Briefing



Oh I miss my nephews already

Day one in campus after a week at home.  Exams are in 2 weeks. This week we have set of lectures about legal medicine( aka forensic medicine).  I really feel blue & just think I need and pull myself and go for a run. Oh God can I quit life!

I guess I'll do some aerobics in my room, then will revise today's note, prepare for tomorrow  ( 5 articles hmm I may skip them  & do some ophthalmology.)

So grumpy & have no one to talk too.

Anesthesia

My surgical placement is over. So is the passive aggressive attitude of surgeons.  We got to spend some time with anesthetist as well. Did a load of  intubations.  It is fascinating how people willingly put their lives ( literally) at stranger s' hands (C'mon your medical team is).

      At the induction of general anesthesia, you receive muscle relaxant that paralyzed all your skeletal muscles, including the diaphragm. You stop breathing for a while until the anesthetist intubate you and connect your lung to a machine that breath for you.  It is scary. Especially if you are the one who intubate.  Then what if you paralyzed the patient but the pain medication you gave is not sufficient, and he could feel the surgeon cutting his abdomen open and can't complain. Yes, the patient will be monitored. Any raise in his blood pressure or heart rate upon inducing a painful stimuli will be taken as a sign of pain & fast acting analgesic will be administered .  But the fear, of causing harm … at every stage of anesthesia. I can't help but admire those fighters, who in addition to their critical task, have to endure arrogant surgeons. 

It  made me think, about those who work sincerely and are sure the credits will go to someone else.

Oh anesthesia, I enjoyed you so much.

3 weeks to final.  A year and half work to be examined. Family medicine, pediatric, internal medicine, general surgery , ortho, anesthesia, genetic, microbiology, forensic, …. How to re read tons of information.

Can I sleep and woke up to find them over.

Surgery

I wrote these 2 posts a while ago but couldn't publish them.

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Just finished surgery. It was not that fun , with the resident, SHO, and aspiring interns fighting to scrubs in and do all the doable. We were left to re-clerking and examining. But no real hands on!  Shoot me now. I don't know how I feel about surgery. I know it was less stressful in term of the amount of information you need to know.  But I left wondering  why I choose medicine as a career? It is rarely rewarding. It is draining.

For the majority of the past 2 months I was feeling " unconnected".

I really need friends to chat with

I need to exercise

To do list

Sleep properly

Study

Read outside blogosphere

Study more

Spend some random time in the hospital

Do some aerobic

Buy some clothes ( the current ones stink before I put them on).

 

Holidays

Hi,

It has been a while. Thanks to the refreshing  Eid holiday I am back. (uhmm  let's pretend someone will read this).  

I am sure most people know about Christmas at least from movies. So I thought  to give you a glimpse about Eid.

Eid might be the  Islamic equivalent for Christmas. Basically lots of family gathering an visit exchanges. It can get crazy. Hardly an hour pass without the door ringing.  People usually stay for few minutes for the "Eid greetings"  and then go ahead rotating between acquaintance .

My favorite part is food. There is plenty of it. I think the sweet I ate in the 3 days  of Eid holiday is more than what I ate the whole year. Yummy

Also, there is a special prayer in the Eid morning. Then there is a ritual of sloughing a sheep ,usually, as memorial for prophet Abraham sacrifices. At least 1/3 ( I think) of the meat should be presented to the poor.  The rest can be used for  barbecues/other dishes and shared with relatives. I am a vegetarian so I skip this part.

Ohh and children  dress in new clothes and go knocking doors and people give them sweets or money .  ( Like in Halloween, but with less scary theme).

I know I am not a child but I am happy to say I received gifts and money, too.  Yahoooooooo

O and we are blessed  with two newborns in the family.  

*** I guess writing about happy times makes me happy. I started writing initially by stating the series of unfortunate events that made me think my life was dull and depressing. I am counting my blessing right now. 

Death in the family

What else to say

Evidence based medicine ( try not yawn)

This whole week we have been through practical/statistical way to appraise any given research paper. Say, your patient came asking about the risk of drinking coffee and developing high blood pressure or wearing white clothes and getting hit by a lightening or even using aspirin to reduce heart attack risks. It turn out you don't accept any research paper. Even if it was a review comparing many published papers and drawing conclusion from them (meta analysis). You first appraise that paper, to check its quality and validity and obviously applicability to your particular patient. There are many formulas and such. My point: Evidence based medicine is intended to tailor each patient clinical encounter.

If you still awake, I felt a shamed that after all these year in college I still have no published research. I don't know if that even matters to me. But I feel sad and old. And like a spoiled babe, I need a research right now. But I am not good in working with ..um doctors!

End of year exam is nearby, maybe I want an excuse to not study, Hey, and so is my elective. Hooray!

Oh and I can use some friends, with chocolate and aerobic exercise. Yah, didn't make sense to me either. I need to sleep. But first aerobics, appraise a study with a colleague for tomorrow's presentation and then ... study some more! College life rocks!

 

 

 

 

Lectures

In high school I learnt a funny trick to avoid literally falling a sleep in a boring lecture. It consist of raising your hand and coming up with a question related to the topic title. Piece of cake with whiteboards. Not so easy in a  series of  powerpoint lectures. Let's say I made the whole class confused today. I am pretty sure the tutor thought me asking him was part of day dreaming. Hey even maybe a stroke. He asked me to read the next slide, maybe to assess my mental state.
I have no idea what I said. But from my classmates reaction, it sounded genius.

Good news, I stayed awake for the rest of day.