Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Last Words(?)

This may be my last post. I'm thinking this because of the following reasons:
  1. What little spare time I have, I should be reading.
  2. The quality of my posts have generally sucked for some time now, and I don't anticipate a reversal in that trend, and
  3. I think writing about every single notable event that happens to me during intern year/residency is a tiresome exercise for both me and what remaining people visit here, anyway1.
Instead, I'll just sum up some things that may have happened in the last month-and-a-half:
  • I moved.
  • I independently made medical decisions.
  • I let the nurse make a decision.
  • I bonded with a patient.
  • I wanted to throw a patient out of the hospital.
  • I saw someone else's patient 'code.'
  • I saw my patient code2.
  • I was the first doctor to the code and hesitated to go in.
  • I was the first doctor to the code and started compressions.
  • I got yelled at by an attending physician.
  • I got yelled at by an attending physician for someone else's error.
  • I carried four pagers at once.
  • I wanted to throw each of them into the Schuylkill River.
  • One day I didn't have time to eat until 9pm.
  • I discovered that dried apricots, mixed nuts, and diet soda make an easy, convenient dinner.
  • I didn't get enough sleep.
  • I did nearly nothing, and my patient loved me.
  • I did everything I could, and my patient hated me.
  • I felt competent.
  • I felt like an idiot.
  • I took a fellow intern out for a drink because he felt worse about internship than I did.
  • I wished someone did the same thing for me a week earlier.
  • Someone lived.
  • Someone died.
In short, life happened. Same as anywhere else.

*******
1 For an accurate depiction of residency life, just watch Scrubs.

2 I think 'code' is one of those words that loses its meaning once you say it enough times. Like 'cow' or 'Bracken.'

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