AC1 – Week 3

Monday

Into the big wide world! It feels weird not being in lectures on Mondays, I
am so used to dragging myself out of bed to go to 9am’s and now it is
completely different. Well, not so different, I am still up ridiculously early
to catch the bus to get to hospital for 8:30am, so I guess some things stay the
same!

I got to hospital for my first CLO. These are clinical learning opportunities
where we shadow anyone but doctors in the hospital. Today I had the REACT team.
It was slightly different to what I was expecting, well, a LOT different to
what I was expecting but I ended up loving it anyway. REACT is a team at UH
which prepares elderly patients for transfer back home and suggests any
adaptions they may need. I ended up hanging around in ED and went to see a patient
being screened to go home. It was interesting to see how patients are assessed
and the gentleman we were talking to was lovely.

After, my tutor had to go and make a call, so I ended up just waiting. I
wanted to be pro-active, so I ended up popping back into the gentleman’s room
to listen to his chest as he had an infection and I wanted to hear what that
sounded like.

After, my tutor suggested I go and see a patient with Parkinson’s who had significantly
deteriorated and was severely ill. I went into the room and instead of throwing
21 questions at the wife, I ended up just helping her care for her husband by
helping her clean her husband’s beard from custard. The wife looked exhausted
and my first instinct is tea, tea solves everything. I dashed off to make her
some, so I now know where the tea station is in ED (which I believe will come in
handy) and when I came back, she was alone. I asked if she had had anything to
eat and managed to find her some (very dry, very crumbly toast). I went to sit
with her just to offer some comfort, but I was whisked away by my supervisor, I
hope I helped her a little though!

In the afternoon I was convinced I had bedside teaching, so I went to sign in
but couldn’t find my name. Turns out, I was meant to be in clinical skills
teaching learning how to take blood, starting 10 minutes ago. I raced up to the
third floor and collapsed into a chair. Learning to take blood felt amazing, it
really feels like a step up from first year, and I am hoping that I will now be
more useful on the wards than before. It’s weird, I’ve finally learned the
technique I’ve been wanting to learn since day one, but it’s not been the best
part of my day. I still wonder what happened to the lady whom I met in the
morning, and just getting her a cup of tea reminded me why I want to keep going
with my medical degree and why I became a walking textbook in first year.

In the evening Will came around to celebrate him passing his second-year
exams and the two of us managed to successfully cook a damn good dinner!

Tuesday

First day in Uni with the Freshers. I’m not going to lie. I am an over
excited puppy, so I was excited to get to the med school, but I was also aware
of the mountain of work I currently have brewing. We had our CBL finish in the
morning and then I decided that I would try to get some work done before
afternoon lectures. I ended up just basically distracting myself for an hour
and doing 10 minutes of actual work.

In the afternoon we had a lecture on cannulation and the anatomy behind the
technique. This was slightly weird as with the first years now here, we got
kicked out of our MTC, and we are now in the MSB, haven’t figured out if I am
pleased or not about that yet!

In the evening I FINALLY had my first SSC1 session. I am doing Middlemarch –
Medical Humanities. The book was written by George Elliott, of whom one of our
teaching hospitals is named after. The module focuses on Humanities in Medicine
which is a nice break from the pace of normal lectures. I have several ideas of
what to do, so I am excited to start putting them into place.

In the evening I finally got to meet my amazing medic kids. I am married to
Kat, a fellow Neuro in my year, and we have two kids who are Neuro inclined 😀
It was lovely meeting them and it was our daughters birthday so naturally I had
to embarrass her in front of everyone there by getting her a cake and singing
happy birthday at the top of my lungs, what can I say, I am OWNING this embarrassing
parent lark :D.

I also got to meet some other freshers and chat to them how their week is
going, everyone seems lovely and I even got recognized for my blog a few times
which felt really humbling. I’m glad I’ve helped others get to where I am!

I got home late and basically collapsed on the bed and was knocked out to
the world.

Wednesday

Pretty standard day, we had a 9am lecture on UTI and then a two-hour lecture
on Delirium and Confusion… which left us all confused. It was a Neuro lecture
so I should have loved it, but I am dreading typing that lecture up!

We then had some free time (sorry to rub it in first years) so I spent the
afternoon making rather fetching brain hats and a game to win a cuddly neuron
for fresher’s fair that evening. There was glue and Sellotape everywhere, but I
was pleased with the result and even my anatomy professor loved them!

We had freshers fair in the evening which was brilliant. We got a lot of
sign ups and I am pleased to say that the “pairs” game I had made
brought out the competitive med student in everyone. I was exhausted by the end
though, so I made it back and again collapsed into bed. The plan is to sell
more raffle tickets next week so Freshers, come and get your soaps!

Thursday

We had a Neuroimaging 9am lecture so of course I was excited. Radiology is beginning
to become a speciality I am really intrigued by especially the Interventional
side as it means we can fix patients problems without having to operate. I’ve
got the contact for a Radiologist at UH so I am going to email to see if I can
find out more.

After our morning lectures had finished, I spent the rest of the day
following Matt around as he took photos for his Med Project. He is going to
take photos of first years throughout their journey at medical school and see
how they change and how their perspectives differ throughout the year.
Considering Matt is normally behind the lens, he normally does not have many
photos of him (despite his cannula porn type arms see the image below)
so I used my limited photography skills to take some photos of him taking photos!
We also ended up in my Anatomy lecturer’s office doing a mini photo shoot and
got talking to her about teaching as I really want to build up my portfolio.

She also has an incredible book called “The Secret Language of
Anatomy” of which I believe my medic dad will love and I certainly do. It
is a book that tells you the origins of certain anatomical names of the body, I sadly geeked waaay too much over it.

 

Friday

This is what I have been waiting for, a day off!! I let myself sleep in until I naturally woke up, well, until a couple of my freshers rang my door bell.

I had a slow morning, sorting out the To-Do list and eating a perfect sausage sandwich, of which knowing that fact has greatly improved your lives :,)

I basically spent the day catching up on lectures and had to head to Tesco to grab a new flask as mine was taken over move in weekend. Turns out this new flask leaks more than an old tin roof. In the evening I went climbing with Matt and got signed off ! I now feel like a grown up on the climbing wall 😀