and they say you dont say blog anymore. pero kebs. :p I miss writing :)
It has been 53 days since the start of clerkship this June. 73, to include the 20 days of summer elective and well I am surprised that I have the energy to write and that I am not indulging myself to such sweet slumber which I often do lately with whatever free time I get (considering that I'm in post duty status and will be having duty again tonight).
It's sad how my last entry was almost 4 months ago, saying good bye to ICC. So much has happened since then that it is quite anti-climactic to welcome clerkship since we've been in this routine for quite some time now. But I've always wanted to write and now that I am able to allow myself to open my laptop and let my thoughts flow, I guess it is never too late.
So hello clerkship! We've been together for a few months and it was not easy. Although some would say that we have not reached the hard part yet, since the first three rotations that we had were relatively benign. However, coming from ICC - a year of rest and fun learning plus a stress-free summer elective which taught us ways on how to relax, being a clerk after that, is well, tiring in its purest and simplest sense.
It's tiring but I'm definitely learning a lot about medicine and life in general.
If you want to learn about a different side of medicine, of alternative modalities that you can offer to your future patients to help them, then TradMed is the perfect summer elective to go to. We were introduced to Chinese Medicine, acupuncture, bioenergy healing and all other stuff I once thought were not really legit. Having a first hand experience in all these things, made me believe in them, in one way or another. All my preconceived notions on these alternative modalities were erased, because I was made to understand how they work and why patients want them.
Realization:
Sometimes what the patients need is not the alternative modality per se but the kind of interaction that the alternative physicians do to their patients. Both our mentors in this elective, Dr. Galvez-Tan and Dr. Tan-Gatue really took time to listen to their patients and their worries. It's inspiring, that in fact, it is actually doable and it's amazing how it can actually add a lot of help to patient care.
And then we were welcomed to the real start of school year clerkship with Surgery - a very physically tiring course for 4 weeks where we rotated into the different services of GS1 (head and neck), GS2 (colorectal), GS3 (hepatobiliary) and trauma. It was our first try to being 'SIC's but with a relatively lighter load, the first few weeks of adjusting to the pre-duty, duty, post-duty schedule where the dates or days no longer mattered, as long as you know what post you should be in. And the first time that we actually understood what it meant to be 'post-duty' (nung ICC kasi, lakas namin makagamit ng, 'post duty ako e'. hindi pa pala yun yun :p)
We were also given the chance to be students under the SOD (surgeon on duty) and go to the OR to assist in a variety of operations where we *drumroll* retract.
And well, you see, I have very poor upper extremity strength - make me run for 10k or make me walk long distances but just dont let me lift heavy stuff. Unfortunately, ORs are the opposite of that, you don't run and you don't walk, in fact you just stand but you spend hours in a day or in a night trying to retract body parts to ensure that your surgeon has the best view of whatever they are operating on.
So yes, Surgery is the best rotation to take after a summer of eating and making yourself fat. I think I lost weight during this rotation (I think most clerks did).
Realization:
You are a team, in caring for your patients, everyone is accountable, not just one person. In this rotation, the dynamics of our block was also tested, in terms of 'saluhan' and well basically taking care of each other. :)
Not confident in doing procedures? In Emergency Medicine, you don't have a choice. I was not entirely comfortable in doing procedures (IV insertion, blood extraction, inserting a foley catheter or an NGT) during the surgery rotation but come DEMS, well as I said, I dont have a choice because no one else will do it for me.
No, I am still not that confident (and I dont think I will ever be - because it actually depends on the patient's veins and anatomy in general), but I think after this 2 week rotation I was more decent in terms of procedure outcomes.
And yes it was as tiring and as starving as surgery.
Realization:
The PGH Emergency Room is in such a sad state. And with the new policy of having no more free laboratory tests, things are more well - sad. Being in the ER for 2 weeks straight (and every 3 days during SOD) made me in a sense, desensitized to this kind of sad state (again, sadly). Because if i let myself feel sympathy (for just one second), I'm pretty sure I would shed a tear for all those patients that I saw.
