Friday, March 05, 2010

Man, I Love My Job!

Last month, I was stuck in the ICU.

Not that I didn't like it...I just felt really out of my element. People in the ICU are really sick - and unfortunately, lots of them die. I just felt uncomfortable...as if I didn't know what to do for them. In the ER, I can rattle off all the labs, images, and medicines I want for most complaints. But in the ICU, when the patients come up all hooked to ventilators and with multiple different lines running multiple different drips - I'M LOST!

I LOVED all the procedures I got to do though. And when I finally got back to the ER this month, my first central line was no problem.

Waking up every single morning at 5:01am got old too. I kinda like sleeping in sometimes!

But now that I'm back in the ER ER ERRRRR, I'm so much happier! I've decided in my head that I need to take full advantage of being just an intern and do as many procedures on my patients as possible. Even if I don't suspect something in the abdomen, why not roll the harmless ultrasound machine in there and take a look around. What patient doesn't like seeing their own organs on the screen? I know that I would want to know what my kidneys looked like!

And who knows what you'll see? Like the sweet gall stones I found on my patient with abdominal pain...(black area in the middle is the gallbladder....white balls inside are the stones!) I wasn't surprised at all when the official ultrasound came back saying "Cholelithiasis".


Today, I even got to reduce a dislocated jaw!

I work with such great people - and it is so refreshing being back "home".

1 comment:

Unknown said...

This is Hannah Bevills, I am an editor with Hospital.com. We are a medical publication whose focus is geared towards promoting awareness on hospitals, including information, news, and reviews on them. Given the relevance of what you are offering from your site and what our mission is, I feel we may be able to collaborate in some way or another, I look forward to your response regarding the matter. Thanks!

Hannah Bevills
hannah.bevills@gmail.com
Hospital.com