Friday, May 04, 2007

I Need Another Year

It's already 2:30 am and i just came back from the wards. Just got done intubating a patient who's lying on a folding bed. Despite my petite stature, twas difficult for me to intubate the patient in a kneeling position. Have to assume an "indian sit" so that i could visualize the hole i was about to poke with an endotracheal tube. Great! Just when im fresh from a bath, i have to sit on the ward's filthy floor and be exposed again to whatever droplets or secretions that the patient has.

That was quite a difficult intubation for me. One, the laryngoscope's blade was short. The epiglottis was waving at me from a distance. Second, the patient's folding bed was too low that i have to position myself in a way that i could visualize my field. Third, the patient was combative. She was hypoxemic and restless. I have to use diazepam twice to calm her down. As a consequence, some of her incisors were lost in the process. She kept on biting my blade. Good thing, not my fingers.

So basically, everything that has happened drained my energy. Here i am, already a senior resident, still wide awake, feeling sticky and icky at 3 o'clock in the morning. Nuh-uh! I'm not complaining about my job. I'm used to this kind of life. What im just trying to say here is that, granting the department shall consider this term as my last year, i still havent proven something. I guess i still need another year in order to prove to myself that heck, my resident before was really right.

You see, when i was intern, i was already toxic. My resident would usually leave me at the emergency room and i get to admit patients on my own. Maybe they trusted me enough. Sheesh they just dont know how agonizing that was being left all alone at the ER. On the brighter side, i tend to become more independent and my decision making skill was developed. As a bonus, my resident also gets a good night sleep.

In short, this thing that i wanted to prove before i leave this institution is the fact that when i was an intern, my resident assured me that i too could rest like him when i become a resident. He was just first year then. As for me, after 3 looooong years, the rest that he assured me still didnt happen. To think that im already in my senior year. Darn! Am i just soooo toxic that even in my senior year i still am awake at this wee hour of the morning? Can i just for once experience a straight-flat-on-bed sleep from 12midnight to 7 am on a 24-hour duty? Can I? Puh-leaze...whoever you are who's in control of our admissions?

Goodness! Toxicity has eaten me whole. I need to have my sanity checked. Or maybe sleep's now starting to overpower me. Im outta here!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Cool ka lang. Having quite a few relatives who are in the same field as you are, I fully understand the sacrifice your profession requires of you and the stress that comes along with it. But there's always a reward in the end, the satisfaction that you've saved or extended a life.

Hope you'll have a great and restful weekend, Angel. :-)

AngelMD-No-More said...

i do agree with u snglguy and this is the reason y im staying here...the feeling of being fulfilled after a hard day's work is very much rewarding.=) if i may be ranting in this blog, well, this is wat this blogsite is for..hehe