Care of the Surgical Patient Week 3

Monday

Was meant to go in for theatre today but ended up missing it due to being in absolute pain with my hip the night before. I got about 3 hours sleep in all and the thought of being in pain and tired all day in surgery did not seem like something I wanted to push myself through.

I decided instead to take the day off and try and give it some rest. Sometimes you just have to know when you are beat.

It ended up working well for me. I got some washing done and caught up on a bit of work, having several naps between it all. I felt bad that I wasn’t in surgery, but I know I would have got there and clock watched all day.

Tuesday

Back up and at it! Kinda. It was a work from home day, and today I got to join a new team for their meeting. As part of JASME I got to step up and be the rep at the EDC which is the Educator Development Committie. Essentially, they are a group that look at evidence based research that supports the developing educator.

I was excited to be part of this as one of my areas of interest with Med Ed is encouraging the use of different technologies when teaching. It is clear that the days of packed (or not so packed) lecture theatres are behind us. It was also nice to see a familiar name. Well, sorta familiar name. I wanted to apply to Leicester when I was 18 and the head of the EDC team is a lecturer at Leicester. His name kept ringing bells and i was FRUSTRATING.

I then had a bowel cancer tutorial at the end of the day which was good although felt a bit disappointing. It was a hybrid teaching session which, just, don’t work. I am also starting to become tired of online teaching. Poor signal makes an hour session last forever, and it’s even easier to monologue for an hour. I appreciate the convenience of it, it just doesn’t work all the time.

In the evening, we had a careers talk about working in New Zealand. It’s always been my dream to go to Australia/ New Zealand, so this was perfect for me. I plan to go during my FY3 year unless I end up taking time out to do a masters. I am not sure where my career path is going, but it’s good to have information now. It was by two Warwick grads, one here in the UK and one still living out there. I can’t picture myself going permanently. I am slowly growing out of the idea of moving back home for long. I want my independence and to live my own life but I don’t want to be half the world away from my family.

Wednesday

Wednesday morning I had my bedside teaching session with my consultant. I was a bit nervous, I knew it would be bowel related, and I was confident in my abdominal examination, but this was surgery. A whole other ball game !

It was actually a really good morning. I did take away a lot and the best thing is we spent a good two hours talking about Australia and New Zealand in a hospital corridor.

Honestly, they’ve matched me with the right consultant.

I was looking forward to the afternoon as we had a suturing workshop. This was the second of my degree and although they are more of a novelty (it’s rare to be asked to do some sutures) they can technically be tested on. However, I enjoy suturing, it’s sorta therapeutic:

This was my attempt at a mattress stitch.

Thursday

Online discussion again. I get online learning for lectures, it works, but I am beginning to hate the discussions being held online. However, I can’t moan, I did this in my socks, with a cuppa tea next to me.

In the afternoon we had our simulation session again. The crutches are beginning to do my head in already, but luckily I found a space next to the building to park, so I only had to hobble a little. I also annoyingly keep arriving stupidly early to these things. I was so organized up till a week ago when I just seemed to lose the plot.

I do like these sessions, though. I like being able to see my group and catch up. Sometimes you just need the reassurance that others are doing the minimum outside of placement too to keep you going!

It’s also the perfect excuse for cake: