I knew it was going to be a struggle when she said "so you don't suction them before drying them out, then?"
[trying to upload a few things to my 'eportfolio' but it's painfully slow, so blogging at the same time to alleviate my boredom]
Any final year medical student worth their salt should know that resuscitating a newborn baby begins with drying them out with a warm towel - because that's most often all it takes to stimulate breathing and crying. Most newborns can clear a few hundred mililitres of fluid from their lungs in a matter of minutes. And drying them out so they keep warm will keep the lung surfactant working.
Yesterday was a complete nightmare. Having spent the whole of Saturday in super-patient mode with a brand new SHO (comforting myself with the hope that Sunday would be better), I then get a different, totally new person on Sunday. Even worse, she's never put an IV line in a child before, EVER, and knows less than a medical student about how to resuscitate a baby. So I end up doing everything (and I mean EVERY SINGLE THING) myself. For 12 hours. And because I'm painfully aware that I'm meant to be teaching her, I page her and wait for her to swan in to observe what I am doing before I start each task, slowing things down even more. So over the course of the day, I did all the IV lines, all the blood samples, saw all the babies on post-natal ward the midwives were worried about (including admitting and performing a lumbar puncture on one who was septic and comforting its tearful mum), attended all the deliveries on labour ward requiring a 'paediatric' presence, took referrals from community midwives, did all the 'jobs' on Special Care, and kept track of (or tried my best to keep track of) the 2 Intensive Care babies. Lunch didn't happen (I didn't expect it to). There weren't even any horrid cheap chocolates from well-meaning relatives on the nurses' station to keep me going. I drank so little fluid that it didn't matter that there wasn't any time to go to the loo. By the end of the shift I was a complete wreck (but just about managed not to show it). Then She left before I did, which I think is just rude. This is why I'm often grumpy and impatient when I get home.
I was so tired that I slept until noon today. And I'm on call again tonight, with another brand new junior. I don't expect them to be 'good' at the job by any means, but it would just be nice if the inexperience was tempered with some enthusiasm. It just becomes a bit ridiculous when I not only have to perform the task they are unable to do, but they can't even be bothered to come and watch and learn.
Monday, December 08, 2008
hopeless junior docs
Posted by cirrus29 at 2:51 pm
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1 comments:
We are watching a Korean Doctor TV-dramma, I feel and think that you are to great extent, similar to this doctor, who won the respect and admirations from the people around him.
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