffman introduces himself as Mr Reagan. I’m used to him as Hoffman and so he will stay Mr Hoffman for this article.

Nancy seems to be more muted as well, which actually works, and this instantaneously feels a better video for us than the last one.

Again, they are filming at the Harper Hospital, the president is Donald Trump who was president from 2017 to 2021. The video was posted in 2019 which could therefore have been shortly after it was filmed.

General Survey

This is a whole lot different. Firstly the setting – domestic not hospital, secondly length – the video is just two minutes long. No notes, no ASMR related comments. There is relatively little background noise but it starts a bit loud.

However, it is amazing how much influence that air conditioning noise has. It is easy to disregard how loud it is until it isn’t there and then I really want it to be absent all the time.

Although short, this video is the best in terms of restful of the three in this post. In the end it might be the only one to survive the regular weeding process. We shall see.

The Nursing Assessment playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article, why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Jennifer Uppendahl on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

If you’ve woken from another Nytol-fuelled sleep and feel like a bear was sitting on your head all night, it might be that you will be better off trying to relax into sleep by yourself without the aid of chemicals.

For many of us this is far easier said than done. I have found that falling asleep with other people’s noises all around – cars on the road, breathing of my partner, mice in the loft overhead, or bird squabbles in the hedges nearby are sufficiently distracting to put off sleep for quite some hours.

In this atmosphere the masking of those noises with a level of background noise seems to be moderately effective. The Procrastination Pen playlist may be effective for you in that it provides a number of videos taken from YouTube selected for their calm talking, lack of extraneous noises, and potential ASMR effects (in those people lucky enough to get ASMR effects, in any case).

Today’s video comes from a perennially useful source for us which is the student medical exam video. This blog would probably run out of steam quite quickly if this kind of video did not exist. Sadly, the quality of such videos is often, at best, variable, such that many videos get evaluated and few are chosen.

Today’s video is this one:

Head to Toe Assessment

The medical professional is wearing a very large identity badge indicating that she is Julianna and that she is an undergraduate student.

There are no notes with this video. However, comments are permitted and, as expected, ASMR fans have been here long before me.

It is just over thirty-five- and three-quarter minutes, so moderately substantial in terms of videos that we have recently seen on this blog.

Julianna announces that she is Julianna Cook, a Family Nurse Practitioner. I think the institution mentioned is “Auburn University” (it’s spoken rather quickly).

Auburn has a college of nursing and so it sounds like it might be a good fit for a video of this type.

Its channel reveals that it has a brand very similar to the icon on the badge that Julianna is wearing, so it seems very probable this is where Julianna is presenting from.

Julianna appears to have left Auburn in 2020 the video was posted in 2019.

The class is 7116 Advanced Nursing Assessment.

The patient seems to be in tip-top shape (better numbers than I am able to deliver for example). The normal question and answer session must have occurred prior to this video so there is no clue as to who the patient is.

The camera angle is a little strange in this one. Probably so that it could be set out of the way of the participants. But the net result is that they are some distance from it. This is not important if you are simply listening, but sadly, it has some effect on the audio as well which is itself a bit flat and distant. Not as notably, as in some other videos that have featured in this blog.

There are some moments where progress is slowed by the medical professional failing to remember. However, overall, the assessment seems moderately efficient (if thirty-odd minutes can be thought of as efficient).

We are here for the sound which is not excessively loud, no loud bangs of moving equipment for example. There is of course the ever-present air conditioning noise which seems to be a feature of these videos.

There is a fair amount of humour in the video which is perhaps less restful than might otherwise be the case (laughter can be a bit loud). I don’t think this precludes it from membership of the Procrastination Pen playlist but it might cause it to be a victim of future weeding.

There are moments of actual gentleness in this but only a video editor would be able to make this a truly superior video, and of course, the video isn’t mine to do that to.

The channel is Julianna Cook. There are four videos, including the one above, and eight hundred and fifty-seven subscribers as at the date I am looking at it. There is no video posted more recently than three years ago.

Julianna’s Greatest Show

This is just less than five and a quarter minutes, and has some notes. It states it is “NURS 7246 Pharmacology Project”. 7246 appears to be another course at Auburn.

