Adventures in Surgery

Who knows?  Maybe I want to be a surgeon!  I am having so much fun on my surgery rotation!  Pardon me if somethings appear vague from here on out but I am trying to be very aware of HIPAA laws.  My first week with surgery was very intense.  My attending certainly kept me busy.  The very first day he had me as first assist in surgery with him.  Gallbladders, hernia repairs, and small bowel resections filled my day.  My first day was actually the easiest.  My attending never left my side, which was a drastic change the rest of the week went he sent me to accomplish tasks by myself.  I left the hospital at 8pm with two chapters of reading to complete and three surgeries to prepare for in the morning.

The rest of the that first week was crazy!  I logged 95 hours at the hospital.  My days became routine: I would get up around 5 am and get to the hospital by 5:30 to round on 8-12 patients by myself.  Rounding involves looking up all patient info for the past 24 hours.  You check the labs that were run that morning, any imaging or pathology reports that are in.  You check the vitals and the intake and output.  You talk to the nurses to see what kind of night the patient had.  Then you actually see the patient and do your exam.  The exam always includes looking at the incision for signs of infection.  I had one patient accuse me of just admiring my handy work (which I was while checking  for infection).  You answer their questions and tell them you will pass on everything they tell you on to your attending.  Then you get on the computer to right your note about your encounter with the patient.  All this is done with each patient before 8am.  At 8, I would meet up with my attending for our first surgery.  I absolutely love surgery!  Guts are just so cool!  And my attending lets me suture and cut and cauterize and staple.  

In between surgeries you talk to family members and write orders and chart the procedure.  You also run up to the floors to round for a second time with your attending.  He then reviews the notes I hopefully got done that morning and signs off on them.  Then back to the OR for the next surgery.  There are no breaks; I've learned to eat when I can as quick as I can.  My attending is also a machine who doesn't need sleep.  I think he personally enjoys going into a surgery at 9pm.  Then after stumbling out of the hospital at midnight, I go home to fall into bed only to get up 4-5 hours later to do it all over again.  

It's busy, but I wouldn't change it all!  My attending was actually out of town this past week so I worked with other surgeons.  I got to join ortho for a day.  They let me drill into the bone.  It was awesome!  And I spent a day with anesthesiology where I got to intubate patients!  Last night I was on call and got an appendectomy at 9pm.  Well the attending let me start and finish the procedure since we weren't on any time limit.  It was so amazing!  Anyway, I am having a lot of fun and working hard.  I'll try to update you all again soon :)