Medical Intensive Care Unit, Day 1

It's roughly three weeks until Match Day. Three months until graduation. Senioritis has infected most, if not all, of my classmates. This late into the academic year, we're coasting, treading water in the easiest rotations possible, like Radiology, Ophthalmology, or Surgical Nutrition, which is like the medical school equivalent of Golf Course Management.

Not me, though. In my infinite wisdom, which knows no bounds (hence the descriptor "infinite"), I've chosen to do a rotation in the Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU). This seemed like such good advice - one of my interns during my medicine clerkship was full of it - good advice, that is.

From Rahul's Words of Wisdom:

You should do a rotation in the MICU. You know, like, to get a good gestalt of the thing.

Now, with the light at the end of the tunnel approaching quickly, this seems like a poor idea. One of the second-year residents at computer orientation asks me what rotation I'm doing. When I tell her, her eyes bug out - "You're crazy" she says, matter-of-factly. I fear I may be unhappy this month.

I trudge over to the MICU, where the team is already rounding on the patients. One of the first questions the resident asks me is: "How often do you want to take call?" My subconscious is screaming: "NEVER!!! Run away! RUN AWAY!!!" Still, it's a month when I'm going to be very busy, learning to take care of the sickest of the sick. The illest of the ill. At the very least, it should distract my mind from counting down the days to Match Day.

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What I'm listening to right now: Koyaanisqatsi, Philip Glass