Unlike the previous video no ASMR fans have commented on this one.

This starts loud, and I think is designed to be a presentation. There is loud music in it, I think it is supposed to be entertaining but not restful. It does make interesting viewing. I think the chances of falling asleep to it are out there with winning the lottery.

Not a Procrastination Pen playlist candidate but I imagine a good fun video if this is your area of interest.

7226 NP Roles Video

This is a presentation, it is quite loud, it isn’t really restful. There are no notes. There are no comments from ASMR fans, which given the content is perhaps not surprising. The most interesting elements are interviews with people apparently from the public. Herman Cook for example has quite a good voice. However, the background noise is a tad off-putting. It is louder even than we are usually used to.

James Warren’s interview has so much extraneous noise associated with it that I’m surprised it is included. I’m guessing filters are not a thing.

Virginia Cook has a great voice but she is swamped by background noise.

Stephanie has a section with minimal extraneous noise but her voice is quite a lot louder and so not helpful from our perspective.

Linda Condon has a good voice but I think they videoed her footage beside the M25, boy it is loud.

All in all, this video isn’t going to work for us and it will not go into the Procrastination Pen playlist.

The last (and newest) video is this one:

Croup Presentation

This is just over five minutes and it starts loud. It continues loud. It is a presentation after all.

This one is just not for us.

Just the one video this time then.

More time for you to get on with your work. More next time.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Milada Vigerova on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

Sadly, as I regularly prove, sometimes nothing at all is going to work in the drive to get some sleep. Some switch in the brain seems to resist getting thrown into the correct position and although you are tired, sleep just will not come.

These kinds of occasions used to drive me up the wall as I fought to get control and tried with increasing vigour to gain that blissful rest. It doesn’t work. The only option is to just let go, 5am is coming round and you’ll still be looking at the ceiling when it does. It is better to fill the time with something restful. The Procrastination Pen playlist is designed for just such an eventuality.

Today’s video is another professionally produced one:

Hip Examination – Orthopaedics

In common with a number of professionally produced videos it has notes with it: “28 Nov 2012  Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to perform an Orthopaedic examination of the hip joint. It is part of a series of videos covering Orthopaedic examinations and is linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk.”

So it tells us where it was filmed.

Comments are permitted (brave that) and it turns out that other ASMR fans have been here before me (which is not unexpected).

The video at just over nine and a quarter minutes is not a huge one. There is (thankfully) no introductory music. It begins with narration but no clues as to the participants, the narrator has quite a good voice. The same person talks throughout the examination proper such that we do not hear the voices of the actual participants. This makes their participation seem like that of a mime act or worse some kind of puppet, it is a little surreal. However, if you are listening rather than watching none of this will be obvious.

The channel is Oxford Medical Education. This has thirty two videos and 142k subscribers on the day I am looking at it.

With thirty two videos it seems likely that we would be here a while. There are nine playlists, our video appears to be in a playlist called Orthopaedic Surgery which consists of only three videos including the one I first covered. I’ll focus on this playlist in order to narrow down the choice available.

All three videos exceed nine minutes and are less than ten minutes – I’m guessing there was a target in terms of running time.

The next video in the playlist is this one:

Knee Examination – Orthopaedics

A bit over nine minutes so similar to the last one. Like that one it has notes “28 Nov 2012 Clinical Examinations

This video – produced by students at Oxford University Medical School in conjunction with the faculty – demonstrates how to perform an Orthopaedic examination of the knee joint. It is part of a series of videos covering Orthopaedic examinations and is linked to Oxford Medical Education (www.oxfordmedicaleducation.com)

This video was produced in collaboration with Oxford Medical Illustration – a department of Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust. For more information, please visit www.oxfordmi.nhs.uk

Again, the entire video is narrated. I would say the voice is marginally superior to the last one for our purposes.

Shoulder Examination – Orthopaedics

Nine and a half minutes so slightly longer and in this one the patient changes. In the previous two the patient was the same and the medical professional changed. Now we have a patient change and a medical professional change.

