I’m totally like…

I remember when first reading The House of God, how present the sex, innuendos and flirtations were on the wards.  Reading it at the time, this kinda struck as me as something that has changed in medicine. My experiences up to that point had been all prim and propper.  Sure there were whispers of fellow med students hooking up with nurses on away rotations,  of residents who hooked up with students in a call room…but these were just stories, rumors, wishful thoughts perhaps. But now, a year into it and almost four months spent in the ICU, there is definitely something to it. The doc is not exactly slipping the panties off Thunder Thighs  in the call room in between codes, as House of God might have you believe, but there is definitely this element of carnality to the whole thing. The basic motivations are definitely in play, especially when in the unit. EAT. SLEEP. VOID, SCREW. Things you’d filter when working somewhere else, tend to make it into the daylight. Everything is made out to be just a little bit dirty.  And there are certainly a few people who are actually getting a little bit dirty. I’m sure with the call rooms right around the corner things have happened.  Some of the nurse are more than happy to volunteer this information too.  It’s probably a defense mechanism of some sort, some way of fighting of all the death and sickness, of feeling alive in a way. Some of the nurses have been at this hospital for the past 30 years, and they tell me what it USED to be like… and in comparison, we’ve in fact come a long way.

I’m totally like…

I’m totally like…

Been squirreled away in the ICU for the past 10 days or so, which leaves little time to post, much less stop and think of something to post about.  A few ideas of things to write about did pop into my head this past week, but I invariably wrote them down on my rounding list, which invariably got thrown out at the end of the day as some cathartic gesture, so instead I am left with a few random thoughts from the past week or so.

• It’s become a bit routine at this point. Those things that used to be terrifying, aren’t so much any more
• Except for heart rhythyms. Espeically the tachy arrhythmias. Just once I might actually like to have a patient with true V tach so I can see it be like, YES there it is Mr. Cardiac Monitor, that is what true V tach looks like, so stop trying to get me all worked up with your fake V Tach alarms in the middle of the night.
• I got a needle stick this week. It was probably both my fault for going to fast and the movement of the patient that combined for the teeny tiny little prick, but mental note made that even though I’m getting good enough to sink a central line in under 10 minutes, go slow on the needle parts.
• People in the ICU have some fairly legit problems in their life. No quite third world problems, but pretty close. Which put things in perspective when a lady in the cafeteria was pitching a fit because the toaster was not toasting both sides of her bread equally. Definitely a first world problem.

They are totally like…

I’m totally like…

I’m totally like…

I’m totally like…

I’m totally like…