Day 9: Round and Round We Go

I've been looking forward to this day since I've seen my shadowing schedule! Internal medicine seems interesting to me as the residence and their attending don't sit still, hopping from patient to patient from floor to floor. They visit ICU and vascular therapy rooms all in one morning and it seems to go by in a blur. Even though I don't understand what Dr. Jim Johnson (the attending an specialist in infectious disease) is saying with the short and quick medical jargon I still write it down and try to make sense of it. The resident that I've been assigned, Rachel Quaney, is very smart and patient as she answers my questions about what a CVP (central venous pressure), lasics (diuretics), peripheral IV problems, and many more are. I enjoy hearing her story of how she came out here to hopefully get a fellowship for pulmonary care after she finishes her residency. There's so much studying to do to become a doctor especially if you want to specialize! As we do the rounds we get to see the ethics team at work on a especially difficult case and Dr. Johonson use an interpreter to talk to a patient to explain her liver and diabetic situation. I stay far away from the MRSA patient rooms as possibly, especially after the lecture form infectious disease prevention.

However fun the morning is its very short. After we finish the rounds with Dr. Johnson and the other residents, Rachel tells me that Im free to go for the afternoon since all she has is paperwork and nothing else to really show us. I really enjoy the shadowing that we get to do but at the same time it makes me keep changing what I potentially want to specialize in later on. Theres too many interesting things to choose from!!

#MedExTierII