The notes are very similar to what has gone before so I will not repeat them.

The narration is not quite as good for our purposes as the last one. However, as is usual with professionally produced videos, they are amazing in their consistency. In this one (at last!) the medical professional gets to speak for himself and we find that his voice is not at all bad. Part way through, the video goes all sepia in appearance briefly. I’m not clear why, but given you will only be listening this will not be too distracting.

The Oxford Medical Education playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Girl with red hat on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

Every once in a while I like to remind readers why we are here, what this series of blog articles on the Procrastination Pen is designed to achieve, and why you might want to read, especially if you suffer for sleep.

If you are privileged enough to get ASMR symptoms then you will already be familiar with the fact that certain sounds can have a profound effect. For some people, there are physical sensations (often referred to as tingles). For many, there is a sense of wellbeing or relaxation when a certain sound is playing.

The effect is now well documented and so recognised that even mainstream newspapers have articles on it (and not all of them are critical!)

For those not so gifted it is often the case that quiet and calming sounds can be more effective at promoting relaxation than absolute silence (if there is anywhere in your current environment where you can achieve true silence, then you are truly privileged in any case).

For this reason, websites now carry not just articles about ASMR but videos purported to cause such relaxation or full ASMR effects. Sadly, claims for ASMR are a bit of a stretch as it seems that the sounds that cause ASMR are as individual as the person who is listening to them.

A number of people seem to find slurping noises relaxing, some prefer scratching or the sound of running water. For others, some of these sounds are positively off-putting. One person’s ASMR sound is another person’s grating, irritating noise.

I try, therefore, to mute any claims about ASMR for this blog as I can only comment about sounds that work for me. I like quiet voices, gentle and calm behaviour. I think there is a large subset of ASMR fans who like the same thing.

There is no shortage of videos on the popular YouTube site and many of them claim to be great for ASMR. I have listened to many. I found some were interesting, very few effective, most to be irrelevant to me.

I believe that this affects many people. How to arrive at a situation where you only get to listen to those videos which are genuinely relaxing? I considered that the only method was to listen to many – many videos and to keep a record of the ones that are genuinely relaxing for me.

There are probably several people who do the same thing. We are duplicating the effort in order to arrive at playlists of relaxing videos.

I use relaxing videos to get to sleep, I am old, I do not sleep well. There are many people who are either old or who do not sleep well and some of whom who are both old and who do not sleep well.

I have found that having a playlist of relaxing videos playing actually helps. (It would help even more if YouTube would quit playing loud and intrusive adverts during the night time hours – by which I mean any time between 21:00 and 07:00 – when I assume the majority of people have some kind of sleep window. However, I do not control YouTube or have the power even to make suggestions, so I work with what I have.)

I assume that many people would profit from having a playlist like this available to them. This blog is old and hence the name the Procrastination Pen precedes this idea by many years (Perhaps now I would call it ASMR Sleeping or something – however I assume there are many similar sites out there.)

Hence the Procrastination Pen is this blog, the Procrastination Pen is my YouTube channel which contains the playlists, the Procrastination Pen is the Facebook page which links to them, the Instagram page, the Twitter account and so on and so forth…

All of which is designed to inform people that there is a consistent effort going on attempting to identify suitable videos, to create a playlist of such videos and to share the playlist so that they do not have to do the same thing.

With the many ASMR channels on YouTube, I realised that there is little margin in reviewing those (unless there is demand), so I focus instead on videos which were created for another purpose i.e. whose relaxation effects are an unintended side effect rather than the main aim.

For a while now, the focus has been any variant of a medical examination video as these seem a rich source of material. I make occasional forays into other areas.

The blog allows comments, via which you can make suggestions (sensible ones I may even consider for the playlist).

The playlist is also used by me, regularly. One upshot of which is that if I find any of the included videos are not as relaxing as at first thought they get removed.

This should ensure that the playlist remains true to its original intent which is to help people get to sleep and to drift off again if you, as many of us do, wake several times during the night.

