Quick Takes

In the spirit of Jen Fulweiler, I will now give you seven mini-posts on the last day of July of my intern year.

Fireworks on Call

My first call was the nights over the Independence Day weekend. It was busy (as one of my upper levels said of me, "She got slammed"), but I had fantastic support from my chief. On July 4 he let the whole team sneak through the attic and onto the roof to watch fireworks. We aren't supposed to leave the hospital, but we crouched on the tarpaper, hiding the lights of our pagers and phones as we watched the magic. They were the most beautiful fireworks I've ever seen, possibly because I was so sleep deprived. While I watched, I remembered choosing a stock image of fireworks to put next to my first ever blog post, when I was given the news that I was going to med school. It's been a long four years since then.

Triage is Stressful

Most of the intern's job is to work Triage, which is like a mini-emergency room attached to Labor and Delivery. There are only six beds in Triage, but you'd be surprised how busy it can still feel, especially with my pager going off and the phones ringing and me not knowing how to prioritize. I make mistakes a lot: misdiagnosing wet mounts, forgetting to print patient's prescriptions, not thinking to collect a certain specimen, not starting IV fluids fast enough, not writing good notes, not writing the appropriate notes, not routing the notes to the right people.... I don't like the regret that comes with these mistakes, but I'm learning quickly and I'm trying to remember to be patient with myself.

First C-Section

I did my first C-section on that call. It took me about an hour. I was only a little nervous, mostly because I was very confident that my chief couldn't let anything go wrong. I'm still in med student mode: I don't take the final responsibility, so I don't need to worry about bad things happening. It went well. The baby was cute and the closure, if you were interested, was lovely.

Nobody Likes My Choices,
But People Still Like Me

So far, I've worked with three very pro-contraceptive attendings during my clinical time. They are three different shades of displeased that I'm not prescribing (one very discrete, one very ruffled), but they have nevertheless treated me like any other resident (except for the ruffledness of the one physician). There's a little bit of ignorance about how NFP works (both how the methods work (never mind how well) and how the system works (e.g. I don't teach the method in one office visit)), but they are still treating me like a person. I admire their ability to separate someone's choices from the person herself.

Catholic Hospital, Promise.

Our hospital looks so Catholic! There's a life-sized statue of our lady with the Infant on L&D. There's an Infant of Prague on antepartum. There's a Sacred Heart in the ICU. There's a chapel with daily Mass (and I've made it half a dozen times!). But earlier this month the ethics committee (which also approves tubals) permitted an elective abortion. In response, I'm joining the ethics committee.

Look, sunlight! I forgot what it
looks like! (Only kidding.)

Project Overload

I'm currently working on two medical device studies (peon on one, PI on the other), a sociological study (peon, de facto PI), a proposal to start a half-day naprotechnology clinic in my residency, a brochure of NFP options in my new area, and two potential studies: one in student and resident mental health, and another in fetal surgery (!). I'm also joining the ethics committee (see above) and trying to be a good resident. I've commissioned two medical illustrations, I've promised my parish priest a talk on NFP to the parishioners, and I've obtained some funding (and nothing else...) for a mini-documentary on interviewing as an NFP only. It's a little too much.

Blogging in Residency

I will have less time to blog during residency, so please expect about one post a month. I'll update you with what happened that month, and perhaps tell a quick story or two. Ethics posts will continue to come as well, and so will advice/materials on how to be a Catholic in today's field of obstetrics and gynecology.