Saturday, March 31, 2007
I REALLY REALLY need to SIT DOWN and study.I long for the initial determination and burning interest to study when I was a freshman in university. To my dismay ,I am getting lazier and lazier as I grow older.Ironically, I have to feed myself with the latest medical updates from time to time to make sure that I am well-informed and knowledgeable (which I am trying HARD to pretend).Anyway, several amusing phenomenons I observed in my hospital:
1. It's a FOOD CHAIN cycle. Consultants are at the top of the food chain, next are the Registrars, then House surgeons then Trainee Interns ( which I luckily secured myself a place in this chain). Consultants usually eat up the Registrars when they are mad, and I always get oppress by some bossy and grumpy House surgeons. Literally, I am their slave ranging from buying coffee for them in the FIX ( well, at least I get a free coffee for doing the odd job) to fetching them medical charts to writing discharge summaries. Oh, for those hopeful medical students, they are not even in the food chain, YET.
2. Nurses are the gossip queens. That's what they do during their break time (which seems to go on forever and have several breaks in a period of 3 hours). If you want to know which doctors are having affairs or getting divorces, simply consult them. They will tell you all about it if they decide to like you.
3. Some nurses love to boss around medical students. Ah.. I experienced that first-hand when for the last 2 years. All they want is POWER, and they will make your life like hell. They shoo you away whenever they feel like it and trying to pass the message across: I am doing MY job which is super important and you medical students will only touch my patients when I SAY SO.Arguably, they are at the bottom of the food chain anyway, medical students are the only group they can act like a boss.4. When you are a Trainee Intern, they RESPECT you. I am quite surprise when one of the nurses came up to me asking for MY advice regarding to one of the patients. GEEZ....they even thanked me at times ( which never happened before when I was a medical student). Wow, I like to be the Intern.
5. If you want to be served coffee every morning, wait till you are a consultant and the nurses will dutifully do that. So, say...another 10 years to go.One of the good thing I like about this year:It's good to have the overtly enthusiastic 4th years.(the newbies! Being able to draw blood in a patient will definitely make their day!) They will do ANYTHING you ask them to do ,eg skimming through the big medical files of patients, taking you charts and agree on whatever you said. If being asked a question that you don't know the answer, simply say gracefully :' ah.. That's an excellent question! It's good that you thought about that. Go home and read them up and tell me all about it tomorrow. I will tell you if you are correct.' and walk off confidently. Of course, I will have some read up to do that night.Whenever the consultant asks me shit-I-don't-know-the-freaking-answer questions, I will just turn to the 4th year for an answer expectantly. Of course, I will put on the I-will-let-you-answer-that-simple-question look. See? It's not THAT hard to get yourself out of the shit hole, and still...looking SMART-ASSly good and CONFIDENT.Labels: Responsibilities, Sentiments
* Dreaming is like lollies to the souls_
5:50 AM