If you are still reading this far, well done, you’ve proven that you have a great span of attention and your reward can be today’s video. Which is this one:

Abdominal Examination – OSCE Guide (Latest)

At a bit less than eight and a half minutes this is not a huge video it is a professionally produced video and so has notes, and what notes, possibly the most extensive notes I have read thus far on any of the videos so far reviewed. For this reason I am only including the edited highlights in this article:

“6 Oct 2018  Clinical Examination (OSCE) Guides

We’ve just released a collection of 500+ OSCE Stations! 🙌 https://geekymedics.com/osce-stations/ See the written guide alongside the video on our website https://geekymedics.com/abdominal-exa…

The ability to carry out a thorough and slick abdominal examination is something every medic needs to master. This video aims to give you an idea of what’s required in the OSCE and you can then customise the examination to suit your own personal style.

Check out our other awesome clinical skills resources including:

– 📱Geeky Medics OSCE App: https://geekymedics.com/geeky-medics-…

– 📝 150+ OSCE Checklists (PDF): https://geekymedics.com/pdf-osce-chec…

– 🗂️ 2000+ OSCE Flashcards: https://geekymedics.com/osce-flashcards/

– ❓Over 3000 Free MCQs: https://geekyquiz.com/

– 🩺 Medical Finals Question Pack: https://geekymedics.com/medical-stude…

– 💊 PSA Question Pack: https://geekymedics.com/psa-question-…

–  🏥 Medicine Flashcard Collection: https://geekymedics.com/medicine-flas…

– 🔪 Surgery Flashcard Collection: https://geekymedics.com/surgery-flash…

– 🫁 Anatomy Flashcard Collection: https://geekymedics.com/anatomy-flash…”

So unusually for inadvertent ASMR videos this one pins its colours to the mast up front. It’s a medical video but the notes directly state “Some people have found this video useful for ASMR purposes”.

Comments are permitted and as expected some of these comments do not appear to be from medical students. I think we can conclude that ASMR fans are all over this. I rarely find a video where this is not the case. If there is a relaxing video a few hundred or more likely thousand ASMR fans will already have seen it and often have left some very esoteric comments. I guess it is a community thing which I do not fully comprehend.

The video is calm, quiet, methodical and is more or less perfect from our perspective.

The medical professional is “Andrew” and is a final-year medical student. It isn’t clear which course, or where, Andrew is studying.

The patient is “James Alexander” D.o.B 13/12/1989 (that’s December in case you use a different method of describing dates to the UK one). It might be that we select other videos with James in for review in this article.

There are no objectionable background noises and the introductory music is thankfully very brief. However, the abdominal sounds might prove a bit off-putting for some. It might fall victim to a future weeding process but I intend to include it in the Procrastination Pen playlist.

The channel is not an obvious one for relaxing videos (at least by inference from the name) it is: Geeky Medics and it has 1 million subscribers. This has to be something of a record for a channel reviewed on this blog. I was expecting tens of thousands of videos therefore but in fact two hundred and sixteen videos as at today’s date.

Given “James” does not appear in the comments to the video it is probable that a simple search of the channel isn’t going to pull up videos where he is the patient.

Instead, I’ll go the old-fashioned route and scroll through the two hundred and sixteen videos in the hope of spotting him from the image placeholder for the video.

There are some video shorts that feature James, however the first has funky background music and so is not suitable for what we are looking for:

The latter one features some disturbing breathing sounds and so I think we can discount that one as well:

The next video of any length to feature James Alexander is this one:

Cardiovascular Examination – OSCE Guide

The medical professional is again Andrew.

This is consistent with the last one in terms of approach, volume, startup music. The notes are almost the same as before (I’ll cease to feature the notes now as they are much the same between videos.)

This is just over eight minutes and as before is marvellously calm. However, there are some loud heart sounds which might be off-putting.

The next video is this one:

How to record an ECG – OSCE Guide

At just less than 4 minutes it isn’t huge. The startup music remains muted here. The medical professional is “David,” his voice is not as relaxing as Andrew, but it is still pretty good.

The video is predominantly quiet with limited input from participants. It is methodical and thank goodness, because the procedure looks to be a complex one. Thankfully this time there are no noises from internal organs.

