12 hours shift...here I come

Today is shift #3 at Methodist ED....12 hours. No big deal as long as there are patients today.

My last shift was Wednesday, overnight....12am-8am. I was lucky to see 5 patients. Nights like that are wonderful for the residents...chill, relaxed. But for me, I would describe it another way: long! At some point during the night, you start to feel like a stapler...a piece of equipment just waiting to be used. Every once in a while someone glances over and sees you sitting there, waiting... yet they quickly continue their conversation about nothingness with the other residents while you continue to stand there. I had nights like these in 3rd year as well. Terrible nights. I would rather have patients coming out of the woodwork with shady complaints of back pain....or a drunk patient. At least they are entertaining and make history gathering fun. Unfortunately in medicine, and especially in the emergency department you never know how a night will turn out...whether it will be extremely busy or painfully slow. My luck turned into the latter.

Let me stop being a downer and say that there were 2 positives for the night. One, I was able to do an abdominal ultrasound on a gentleman with right upper quadrant pain. The 2nd year resident could not locate his gallbladder and after about 15 minutes gave up. He did allow me to continue to try, and after about 5 minutes of my own skilled probe work, I found it!! (Thanks Maimo for the skills you taught me). Unfortunately, I did not know how to use the U/S machine...they are all different. So, I could only save pictures....no measuring...no sweeping pictures. The resident was very impressed though :)

The second positive....got to see my resident sew a tongue laceration on an elderly lady with possible tongue cancer. She was hemorraging from the mouth, coughing up blood....after 3 sutures, no more blood. I never saw that before, so it was a nice experience. Now I am ready to conquer my own tongue lac in the future!!!

I am hoping that today makes up for Wednesday night. I'm thinking Sunday, nice day out, bound to be some accidents requiring suturing....and residents ALWAYS seem to want the medical student to suture. Not sure why that is but I love suturing. I can see myself as a resident doing all my own sutures...sorry medical students but this is all mine!!! HAHA!!

Of course because I am working until 11pm I miss out on True Blood. Now I have to wait until tomorrow to see Sookie :(

Methodist minus 1

Last night was my first shift at Methodist, 8pm - 8am....very busy! Here are some of the things I got to do:

- ABG on a gentleman with COPD
- Vaginal ultrasound on a woman 5 weeks into her pregnancy
- Biliary ultrasound on a young woman with abdominal pain
- IV placed successfully followed by 2 not so successfully (a little out of practice ;)
- 8 sutures in a right medial wrist laceration from a young man who went to dunk and shattered the backboard...he miss the dunk
- Thumb spica placed on a gentleman who couldn't decide if his right or left wrist was injured more (he kept changing his story). So, the resident finally told me to put it on his right

I am on again tonight from 12am - 8am and I am hoping it is equally as busy as last night. I will let you know tomorrow :) Everyone enjoy your night!!

Back in Brooklyn.....

Wait...how can I be back in Brooklyn if I never left??? Well, I have been MIA the last 5 weeks and never posted that I went home for 3 weeks. The busy life of a medical student...no time to blog ;)

Okay, so where did I leave off....oh yes, I was at Maimo for emergency medicine. Well, that ended. My last day was July 30th. Overall, the rotation was awesome and I enjoyed everything from the environment, to the people, to the patient population. I could definitely see myself as a resident at that program. Lets just hope they could see me as that too!

On the 30th, Furry made a surprise visit to NYC!! Not a surprise for me, but for him. Mom had told him I was coming to Albany on the train and they were going to pick me up. Once they got to Albany, mom gave furry his ticket to NYC. Only problem, she gave it to him like 15 minutes before the train was departing....he freaked!!! Furry's entire world was turned upside down...he took the surprise well though. We spent the weekend walking around...saw the Intrepid....saw the Natural Museum of History...saw the WTC....saw True Blood! Then on monday we headed back home.

I get home to find my dog does not look good. In short, I took him to the vet...vet finds enlarged lymph nodes all over his body....vet takes blood work....blood work shows liver and kidney failure...vet is highly suspicious of malignancy....we decide as a family to make him comfortable with medication and food....one week later Geddy can barely stand and vomits all of his food...I have to put my dog down :( Very sad day, but I am happy I had the chance to see him and to be with him when it was his time. He was a very good dog....my buddy...and he will be greatly missed.

I though mom would take Geddy's death poorly but Z-dog has been a wreck. She wouldn't go outside unless once of us went outside too. She wasn't eating. She wasn't moving much. She looked depressed. So, my mom got a new dog!! I didn't get a chance to see it in person because she got it the day I left (today), but it apparently is a very sweet, docile dog and that is exactly the kind of friend Zoey needs. Hopefully they hit it off and Zoey gets back to being the fun loving dog she was before Geddy departed.

Of course, while home I got to see some friends....Mit, Alana, Laura and many others :) I went to Enchanted Forest with my family for my mom's birthday. I saw Dr. Hess and Lynn...love seeing them!! And I relaxed a little...but not too much because I also had to finish my application for residency, which I am almost done with. Just need to nail down that Personal Statement...

So tonight is off to True Blood at Professor Thom's :) :) And tomorrow, I start my next rotation, Emergency Medicine at Methodist. I am really excited!! Although the 3 week vacation was much needed, I secretly miss the hospital....shhhh, don't tell any of my 4th year friends ;)

Everyone have a great night and I will talk to you all soon!