night and day

February 8, 2010

up & at ’em!
well, good morning! 5:36 AM looks so different from today’s standpoint: the beginning of a new day rather than the end of a call night. just 24 hours ago, i was working on admitting yet another RSV baby in the emergency department, and now i’m sitting in my kitchen drinking coffee as if i’m a rested morning person.

fake it ’til you make it, right?

the good news (very good!!) is that i’m done with overnight call until may! i do have one NICU moonlighting shift (for camera and anthro $$) and various and sundry emergency department shifts in march/april, but both are very different (and much preferable) to spending every other night in the hospital.

so, yay! i think it will take a couple of days to get back into my regular early-to-bed/early-to-rise schedule, but my body will sure be grateful to get back into the rhythm of actually going to sleep on a regular, nightly basis. oh, the things we take for granted . . .

recommitting to education
you may (or may not) have noticed that i have been seriously slacking in the reading/studying department. le sigh. i think night float just got the best of me by the end! fortunately, my schedule is about to become more reading-friendly, and i am going to have the opportunity to do more teaching in the next couple of weeks.

because i think i need some accountability (and concrete-ness) for this effort, i’ll just put it right here: my goal is to read at least something for 12 out of the next 14 days, and to incorporate a daily mini-teaching-session for my med student (and interns if possible) every weekday that it is feasible over the next 2 weeks.

feel free to virtually wrist-slap me over the internet if i don’t do this. seriously.

Q&A of the day
i like this one! and, just so you know, you can still submit to the anonymous portal. i’ve loved getting to see what everyone has been curious about!

“i’ve always wondered . . .as a doctor, is it weird to see patients who are naked or are you completely desensitized to that kind of thing?”

so — the thing is, i’m in pediatrics. therefore, a lot of the patients i examine are just babies and kids, and that’s certainly not awkward at all — it’s just challenging in that you have to employ lots of tricks to allow for a decent exam (ie, prevent them from crying/freaking out).

of course, there are adolescent patients where the vibe changes. instead of distraction techniques (it’s amazing how enthralled a 9-month-old can be with something like my picture ID!), it’s all about explaining what i am doing and why. for example, doing a breast exam on a teen is much less awkward if you are showing them how to do a self-exam while you are doing it.

i will say that i am desensitized to all of the patients i see (i would feel TOTALLY WEIRD seeing an older person, though!). that said, it’s still completely awkward and un-fun for me to examine adolescent males — not really because of any anxiety on my behalf, but because i can FEEL theirs! i think that once i’m doing it more frequently (and in the endocrine world, i will be!) it will become less torturous.

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2.7.10

workout report:
saturday — 12 mile long run with 4 mile tempo segment — which went very well! this was done on relatively hilly terrain in CH. splits:
miles 1-4: 9:03, 8:28, 8:48, 8:34
miles 5-8: (tempo) 8:13, 8:02, 8:06, 7:56(!)
miles 9-12: 8:50, 8:44, 8:45, 8:31

sunday — 4 miles recovery on the TM (0.5% incline, 9:13/mi pace) + weights
– 2 x 12 pushups
– 2 x 12 squats with tricep press
– 2 x 12 bicep curls (12 lbs)
– 2 x 12 walking double lunges (8 lb weights)
– 2 x 12 seated rows (40 lbs)
– 2 x 15 ball roll-to-tucks

return of the laptop lunch
plain yogurt, kiwi, snap peas, walnuts, and some seeded flatbread
reading: none. but this is hopefully the last time i will have to say this for a while!

2 Comments

  • Reply Chelsea March 10, 2019 at 7:26 pm

    Yay for being done with overnight call. I&#39m sure making $$$ moonlighting makes it a little less painful than a regular shift.

  • Reply BroccoliHut March 10, 2019 at 7:26 pm

    Whoa–you&#39re a laptop lunch fan too?? I may or may not have been part of a LLB flickr group pre-blog days…

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