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redge
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Name: Redge
Gender: Male
Interests: independent films. api issues. spending money i don't have. being smart. acting dumb. driving around with my sunroof open only at night. asian linguistics. fighting racism, sexism, xenophobia, and homophobia. adventures in food, electronics, design, photography, art, and cars.
Expertise: a jack of all trades... once a wannabe racer who turned into a wannabe samurai who turned into a wannabe hiphop dancer who turned into a wannabe independent film maker who turned into a wannabe iron chef who now wants to be an allergist.
Occupation: Student
Industry: Medical
Message: message me
Member Since:
5/13/2003
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| I think I almost cried with joy when I realized that today was Thursday, which means tomorrow is Friday and therefore I'll actually get home before 5 tomorrow. Too bad I'm only given one day off on the weekend. =( Oh the life of an intern.
When I thought that I was actually getting a hang of it all my patients my patient census blew up with a bunch of complicated and sick patients. I have one guy who we can't figure out why he hasn't had a BM in over a week... CTs have been negative. A guy who is quite literally slowing dying but his family wants to try chemotherapy which will invariably make him even more sick and possibly accelerate his death. And another who just found out that her cancer had spread to her brain. Oh yeah, can't forget my patient who also happens to be not only a doctor herself but she was also previously a teaching attending at a major hospital. If i wasn't stressed out enough now I have a patient who actually knows when I do something wrong. She's also become this weird sorta mentor when I go in to see her. She always asks me what my 5 year plan is and how I'm doing. She tells me stories of when she was a young doctor and how she just loves to help other young doctors achieve their goals. While I can sense she has good intentions she's quite intimidating. If my life were a reality show this would be a major story arc.
I can't tell if it's because I'm slow that I tend to leave way past everyone else or that I really do have all these complicated patients. I've been getting home with just about 2 hours to get dinner, shower, relax a bit with some tv and then get to bed to start the day once again at the buttcrack of dawn. I suppose a boon of working so many hours is that my electricity bill should be nice and low this month.
As my friend so lovingly pointed out... this is only temporary. | | |
| initiation by fire - week 1Despite having a 9 day orientation, nothing could have prepared me for the stress and growing pains of my first day as a newly minted doctor. My situation was made even more stressful by the fact my first assignment was not at my home institution but a partner hospital in Manhattan. It's highly regarded as one of the premiere hospitals for the treatment of cancer patients which is not only impressive, but daunting as well. Essentially the email I got in regards to my first day was something along the lines as:
Welcome to MSKCC! On your first day report to the conference room at 7am sharp, pick up your patient list, beeper and see your patients before you round with your team at 8am. You'll receive a formal orientation at 1pm later that day.
Not only do you hit the ground running, but you have to do it before you even get an orientation to the hospital. So essentially I was given an hour to get to learn everything I could about the 6 patients under my care, go see them, come up with my plans for the days and be prepared to answer questions from my attending. A pretty daunting task considering I didn't know my way around the hospital or how to log onto the computer system. So for about the first two days my major task was simply to get by. Despite trying to streamline my processes of reviewing their notes and examining patients I would still fall one or two patients behind when it was time to meet with my attending at 8am. The worst part were the little side tasks that would get in the way of me being able to sit down and get actual work done. A nurse would page about orders I had written or I would have to shift through an entire chart to learn about a patient's cancer history since I never got to see them at admission. The first two days were pretty horrible and humbling. While our chief residents said we should be out of the hospital no later than 9pm and get in no earlier than 7am to abide by the mandated 10 hour work break there was no way that was going to happen... at least for all the interns. My first day I didn't get out of the hospital until 10:30 and the next night it wasn't until 11pm. What was funny about my second day was that I had actually thought I was on top of my work and then by the time I had sat done to actually write my notes on my patients it was already 9pm. Keep in mind I have to get up at 5am and it takes me about an hour on the train to get back home. Needless to say I was a pretty tired and cranky intern all last week. It looks like for this year I will really only be getting one day off every week which sucks! We don't get "golden weekends" where if you were on call thursday you can take Friday and the weekend off. Even on the weekends I still have to come in one day to see my patients and write my notes. Looks like I won't be doing any Vegas getaways anytime soon. That's one thing no one every really tells you about residency - the small logistical stuff.