My current rotation, although we will be shifting out on Monday. After 6 intubations and 3 spinal anesthesia inductions, not all of which are successful (goodluck naman), I can say that anesthesiology is a field which is quite taken for granted but something that is very important especially once the patient is on the table.
And although it was initially quite stressful to ensure that we all finish our procedure list, this is the most fun that we had as a sub-block. maybe because most of the time, most of us are always 'sabog' (probably due to the inhaled anesthestics as well :p) Also, tinulog na ata namin dito yung pinuyat namin sa Surgery at sa DEMS at kinain na rin namin yung ginutom namin sa dalawang rotations na nauna. so quits na. :p
Realization:
Monitoring patients, which is basically the bulk of our responsibilities during this amazing year, is actually of utmost importance and something that should never be taken for granted. Pero oo nakakapagod talaga magmonitor.
Sometimes, clerkship makes me forget that I am a medical student, because true enough you have to do a lot of things on top of learning what you should know or what they expect you to know. I always feel inadequate and inefficient in terms of managing my time and my brain cells. And I always get palpitations at the thought that after this year, we will have that Dr. before our names and next year we will be the 'ate' and 'kuya' interns who the clerks will look up to.
Clerkship is making me realize a lot of other things aside from what I wrote here. Too many to place in one blog entry. So maybe some other time. I still have four papers to finish - and I might fall asleep soon. Generally, I am still thankful for all this.
Minsan nakakamiss ang classroom learning, minsan ansarap itanong bakit mo nga ba ginagawa to, at minsan nakakatakot kasi minsan hindi mo na rin masagot yun, kaya itutulog mo na lang kasi usually paggising mo may bagong rason ka ng maiisip. Minsan paggising mo tas wala ka pa ring maisip na rason, hindi mo na lang iisipin. haha. Basta, push lang. Kaya pa, kakayanin. Let's take one day at a time. The best (or worst) is yet to come :) *hingang malalim for the next rotations: MICU-Neuro-IM :p*
It has been 53 days since the start of clerkship this June. 73, to include the 20 days of summer elective and well I am surprised that I have the energy to write and that I am not indulging myself to such sweet slumber which I often do lately with whatever free time I get (considering that I'm in post duty status and will be having duty again tonight).
It's sad how my last entry was almost 4 months ago, saying good bye to ICC. So much has happened since then that it is quite anti-climactic to welcome clerkship since we've been in this routine for quite some time now. But I've always wanted to write and now that I am able to allow myself to open my laptop and let my thoughts flow, I guess it is never too late.
So hello clerkship! We've been together for a few months and it was not easy. Although some would say that we have not reached the hard part yet, since the first three rotations that we had were relatively benign. However, coming from ICC - a year of rest and fun learning plus a stress-free summer elective which taught us ways on how to relax, being a clerk after that, is well, tiring in its purest and simplest sense.
It's tiring but I'm definitely learning a lot about medicine and life in general.
TradMed
If you want to learn about a different side of medicine, of alternative modalities that you can offer to your future patients to help them, then TradMed is the perfect summer elective to go to. We were introduced to Chinese Medicine, acupuncture, bioenergy healing and all other stuff I once thought were not really legit. Having a first hand experience in all these things, made me believe in them, in one way or another. All my preconceived notions on these alternative modalities were erased, because I was made to understand how they work and why patients want them.
Realization:
Sometimes what the patients need is not the alternative modality per se but the kind of interaction that the alternative physicians do to their patients. Both our mentors in this elective, Dr. Galvez-Tan and Dr. Tan-Gatue really took time to listen to their patients and their worries. It's inspiring, that in fact, it is actually doable and it's amazing how it can actually add a lot of help to patient care.
Surgery
And then we were welcomed to the real start of school year clerkship with Surgery - a very physically tiring course for 4 weeks where we rotated into the different services of GS1 (head and neck), GS2 (colorectal), GS3 (hepatobiliary) and trauma. It was our first try to being 'SIC's but with a relatively lighter load, the first few weeks of adjusting to the pre-duty, duty, post-duty schedule where the dates or days no longer mattered, as long as you know what post you should be in. And the first time that we actually understood what it meant to be 'post-duty' (nung ICC kasi, lakas namin makagamit ng, 'post duty ako e'. hindi pa pala yun yun :p)
We were also given the chance to be students under the SOD (surgeon on duty) and go to the OR to assist in a variety of operations where we *drumroll* retract.
