supermedstudent

[supermedstudent]

you're the doctor now

The last few months have been a whirlwind: graduating from medical school, packing, leaving S, moving to V, starting residency. I don't feel like I've processed any of it.

I'm on emergency medicine right now. Intern year is no joke, and I'm suffering. My attending on my first day was frustrated by me, I think, and repeatedly told me, "You're the doctor now."

You're the doctor now.

I feel like a fraud. Even the nurses call me Dr. It's a lie. I have no idea what I'm doing. Clearly. Every day is a struggle just to show up, let alone practice medicine. At least I caught an acute L1 fx yesterday, though barely. A stroke of luck that I caught it. I almost missed it, and I hate myself for it.

You're the doctor now.

I feel sick.

[supermedstudent]

why are the scrubs in American hospitals (as I see in tiktok videos lmao) so tight for women? aren't scrubs meant to be kinda gender neutral and comfortable?

[supermedstudent]

this is so true lmaooo

[supermedstudent]

“I am scared of pediatrics. Not because I’m scared of children, but because I haven’t had chicken pox.”

[supermedstudent]

me after 36 hour shifts

I didn't sleep at all but I feel amazing I can feel the dragon energy coursing through my veins

[supermedstudent]

“And, because nothing can ever be simple in medicine, we have this damned thing.”

And remember, as long as QRS is positive in both DI and DII, don’t bother calculating the electrical axis because it’s normal.

[supermedstudent]

everyone stop having covid ✋

[supermedstudent]

If your 90-year-old grandma, who had Alzheimer's disease, cancer, and COPD, got hit by a drunk driver and killed, and some jerk implied that we don't actually have to grieve her loss or reconsider public policy about driving while intoxicated because she had so many preexisting illnesses and was dying anyway, you would probably want to punch that person.

If your 6-year-old child, who was born with a congenital heart defect and had Type 1 diabetes, got salmonella at Applebee's and died, and some jerk implied that we don't actually need to reexamine food safety rules and health codes in restaurants because a healthy adult wouldn't have died of that salmonella infection, you'd probably want to do more than punch that person.

That's what all this talk about comorbidities and COVID sounds like to me. It sounds like a lot of people saying that the lives of all people who are not "healthy" (whatever that means) and who have preexisting conditions, autoimmune diseases, chronic illnesses, disabilities, or just plain advanced age just aren't worth caring about all that much. Sure, it's kind of sad when old people in a nursing home die en masse like they're in Flanders field, but it's not a big enough deal for me to accept even a minor inconvenience to my life, right?

It's disgusting, and I don't know how anyone can consider themselves a good person while also actively promoting or supporting eugenics.

[supermedstudent]

Just got asked if I can take call this weekend. Honeypie. Sweetheart. No.

[supermedstudent]

my patients do really love and trust me . it's such a warm feeling, I'm doing the right thing !! I feel ecstatic

[supermedstudent]

so there are medstudents in our ward! and I'm trying my best to be the cool intern who is friendly but also teaches them well. I want to be like the interns I adored so much when I was a student too

[supermedstudent]

[supermedstudent]

it was kinda funny how we requested a therapist for a neighboring patient was suspected of being traumatised by witnessing the whole thing, I AM the one who brought her to him, yet no look at myself lol.

the good news is that the patient with the pneumothorax was saved (it was actually an hemopneumothorax!! a very scary emergency and we don't have a thoracic surgery unit in our hospital so I spent the whole night securing a place for him on top of strict surveillance etc)

the other day I lost a patient in front of my eyes bc of a, what seems, massive pulmonary embolism. I spent an hour reanimating him, first ten minutes totally on my own with the two nurses. I was the one in charge, the one who decides what to do, and I did. I started the cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the adrenalin injections etc, while scoping the patient. and the ICU residents came by and took over. after nearly an hour, the patient still died anyway. and then the nurse told me it's my turn to go out of the room and announce the news to the family and to collect myself. and I did, as professionally and empathetically as I can. and finally when I reached our room, I bursted out crying and shaking. the adrenalin that filled my body and allowed me to do the cardiac massage for long minutes left me and now I'm a mess, yet I'm not the one that people should care about. and life doesn't stop bc the fucking pager doesn't stop and I have now a young man with a suffocating pneumothorax being admitted, and I am asked to take, again, responsibility and act with a cool head..

[supermedstudent]

“If you’re confused and the patient’s confused, get an EEG”

— Neuro ICU Attending

[supermedstudent]

the other day I lost a patient in front of my eyes bc of a, what seems, massive pulmonary embolism. I spent an hour reanimating him, first ten minutes totally on my own with the two nurses. I was the one in charge, the one who decides what to do, and I did. I started the cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the adrenalin injections etc, while scoping the patient. and the ICU residents came by and took over. after nearly an hour, the patient still died anyway. and then the nurse told me it's my turn to go out of the room and announce the news to the family and to collect myself. and I did, as professionally and empathetically as I can. and finally when I reached our room, I bursted out crying and shaking. the adrenalin that filled my body and allowed me to do the cardiac massage for long minutes left me and now I'm a mess, yet I'm not the one that people should care about. and life doesn't stop bc the fucking pager doesn't stop and I have now a young man with a suffocating pneumothorax being admitted, and I am asked to take, again, responsibility and act with a cool head..

[supermedstudent]

This job is so weird. Yesterday we withdrew care on a patient who’d had a stroke, patted his husband on the shoulder and said “sorry for your loss” as he sobbed, then went right back to the workroom to write notes and listen to a 90s rock playlist. We watched a man die in front of his husband, and it was simultaneously very sad and heavy and also just part of the workday. It’s been difficult for me to explain how dark the hospital is sometimes and how that’s also just daily life there. Sometimes I don’t even realize how much tragedy I’ve been adjacent to till someone not in medicine asks me how my week was and I can’t figure out what to tell them. 

[supermedstudent]

I'm sure there will be gossip about how I'm just a mere intern and yet I'm the first one to ask for a leave. I'm 1000% sure. oh well, everyone got a sick leave, can't help myself that I'm immune to covid so I'll have my free days anyway sorry