The next one is this one:

How to take an arterial blood gas (ABG) – OSCE guide

This is just less than three and a half minutes and we are back to Andrew as the medical professional – welcome back Andrew.

James is a trooper. He gets asked the same questions at the start of each of these and repeats the answers without blinking.

Those averse to needles I suggest that you just do not watch but lay back and listen, it will be certain to put you off if you actually watch this.

Here we get a concluding screen that tells us the medical student was Dr Andrew Pugh.

And the patient was James Lower

Intravenous (IV) cannulation – OSCE Guide

Seriously if you do not like blood do not watch this. Andrew returns and this video might need to be archived from the Procrastination Pen playlist at some stage as I am sure I am not alone in finding blood related videos distinctly uncomfortable to watch. (It may encourage you to listen rather than watch however).

I decided to look for where Graham Bone was senior clinical lecturer and discovered that he is at South Tees NHS Foundation Trust. These support the following universities University of Hull, University of York, Newcastle University, University of Sunderland.

Therefore, it is likely it was filmed in one of those locations.

Modified Allen’s Test

This is a short extract from one of the videos we have already seen. (It’s possible many of the other shorter videos on this channel have been sourced in the same way).

Respiratory Examination – OSCE Guide (Latest)

I do get the feeling that these videos re-use material from other videos, possibly this is why James is able to blithely respond to those early questions in exactly the same way. Here we have a video just over nine and a half minutes and unsurprisingly it is very similar to those already reviewed.

This one has some quite loud (and possibly off-putting breathing related noises).

So where is Dr Gareth Hynes Respiratory Registrar and does this give us any more information about where this was filmed?

It looks like Gareth is at Oxford University Hospitals so that muddies the waters if anything.

Spine Examination – OSCE Guide

Back with Andrew and a video just less than five and a half minutes in length.

So where is Mr Tejas Yarashi Orthopaedic Registrar (ST7)?

Tejas is currently at Northampton General Hospital NHS Trust but it looks like the last time he had (ST7) as a qualifier was at the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust.

Lung sounds (respiratory auscultation sounds)

This is just less than one and a quarter minutes and mostly off-putting breathing related noises, I suspect we can discount this one.

So was Dr Gareth Hynes ever at Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust? It appears not.

Heart murmur sounds (cardiac auscultation sounds)

Another short one at just over two minutes and is mainly heart related noises, again I think we can discount this one

So where is Dr Matthew Jackson Cardiology Registrar (ST6)? Well it turns out that I can’t locate him so I’m not too certain.

Shoulder Examination – OSCE Guide (Latest)

just less than six and a quarter minutes and as for the previous videos so for this one. Andrew and James again and at this rate the blog post will be encyclopaedic, I think I will split this post into many and cover all the other videos in a subsequent blog post.

An absence of strange noises on this one though makes it a great deal more appealing.

Definition:

Crepitus, noises from the joint

Supraspinatus small muscle in the upper back

The Geeky Medics playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Chris Vanhove on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

After a period of reviewing videos I suspect that availability of ASMR material within the wider medical examination video material follows something of a normal distribution. I cannot prove it but the occurrence of truly awesome ASMR material such as Hollie Berry or Shane Brun is very rare and so they must be outliers.

More bread-and-butter material occurs somewhat regularly. The huge lift in the curve is of videos which are watchable but unsuitable. They are just not relaxing enough. Right out at the other end of the curve are some rather nasty videos which, thankfully, I rarely come across.

That being the case, the discovery of another Vicki Scott is a matter of trawling through a vast number of videos to uncover the jewel in the coal mine.

You can be certain that should I discover such a person they will be featured in this blog, and no doubt (like Dr James Gill) flagged as a favourite from that point onwards.

Today’s video is at the Hollie Berry standard which is fighting talk ASMR-wise.

Alexander technique lesson with Diana Devitt-Dawson

This is just under fourteen-and-a-quarter minutes so a quite typical length for us of late. The medical professional is Diana Devitt-Dawson the “patient” is Gita (probably misspelled). The film quality is not the greatest which is probably of little concern if you are using this to get to sleep.

