Some of you may be wondering - what does it really mean to be 'on call' in the hospital. Technically it means that you stay over and are available to deal with any crisis that might arise after the 9-5 people have gone home. What it really means - is that you are at the will of your resident/attending. Here's how my day went yesterday:
Case #1:
I go down to emerg to see a new kid who has come in. The nurses give start giving a brief synopsis.
Nurse (to attending): Oh here let me get you some consult sheets so that you can make notes while I tell you this.
Attending: Oh no, give those to Pamela, she will write notes for me.
Nurse: It must be nice to have minions!
Attending: She prefers the term 'scut worker' hahahah
Pamela: *sigh and hang my head*
Example #2:
Pediatrics teams get paged for any births on labour and delivery where they are worried about the baby. Basically the obstetrician needs to deal with mom, so someone else needs to deal with baby. At 4pm I got paged to attend a birth because the baby was being delivered by vacuum. (Side note on vacuum delivery - ew ew ew, oh dear god, ew. I will pray every night that I never have to have a child pulled from my vagina in that manner. I can't imagine how things ever go back to normal after that!) So I do my usual sprint across the hospital, almost cheerful because the residents are away today so it will be just me and my attending and I will get to be hands-on. Not so. My attending was somehow NOT paged. I was not just hands-on - I was THE hands. ACK! Not cool. Thankfully neonatal nurses know more than me, and the baby was fine....but I think I may have about 20 new grey hairs after that 15 minutes of work.
Example #3:
The pediatrician oncall yesterday was a happy-go-lucky joking kind of guy, so as he was trying to fill out the paperwork after one particular birth I joked that it had been so long since he'd done his own paperwork that he couldn't find the forms......guess who did the paperwork for the rest of the day as punishment? Apparently my mom was right - my smart mouth CAN get me into trouble :P Ok, so not real trouble, just joking trouble, but still.
Example #4:
When babies are born there is a certain smell. I'm not really sure how to describe it...its kind of gross and itseems to stick to your clothes. Yesterday I also learned that sometimes when there is an infection in the uterus the baby smells BAD. Like I'm talking - makes you want to vomit - kind of bad. How did I learn this? Well, a baby came out, all covered in green/brown disgusting ooze, and smelled like nothing I have ever smelled before (and let's keep in mind I have worked on farms and I have been known to let dishes get moldy in the sink...and this was a million times worse). To which my attending said - you know what Pamela, you take the lead on this baby and work on it yourself. Thanks. I can see right through you and your evil ways...you just don't want to touch the nasty brown goo or have to stand directly over the baby to ventilate it. Double thanks.
Example #5:
A page came through at midnight (waking me up from my long awaited nap after running for deliveries all evening) to go to emerg and see an interesting consult. When I arrived I discovered that I wasn't actually going to interview or examine the patient, my attending woke me up because he thought I would like to see this neat rash. Ok...valid point...interesting findings are always good to see....however after standing around and discussing it for an hour (an hour out of my precious sleeping time) the doctor says - oh you know what, I'm keeping this kid overnight, I guess I could have showed you all this in the morning. Did you want to go back to bed?.....GAH!
Totals for the day were as follows:
Deliveries: 6
Consults in emerg: 1
Hours of sleep: 5
Number of pieces of clothing that have someone else's blood on them: 1
Times I almost vomitted: 3
Times I had to look away to avoid vomitting: 5
Dads who jumped up and down with excitment and cried: 2
Times I washed my hands: too many to count
Times I thanked God for nurses: 50
Number of children I used to dream about having someday: 3
Current number of children I would like to personally birth after seeing all those deliveries yesterday: : I hear adoption is nice!
Lots of love
Pamela
Currently Reading: my 'to do' list, which seems to grow exponentially every day
Currently listening to: Black Eyed Peas
Currently avoiding: cleaning my apartment...I don't even know where to start with this mess. Why is it that magic fairies don't come in and clean it while I'm on call?? I feel like that would be a fair trade for spending 30 hours straight in the hospital.
Countdown to Vegas: 21 days!
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