No 12976, Wednesday 01 Jul 2020, Dr. X

Solution to 22A has been deliberately left unsolved and is to be answered only by a non-regular/novice commenter, with proper annotation. Those who have answered earlier in the week, please give others a chance.

ACROSS
1   Up-to-date cardiologist’s concern — incorporating latest in treatment (5, 2, 3, 3) STATE OF THE ART {STATE OF {Tr...t}HEART}
8   Wife lost control after starting to yell? Surrender (5) YIELD {wIELD} after {Yell}
9   Finding faults with socialite girl embracing when husband’s away (9) DEBUGGING {DEB}{hUGGING}
11 Rock music by Mercury say (5, 5) HEAVY METAL [DD]
12 Bar in small shack (4) SHUT {S}{HUT}
14 Most smarmy Republican ignored terrible riots over falsehood (7) OILIEST {rIOTS}* over {LIE}
16 Discover uranium? Tehran’s excited (7) UNEARTH {U}{TEHRAN*}
17 Notice boss, largely high on spirit, spilling a bit of vodka (7) OBSERVE {BOSs}*{vERVE}
19 Celebrity wearing mostly different glossy coats (7) ENAMELS {E{NAME}LSe}
21 Exam in school, a routine review (4) ORAL [T<=]
22 Romantic proposal by Bill at essentially swish club (10) ?D?A?I?T?C (Addendum -  IDEALISTIC {IDEA}{LIST}{swIsh}{C} - See comments))
25 Sweet fellow ignored anxiety during consummation (9) ENDEARING {END{fEAR}ING}
26 One rebellious youngster consuming ecstasy, for example (5) IDEAL {1}{LA{E}D<=}
27 Status seeker in party gets agile, snorting cocaine (6, 7)  SOCIAL CLIMBER {SOCIAL}{LIMBER} over {C}

DOWN
2   Body part, one perhaps found in extremity (7) TOENAIL {T{ONE*}AIL} Semi&lit
3   Current boyfriend at first runs around giving soft toys (5, 5) TEDDY BEARS {EDDY}{Bo...d} in {TEARS}*
4   Nostalgic number in retro party that is enthralling many (5) OLDIE {DO<=}{IE} over {L}
5   Form of musical notation with a recurrent pattern in chart (9) TABLATURE {TABL{A}{RUT<=}E}
6   Creep in triangle ignoring wife (4) EDGE wEDGE
7   Scoundrel outside hotel pursuing Aishwarya in Indian city (7) RAICHUR {RAI}{C{H}UR}
8   What makes a boy beginning to yearn, smooch more artfully (1, 10) Y CHROMOSOME {Ye..n}{SMOOCH+MORE}*
10 Take medical examination for fitness to become sexually intimate (3, 8) GET PHYSICAL [DD]
13 Tendency to criticize veganism? It’s odd (10) NEGATIVISM*
15 Routine drudgery to study origin of materials found in dig (9) TREADMILL {T{READ}{Ma...s}ILL}
18 Rogue deserts after accepting ring with love (2-3-2) SO-AND-SO {S{O}ANDS}{0}
20 Climax in sex, tremendous (7) EXTREME [T]
23 Gang elegantly steals gem (5) ANGEL [T]
24 Thrash revolting leader of insurgents in African country (4) MALI {LAM<=}{In...s}

Reference List
Wife = W, Husband = H, Small =S, Republican = R, Club = C,  Fellow = F, Ecstasy = E, Cocaine = C, Party = DO, Many = L, Hotel = H

Dr RKE's TalePiece

Doctor’s Day Tale

Viranna Nayak was huffing and puffing on the TREADMILL in the STATE-OF-THE-ART heart hospital in Bengaluru. He had only come to GET a PHYSICAL examination done with his cardiologist, Dr.Mahalingam (MALI for short). The specialist had OBSERVEd a worrying change in Nayak’s ECG and had ordered the treadmill test.

Viranna Nayak, an agriculturist from RAICHUR, had UNEARTHEd a high-YIELD variety of an OILIEST groundnut some years ago, that had SHOT him into fame. He no longer needed to work in  the fields as he had done while young. The physical inactivity and the oil rich diet made him the IDEAL candidate for a coronary. More than all these factors, it was the stress about his son that caused him the heartache.

Viranna Nayak started feeling EXTREMEly faint as the treadmill was accelerated to the next level. Without any warning, he suddenly collapsed. As he was falling over the EDGE, Ms ANGEL Mary, the alert nurse supervising the treadmill test, stopped the machine and lay his limp body on the couch.  “Jesus, he has no pulse, call Dr.Mali” she shouted and started to give him a cardiac massage. She inserted an ORAL airway and proceeded to give mouth-to-mouth respiration. In the IDEALISTIC set up that this hospital was, it was possible to resuscitate him within 3 minutes and move him directly for a percutaneous coronary intervention to the cath lab in the next 10 minutes. A blocked left main coronary artery was stented and Viranna Nayak sprang back to life magically from the dead.

Dr.Mali, was not the doctor who treats the illness in the patient, but one who treats the patient with an illness. When Viranna left the hospital on 1st July, Dr.Mali told him “shed your NEGATIVISM, take your son to Dr.So-and-so, an endocrinologist, who specializes in transgenders”. “How on earth did he know?” thought Viranna, “I had not told him anything bout my son”. Dr.Mali did not need to be told. One look at the tall boy of 17, the junior Nayak, who was effeminate, still holding a TEDDY BEAR with the ENAMEL on his TOENAILs was enough for him to guess the source of stress for Viranna. The “boy” was a girl trapped in a boy’s body due to a disorder in “his” Y-CHROMOSOME.