Diana has a really good voice for us I think. Another smile-causing aspect is the absence of intrusive background noise which haunts some of the videos I have featured.

Comments are permitted and judging by the feedback, I am not the first person to notice how good this is for ASMR. Many are rating this above professional ASMR artists (I’ve seen a few such videos, and in many cases they are correct).

The sad thing is that the channel Diana Devitt-Dawson contains only one video and this is it.

Diana appears not to have any further entries on YouTube (this has heavy echoes of my experience with Hollie Berry).

There are reiterations of the same video featured on ASMR channels, such as this one:

Legends of ASMR – Diana Devitt-Dawson

So that’s it this time, I’m afraid.

I now think that the Alexander Technique might, potentially, be a source of more ASMR material. I’ll keep my eyes open and my search fingers poised.

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Adam Kuylenstierna on Unsplash

Sleeping With ASMR

I have now been listening to the Procrastination Pen playlist for so long that I have realised that some elements of it are appearing in my dreams. Recently, I was arguing with a person I work with (in the dream) over their rights to reuse the entire text from a video from Moran Core, having convinced myself that it had been lifted wholesale and reused for an education purpose. (In fact, I suspect it was simply playing at the time and I overlaid my dream content with that from Moran Core).

On that basis, I had better be cautious about the material that I incorporate into the Procrastination Pen playlist or some of you may be having nightmares.

Today’s is another video drawn from a rich resource which we have covered before. This is the nursing student video, created as some element of their course. The clues are all present – domestic setting being the main one of course. In this case the use of a dining chair for the patient to sit on, we have seen a sofa even what appears to be the student’s own bed.

At just shy of eleven and a half minutes this is a nice length for one of the videos we commonly see. This one has no comments (phew) the downside of which is that we do not know if the ASMR community has happened across it as yet. (I would hazard a guess in the affirmative).

There are no notes – this happens with professional videos occasionally but more usually is a symptom of an amateur video as we have seen before.

The “patient” introduced as “Mr Evans” and the title of the video is:

S. Evans Thorax/lung Assessment

It is probably sensible to assume the husband of the medical professional involved.

Mrs Evans (I’ll guess that is who it is) starts a little loud.

Matthew Evans is the patient DoB 06/07/1984 (i.e. July in case you are reading this whilst located in the US or are using the US method of describing dates). So, if Matthew is the patient, S Evans must be the medical professional.

This is another one of the videos which has comedy “privacy” at the beginning – i.e. miming providing privacy when none is provided.

In fact, Matthew seems to have a better voice for our purposes than Mrs Evans does and fortunately he gets to talk a reasonable amount (he is subjected to a battery of questions). Interestingly there is no attempt to explore the answers which seems to show the student obeying some hidden checklist as to what has to happen in an examination, rather than using the information for anything useful.

Part way through a baby starts crying in a remote room, which is a tad distracting. I kept hoping that someone would go and find out what was wrong with the baby.

The channel is MGA Nursing, it has just forty subscribers which is to say the least odd. However, it has forty-three videos on it and all of them look to be medical examination videos – i.e. this is good news for us.

Fortunately, the videos are all labelled using an identifier for the medical professional. In this case we have a number of videos for S Evans.

The other videos for S Evans are as follows:

S. Evans Neuro Part 1

This is nearly sixteen minutes long and so it is a bit chunkier there are no comments and no notes so that might well be a theme for all of them.

Again, Matthew has a better voice but here we find out the medical professional is called Susan. Again, the “patient” Matthew is subjected to a barrage of questions and it is, again, not clear why.

Mrs Evans continues a bit loud; it is possible all of these videos will be marginal in terms of the Procrastination Pen playlist. I’m quite active in terms of weeding recently so we’ll see how long they last in the main list.

Susan seems to be consulting a checklist throughout the examination which reinforces the view that a series of steps have to be covered to comply with the purpose of the video (i.e. a requirement of the course in which Susan is involved).

We are quite fortunate in this video in that Matthew gets to talk a great deal more often and his voice is a much more restful one than his wife’s voice.

