I was on call last night, and saw a lot of patients. I feel like I was in the ER for 30 hours straight! That's a bit of an exaggeration, but not much. Many of the consults were not really very legitimate surgical consults, either - I guess the ER doc just wanted them to go somewhere. So that was a bit frustrating and I was pretty grumpy by the morning, especially when I finally thought I'd finished, and then got paged by the same ER doc at 6 a.m. telling me there were 2 more patients he needed me to see. The nice thing was that almost all the patients I saw were incredibly pleasant, patient, and so grateful for my help (even if I wasn't really helping them much). The lab at the hospital is in the process of changing its system, and our computer system where all the patient information is stored has also recently changed. Let's just say there are a few glitches, such that I want to bang my head against a wall almost every time I'm trying to check a patient's bloodwork results these days. The computer system was NOT designed by anyone who has a clue about clinical medicine, and it is so not user-friendly. I spend about 4 times as long as I used to checking results, etc, just because of the problems with the system. Not only that, but bloodwork that used to take 1 hour to come back often takes 3-5 hours, or longer sometimes, and even if the computer says it's back, we sometimes can't access it and end up having to call the lab. All this makes for much frustration for all of us, including the patients, who have to do a lot of unnecessary waiting in a place where there is already a lot of waiting. A lot of them are grumpy about it, and so am I.
But last night, almost all the patients I saw were understanding, patient, pleasant, and truly grateful for the care they'd received, despite all the glitches. There was one lady in her 70s who waited a long time for her bloodwork, and was just wanting to go home. She was upset about having to wait so long, but instead of complaining, she kept telling me I had a beautiful smile and was very sweet and that I had reassured her and made her feel so much better, and she thanked me again and again for my help.
Another gentleman, also in his 70s, waited 5 extra hours to be discharged because of the lab problems we were having. I had warned him when I saw him in the middle of the night that this might happen, and he just smiled and said that was fine and just to do whatever I needed to do to make sure he was okay. When I finally came and told him he could go home and apologized for the wait, he didn't even complain. He just thanked me very much for looking after him, and then asked if I'd even gone to bed yet (I hadn't). He seemed more concerned about me than about the long wait he'd had. There was another patient who was quite ill, but in the morning when I checked on her, she also asked me if I'd slept at all, and didn't seem bothered by the way things were going for her.
There were a few others, too, who were similar. And even the nurses in the ER, who are usually really grumpy and wanting us to get our patients out of the ER as fast as possible, were very pleasant and understanding. It was quite a night, very unlike most other nights I've had, where people are yelling at me all the time or getting frustrated because of waits.
I'm back to not operating, because my wrist is still a problem. I now have a big ugly splint on it that was custom-made for me, and I'm supposed to wear it for about 3-4 weeks. This was turning into a bit of a problem, because I'm supposed to switch to another placement July 1, which is also going to involve a lot of procedures that I won't be able to do. So I called my program director today and asked her what she suggested. She was very understanding and accommodating, and the plan is that I will spend July working on research, and going to clinics, and then start the next rotation in August instead of July. I'll just make up that extra month later in residency, when I would have taken a research month. So that will work out well, because I'll be able to really rest my wrist without feeling pressure to scope or operate, so that hopefully come August I'll be as good as new. I'll still be on call for Surgery at night time to back up some of the brand new residents who are starting July 1, but I won't be expected to operate. I feel good about that, even though it's too bad this is happening. I thought things were feeling much better last week so I went back to operating, but it was too soon, and I aggravated things again. Now I'll have July to let the inflammation settle, and get some physio to get the strength and flexibility built up, to hopefully prevent future problems with this. Pray! I really can't have this turn into a chronic, ongoing problem. I don't think it will, as long as I take care of it properly up front.
So it's a good thing that I was assigned to do a research presentation in early June, because I now actually have a project to work on in July, and I should be able to make some good headway on it. I was bitter then about having to do scramble to put something together, but I guess it's worked out well. "All things..."