And well, you see, I have very poor upper extremity strength - make me run for 10k or make me walk long distances but just dont let me lift heavy stuff. Unfortunately, ORs are the opposite of that, you don't run and you don't walk, in fact you just stand but you spend hours in a day or in a night trying to retract body parts to ensure that your surgeon has the best view of whatever they are operating on.
So yes, Surgery is the best rotation to take after a summer of eating and making yourself fat. I think I lost weight during this rotation (I think most clerks did).
Realization:
You are a team, in caring for your patients, everyone is accountable, not just one person. In this rotation, the dynamics of our block was also tested, in terms of 'saluhan' and well basically taking care of each other. :)
Emergency Medicine
Not confident in doing procedures? In Emergency Medicine, you don't have a choice. I was not entirely comfortable in doing procedures (IV insertion, blood extraction, inserting a foley catheter or an NGT) during the surgery rotation but come DEMS, well as I said, I dont have a choice because no one else will do it for me.
No, I am still not that confident (and I dont think I will ever be - because it actually depends on the patient's veins and anatomy in general), but I think after this 2 week rotation I was more decent in terms of procedure outcomes.
And yes it was as tiring and as starving as surgery.
Realization:
The PGH Emergency Room is in such a sad state. And with the new policy of having no more free laboratory tests, things are more well - sad. Being in the ER for 2 weeks straight (and every 3 days during SOD) made me in a sense, desensitized to this kind of sad state (again, sadly). Because if i let myself feel sympathy (for just one second), I'm pretty sure I would shed a tear for all those patients that I saw.
Anesthesiology
My current rotation, although we will be shifting out on Monday. After 6 intubations and 3 spinal anesthesia inductions, not all of which are successful (goodluck naman), I can say that anesthesiology is a field which is quite taken for granted but something that is very important especially once the patient is on the table.
And although it was initially quite stressful to ensure that we all finish our procedure list, this is the most fun that we had as a sub-block. maybe because most of the time, most of us are always 'sabog' (probably due to the inhaled anesthestics as well :p) Also, tinulog na ata namin dito yung pinuyat namin sa Surgery at sa DEMS at kinain na rin namin yung ginutom namin sa dalawang rotations na nauna. so quits na. :p
Realization:
Monitoring patients, which is basically the bulk of our responsibilities during this amazing year, is actually of utmost importance and something that should never be taken for granted. Pero oo nakakapagod talaga magmonitor.
***
Sometimes, clerkship makes me forget that I am a medical student, because true enough you have to do a lot of things on top of learning what you should know or what they expect you to know. I always feel inadequate and inefficient in terms of managing my time and my brain cells. And I always get palpitations at the thought that after this year, we will have that Dr. before our names and next year we will be the 'ate' and 'kuya' interns who the clerks will look up to.
Clerkship is making me realize a lot of other things aside from what I wrote here. Too many to place in one blog entry. So maybe some other time. I still have four papers to finish - and I might fall asleep soon. Generally, I am still thankful for all this.
Minsan nakakamiss ang classroom learning, minsan ansarap itanong bakit mo nga ba ginagawa to, at minsan nakakatakot kasi minsan hindi mo na rin masagot yun, kaya itutulog mo na lang kasi usually paggising mo may bagong rason ka ng maiisip. Minsan paggising mo tas wala ka pa ring maisip na rason, hindi mo na lang iisipin. haha. Basta, push lang. Kaya pa, kakayanin. Let's take one day at a time. The best (or worst) is yet to come :) *hingang malalim for the next rotations: MICU-Neuro-IM :p*
Hi Anne. Nice to see you blogging again. Keep on writing, I'm reading. :)
ReplyDeletekapag may oras :) thank you!:)
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