It is interesting to see Matthew fail some of the tests. This is something not seen before in one of these videos but, again, it isn’t clear what is going to be done about it.

S. Evans Neuro Part 2

This is much shorter at a little less than seven minutes. The setting is relocated to a domestic bedroom this time.

Again, it is a little loud to start. It is interesting that some of the vibration tests just do not seem to work (either that or Matthew is considerably more honest than some participants we have heard in the past).

During the actual examination things are a good deal quieter, however I still rate Matthew’s voice over Susan’s.

S. Evans Abdomen Assessment

This seems to be quieter at the start, there is the comedy privacy mime again, which this time occurs off camera. Again, Matthew is subjected to significant interrogation at the beginning.

At just over eleven and a half minutes this is similar in length to the first one we saw in this blog post. However, it is much better in terms of volume for us I think and makes a better candidate for the Procrastination Pen playlist.

All in all, a more gentle examination than the ones that we have seen previously in this article.

S. Evans Eye Assessment

A little under eleven minutes and we are back to a dining room chair for the patient. Again, with the initial questioning. The great thing is that Matthew gets more time speaking.

However, at points Matthew is a bit loud which makes this less useful from an ASMR perspective.

After this one I am making some guesses because the video titles cease to contain any reference to S Evans. However, I believe that these videos contain the same two participants so I have included them below.

IMG 3025

I would say that this is the same two people, it is just less than nineteen and a half minutes long – but the standard of title naming seems to have been lost. This just looks like a default naming system used by a recording device such as an iPhone. So perhaps this was just uploaded from such a device and no modifications were made to it.

We are back to the bedroom as a setting. This is reasonably quiet and is similar to videos we have already seen in this article previously.

This, again, contains the baby crying which was so off-putting in the first one of this series. No one seems to jump and run, so potentially there is someone else in the house responsible for the baby’s care (or the baby is next door and has blast furnace bellows for lungs).

IMG 2916

Again, this is the same two participants. At the time the video is being shot we learn that although Obama is president Trump has started campaigning. Although Trump became president in 2017, he started his campaign in 2015. It is quite likely therefore the video was shot in 2016 which also fits with when it was posted (September 2016) so the dates line up. This time we have notes (perhaps to compensate for the absence of a useful video title): “26 Sept 2016

S. Evans. Physical Assessment- General Survey September 25, 2016”

Matthew also confirms the date.

The video is a little less than three minutes and so is a very brief one for us.

Matthew gets a reasonable amount of talking time which is good.

IMG 2934

This is slightly over four minutes so again is very brief. It has the same two participants and starts a little loud, I think. Again, Matthew gets to talk a reasonable amount. The actual examination is quite quiet and gentle.

There are baby noises in this one too, and this time the baby sounds to be in the self-same room that the participants are in. I’m assuming that someone nearby is doing the baby soothing, bouncing on knee, or what have you because neither of the participants seems at all bothered by this.

It does get to the level of loud in this one which I think is sufficiently distracting that this one cannot be included in the Procrastination Pen playlist.

Assessment: Ears

The quality isn’t great here but I am making the guess that this is the same two people.

This is a little under eight minutes and so is back to a better length. It has a moderately quieter start than some of the previous videos considered.

Again, there are baby noises but the baby is back to a remote room. I think we can conclude that the baby is in the same house. But possibly not Susan or Matthew’s responsibility.

So overall more the “acceptable” rather than outstanding in terms of relaxation for sleep purposes. I’ll trial them in the Procrastination Pen playlist but the weeding of it continues apace so some or all of them maybe flushed out in a future weeding process.

The MGA Nursing playlist on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The overall playlist of videos covered so far on the Procrastination Pen is here:

The videos weeded out because over time they are just not as good as the others is in this archive list:

I keep this in case subscribers to the Procrastination Pen have personal favourites that they want to hear.

The playlist of videos requiring age verification is here:

I can’t be bothered to stop my listening to log on, this interrupts the experience. You may not mind this in which case this list is for you.

I hope that you find the playlists restful and I hope you get plenty of sleep.

If you liked this blog article why not follow this blog.

Until next time.

Photo by Kristin Brown on Unsplash