Monday, July 19, 2004
Paging Dr White, Paging Dr White... (Back to Square One)
Too tired to write much tonight... I've now completed my very first night on call as a Canadian resident in general surgery. I'll write a bit more tomorrow, but suffice it to say that both I and my patients survived the night, I did a bit of operating and that North American surgery is rather like UK surgery after all.
It's the little differences that are going to take the most getting used to - the instruments having different names, having the scrub nurse 'gown and glove' you, having to take your wedding ring off to operate (really not happy about this one), etc. It turns out that I'm also responsible for providing ward care at the most basic level, prescribing painkillers, sleeping tablets, getting dopey calls all night long, etc. It's a bit like being a houseman all over again and I spent the day feeling a bit like I'd rewinded by 10 years. Then when I was operating, I was often showing the senior resident how to do the procedures, as I'm the Fellow during the day and I'm a good bit more experienced than him. It's all a bit confusing, but I suppose it's a good way to get used to the system 'from the bottom up'. I spent a lot of time in the ER too, assessing various patients, and I can assure you that it's not quite as exciting as it looks on ER on the TV!
Not me
Anyway, I got some sleep, but those 04:30 phone calls really take it out of you, so I'll sign off now and write more tomorrow.
Oh, one more news item - due to an administrative slip-up, at the moment the hospital says we're not going to get paid for doing our on-call, which more or less leaves the overseas fellows without any income!! I don't mind doing on-call, but not if it's a 'freebie'! Hopefully we'll have some good news on this over the next day or two, or else we'll not be doing any on call at all!! Good thing P's got an income, after all!
[Seriously, though, this should be sorted out in a day or two, so don't worry...]
Night all,
J
It's the little differences that are going to take the most getting used to - the instruments having different names, having the scrub nurse 'gown and glove' you, having to take your wedding ring off to operate (really not happy about this one), etc. It turns out that I'm also responsible for providing ward care at the most basic level, prescribing painkillers, sleeping tablets, getting dopey calls all night long, etc. It's a bit like being a houseman all over again and I spent the day feeling a bit like I'd rewinded by 10 years. Then when I was operating, I was often showing the senior resident how to do the procedures, as I'm the Fellow during the day and I'm a good bit more experienced than him. It's all a bit confusing, but I suppose it's a good way to get used to the system 'from the bottom up'. I spent a lot of time in the ER too, assessing various patients, and I can assure you that it's not quite as exciting as it looks on ER on the TV!
Not me
Anyway, I got some sleep, but those 04:30 phone calls really take it out of you, so I'll sign off now and write more tomorrow.
Oh, one more news item - due to an administrative slip-up, at the moment the hospital says we're not going to get paid for doing our on-call, which more or less leaves the overseas fellows without any income!! I don't mind doing on-call, but not if it's a 'freebie'! Hopefully we'll have some good news on this over the next day or two, or else we'll not be doing any on call at all!! Good thing P's got an income, after all!
[Seriously, though, this should be sorted out in a day or two, so don't worry...]
Night all,
J
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