Monday, January 08, 2007

Inadequate



On the 8th day of my 3rd year as a resident, i still have this feeling of inadequacy. Been telling my seniors before that internal medicine is really not for me for several reasons: 1. textbooks are tranquilizers for me 2. when i was in medschool, i didnt read much...i was wondering how i passed 3. my first love was pediatrics 4. i am toxic...very toxic when it comes to admissions...in short, i definitely dont have the time to read on my cases 5. did i mention that i hate to read textbooks?

In my senior year, i am expected to read. I do read. There really are times that i love to read. I just cant explain though why on the 2nd page of my reading, my eyes start to get heavy until i couldnt keep them from opening. Thus, i could finish one chapter on installment basis. First two pages first then the next pages the other time. In short, even if i read my book, it seems that my knowledge is in installment basis too.

This afternoon, we had our first mortality review. As the ICU resident, my cases were the first that our chairman reviewed. I had two deaths last week...both were acute myocardial infarction. Exaggerating he may be, but he was almost having an infarction while reviewing my charts...so he said. I thought i've done my best to salvage those patients. I thought i was managing them well. Yet, there were loop holes in my management that he was able to discover. He was keen to observe that based from the patient's vital sign sheet, my patient was not improving. Yet during my rounds, my patient was doing well not until a few minutes prior to her demise. It wasnt a sudden death i realized. Only if i was as keen as him in reviewing the patient's vital signs, i could have anticipated her supposed to be untimely death. Tsk tsk...i love mortality reviews!

Really! I love those times when my management are questioned. At least i get to polish them. At least someone looks over my work. What i just dont like with this review though is that someone has to die in order for me to realize our mismanagements. Someone has to die in order me to realize that i really have to read...voraciously read.

I feel so inadequate. I feel that there is a need for me to really study. Now what am doing right now? Alright, time to open my book and start the ball rolling. Goodluck self. Might be in dreamworld in no time.=P

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