Weblog » Archives » February 2008

  • Bloody mess

    The attending surgeon motioned me into her office. She was still on the phone."Uh-huh, uh-huh. OK. OK, I'll send my resident down now."She hung up the phone."That was the ER. They think they have a leaking triple-A. Can …

  • Surfer

    As reluctant as I, a native of the Pacific Northwest, might be to admit it, California has rubbed off on me. I've noticed that increasingly the first word of many of my sentences start with either "Dude" or "Babe.""Dude,…

  • Breathe

    It used to be that surgery residents were encouraged, even applauded, for being married to their work. Now no longer. Duty hour regulations and mandatory days off ensure that a resident like myself will have some time aw…

  • Hog and warts, second year

    The one reliably bright spot about working at the military hospital is the pig lab, where a 200 lb neutered hog is anesthetized for the surgical educational benefit of the inexperienced residents at hand.I fondly remembe…

  • Tetris

    It's gotten quieter at the hospital. We had four patients on our list this morning, but two of them were consults that we signed off on today. The third was a patient who was getting placed in a nursing home, and the fou…

  • If I was a car, you could pimp me, and I'd have a TV show

    Wednesdays are education day at the military hospital. This involves three hours of the attending surgeons grilling the residents with "questions that are sure to show up on your oral boards." (This seems to be the commo…

  • Military quotations

    Situation, quotation.While taking out a patient's gallbladder:"What? What are you doing?! Did I tell you put your instrument there? No! Independent thinking is for senior residents. Are you a senior resident?"After accid…

  • Hierarchy

    One of the most memorable and true things an attending (in this case, a medical intensivist) ever told me:"Don't fool yourself. Just because we're not all wearing f***ing stripes and badges on your white coat, don't thin…

  • I hate central lines!

    There are have been some recent complications at my hospital involving central line placement. Serious complications.I hate putting central lines in. Though I've never permanently maimed someone with the gigantic needle …

  • A surgeon's workup

    [This will obviously only make sense to those of you familiar with medicine, but I think it a humorous story anyhow.]We had a patient in the Burn Unit who had (relatively speaking) fairly minor burns (about 20% total bod…

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