MGH interns give Santa his annual medical workup

First-year surgery residents, called interns - in notoriously the toughest year of training in the toughest specialty - have "admitted'' Santa Claus every December since the early 1950s, dreaming up dire medical problems, conducting exams and tests on a costumed actor or life-size doll, and filling out medical forms. What began as an attempt at comic relief late on a slow night in the emergency room has blossomed into a 60-year tradition. This month, Dr. Andrew Warshaw - who led "Santa Rounds'' as an intern in 1963 and later became chief of surgery - and Dr. Gregory Ruhnke of the University of Chicago published a paper detailing the history of Santa's admissions in the Archives of Surgery.