Things aren't all that bad however. The nurses at the hospital are amazing and I feel like the medical equivalent of a country hick because I'm constantly amazed at what they can actually do. Having received most of my training at county hospitals I'm used to having to do a lot of my own orders. If I have a STAT lab that needs to be drawn I'm used to having to do it myself. This hospital the nurses do all my orders without any attitude or spite and for that I'm completely grateful. I'm also used to having to constantly tell the nurses that I've put in new orders or I'm changing something I had previously ordered and at this hospital it's never necessary. A flip side to that is they all think I'm really nice by calling to tell them my plans. Another thing that I've come to like is simply having the stamp with my name and MD on it. It's amazing how powerful my signature has become.
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| Residency is kicking my butt. Granted this is only day 2 I still feel so completely and utterly unprepared. I clocked in at 630a and left at 10p. Today pretty much the same - got in at 630a and left at 11p. The hospital I'm starting at is incredible and I love the resources and staff. Even more the fact I'm fed.
More to update later but i have to get some sleep before I head back to the hospital in about 5 hours. FML | | |
| My usual routine while getting ready in the morning is to check out the news stories on Yahoo! before I head out. This one on the front page stuck out in particular for me "Scary Welcome for French Tourists: Police Chase". Turns out this poor unsuspecting family decided to take a ride from a one of those non-licensed cabbies that solict you right at the baggae claim. The police had been tracking this guy and when they tried to stop him from taking these people in his minivan to their destination it broke out into an all out high speed chase. Talk about a rude welcome.
About 2 years when I was flying back from the Caribbean after a hellishly long flight I was approached by one of those non-licensed cabbies at baggage claim at JFK. My original plans were to arrive in NYC at 2pm, check into the W, and pamper myself before heading back to San Diego the following morning. Unfortunately, through a string of bad events I didn't end up getting into NYC until 2am. I was tired, cranky and just wanted to get to the Airport Holiday Inn to shower and sleep. I said yes I needed a car before even thinking about it. So this huge Afro-Caribbean dude grabbed my bag and led me outside. Now, I didn't really notice anything was wrong until he lead me past the row of waiting taxi cabs... in fact, he had led me to his mini van in the parking structure. At this point any sane person would have said "hey, this is bullshit I'm taking another cab!" but being that i was tired and have had my share of home business cabbies from the Caribbean I decided to just let him take me to the Holiday Inn, which in theory was only 5 minutes away. After about 10 minutes I notice we're no longer close to the airport and we're about 15 minutes away from Manhattan! Ok now my awake and realizing how retarded I was. My immediate thoughts go to the possibility he's going to drop me off in the ghetto unless I pay him some crazy amount. Or I'm going to end up on the front page of the Daily News "Med Student Slain: Wasn't so Smart Afterall". So i start asking where the heck is he taking me and how long it's going to take. He replies back "the holiday inn... maybe 5-10 minutes more". I have 911 ready on my phone and my thumb is ready at a moments notice to hit the SEND button. Needless to say I end up safely at a Holiday Inn about 10 miles away from my intended one but I vowed never again
So the lesson here is to never accept rides at baggage claim.
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| Orientation, Day 2The information in today's orientation was a lot more immediately applicable that the previous day's orientation. Yesterday it was mostly conceptual constructs of what it meant to be professional, practice systems-based medicine, etc... Today there was a lot more practical information in regards to ordering labs, admitting patients and writing notes.
I have 37 fellow residents in my class and have thus far only really learned about 6-7 names. No wait... make that 8.
We won't be seeing our first patients until next week and already I'm starting to feel overwhelmed by the amount of information we've been given. My only comfort is that we're basically expected to be idiots on our first day/week/month of residency. What was also striking today was how quickly residency is expected to fly by. We were told today if we want to pursue fellowship training after our 3 years of internal medicine we were expected not only to know by the end of our first year, but also be in the process of applying by the beginning of our second year. Doesn't leave much room to get the requisite research and publications done that are a given for anyone wanting subspecialty training. It's only been recently that I've admitted to myself that it's my fickleness that landed me in internal medicine so the news of this made me sweat a bit during the presentation.
I just received my schedule for my first month and I'll be working at a well renowned cancer hospital in Manhattan on their gastroenterology cancer service. I'm feeling quite intimidated about the prospect of managing cancer patients. I also found out that I'll be on call July 4th. =/ sucks to be the bitch intern. | | |
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