Bones and groans

Well I had a long rant yesterday that is Saved As Draft, and there shall it remain. Long story short: morning spent wrangling with bureaucracy. Brief period of awesome when I finally got things sorted and was introduced to ED (English speaking! program for international students! assigned to people who are keen to teach!). Invited to "dinner" by a young gentleman - actually lunch at about 10.30 in the morning. Nerdy, nice, semi-weird (check check check) but alas, a foot shorter than me. Then I was hauled off by Mr Ortho to see hand surgery. Ok, so seeing a thumb COMPLETELY SEVERED cleanly like an anatomical diagram, with the loose bit covered in ants, was pretty cool/gross. And the patient semi waking up mid-surgery was...interesting. But most of the SIX HOURS was watching someone poke at something invisible with something invisible - microsurgery. And then the rest of the night was also spent in ortho feeling like a useless sack because I can't for the life of me understand mask-muffled franglovietnamese instructions. Didn't help that the flipside of Mr Ortho's Alpha qualities (decisiveness, vigour) is impatient assholicness that rears its fugly head in theatre. At the end - 11pm, because I was going to stay with him on 24 hour call but threw in the towel - he said "the best thing I've seen you do all day is holding legs". A job a block of wood can do! Could've been more useful with a five minute tutorial on what's expected of me and what the bits and pieces are called, but no, I'm sure letting people know they're tards is a better way of getting things done. Well screw you, Mr Ortho, and screw your specialty. It's a waste of intelligence - glorified carpentry. After something like twelve hours, I'd be happy never to see any ortho surgery again in my life. I came home pissed off and depressed.

Did I say short? Heh. Still had some rant left in me.

However, today was fantastico. Worked the 2.30-9pm shift in ED, which meant yay extra sleep! But really, I heart ED. Instead of cursing my lack of Viet abilities, for once I was glad of what little I have, as I was able to take pretty decent histories. Really don't know how international students cope here, when history is like 80% of diagnosis, and so much learning requires explanation. (Not to discourage anyone who's planning to come here! depends on the program, staff and department I guess). I got to do a few procedures like blood-taking, IV cannulation (1/2 tries - better than my 1/6 record in Armi) and suturing, which is always funzies. And saw stuff like a pneumothorax, CPR, CVP measuring, emergency intubation, acute glaucoma and paraquat poisoning. ED is where the medicine is: a bit of everything, fresh patients, mysteries to figure out. A thrillion times better than bones bones bones!