I am a pretty shit medical student.

I was on take last night with three other firm mates. Night takes at the free come with more than just running around in the freaky half-lit hospital in the middle of the night doing odd jobs and waking grumpy patients for random things, the highlight (for students) would be the post-take ward round at 5.45am with Dr. Bnn. He, apparently, is legendary. Known as the most politically incorrect, racist, sexist, homophobic, walking better-than-wikipedia person alive, he has a habit of asking the most ridiculous questions to students, and making the most inappropriate comments ever, we hailed him the bayne(n) of our life.

We were given heads up from millions of other students who were previously humiliated, insulted, upset by him to be mentally prepared. In addition, from the moment we arrived in the hospital, doctors of all levels kept telling us not to take anything he says personally, to prepare to be "freshly barbecued" during the ward round and the med reg said she would do all she can to protect us. Man, it was like we were preparing for a battle against space ships when all we had were our bare hands to fight. What on earth did the medical school get us into?!

Ok, the take was eventful with interesting patients and other things happening and stuff but really, we just spent most of our time trying to predict questions we might get asked by Bnn and researching on answers, spreading out our knowledge way beyond the realms of medicine. Actually it was quite fun preparing because general knowledge is always interesting to know. The hours went by, mostly spent running up and down the stairs, interspersed with random breaks filled with junkfood, tea, coke and adrenaline.

The clock struck 5.45am, the legend arrives. Ridiculous questions were asked, each and every single one of us were hurled insults left right and centre. The comments he made were so ridiculous, if you took it seriously, anyone would cry within the first 30seconds of the ward round but it was really too funny, we spent most of it laughing away and I think he got no kick from it. Well done team.

My first question from him was "when did the British leave Singapore". OH, COME ON, give me some credit, I did have 10 years of social studies and "national education". He got bored because I could answer and left me alone for a while. After that, every question he asked me ended with "in Singapore". For example, give me the causes of gynaecomastia IN SINGAPORE. Tell me why women take senna IN SINGAPORE. Everytime he said "in singapore" everyone knew it was my question.

At some point, I was then labelled as "the girl from Singapore (er, not) who cannot reason logically like the British because she's from Singapore". My firm mates were called "an eunuch sitting on the fence with testicles on the line", "brownie, the quiet fat one trying to hide" and "girl" said in the most condescending way ever. Man, it was such a hoot I actually really enjoyed his ward round. It could either be because he was in a good mood and didn't give us such a hard time or that we were so mentally prepared to not take anything he says seriously that his insults just flew over our heads or that we were so charming he just liked us (HAR HAR yar right).

After take, we went to the medical school bar to catch a power nap before heading off for lectures and clinical skills. We finally got out of the hospital at 5pm and felt the fresh breeze in our face after being cooped up in the hospital for 20 hours exact. Now I have 10 hours to recuperate before going back to the battlefield for another day of 9 to 9. Man, you just gotta love the politically incorrect people. They are too funny!

"At the free, everyone is a Wamuo"

-Marc.F.Osterdahl

(eh Marc, didn't Wamuo love you at the whit??)

I haven't quite been blogging about life in clinics of late. I think mainly because I don't quite feel the passion for medicine after I moved out of the whit. There was just something about the hospital's culture that made you feel part of the team and gave you a strange motivation to want to go in for 8am starts willingly and stay till unearthly hours. The free started growing on me after I stopped moping around in social misery and stopped comparing it to the whit (which by the way, is on a completely different league altogether so why compare?).

I just finished my rotation in respiratory medicine. It was really dull for me because most of the patients were too critically ill to speak and those who could speak were on masks, so, well, they couldn't really speak. The one patient who wasn't on a mask basically already spoke to twenty thousand students previously and obviously doesn't want to speak to yet another one which is fair enough. Well, the rotation wasn't all good but it wasn't all bad either. I really loved the registrar and his attitudes with patient care, he helped us tweak our examination skills to make it more comfortable for the patient. I also loved how he basically cuts to the chase and gets people to stop waffling if they were trying to stall for time while answering questions. Absolute brilliance.

I sat in on a general medical clinic today and the clinic was alright, with the usual inability to answer questions and feeling really stupid - what's new. In addition to that, the consultant really threw a fit, screamed and swore on the phone, hung up on the other person, turned to two of us and bitched about the situation. I did not know how to respond so i just sat there (as if he didn't already think i was dumb, now he probably thinks im deaf too) while my partner joined him in bitching! It wasn't a pretty sight. Well, he also duly complained to everyone else who came in through the door about whatever happened, most of whom just gave a mandatory nod and "that's annoying". The worse thing is, my partner left at 3.30 and I was left there to fend for myself all the way till 5pm.

Being stuck in a tiny room with a big (HUGE actually) angry black man, not really my idea of fun.

That aside, it was a good clinic, learnt lots about how little I knew, which is always good motivation to go read up and find out more. I was surprisingly able to churn out the right answers to some questions I didn't even understand which is always a pleasant surprise. Time to go read up and start climbing out of this long overdue sitting in the pit of un-motivation. Now, where are my climbing boots?

EPIPHANY.

what can i say? i guess theroyalfree is growing on me.
Slowly, but surely.

On the 9th of March 2009, my postdoc gave birth to a baby boy, weighing a healthy 3.1kg. Welcome to the world, Alessandro. ((:

it's just one of those days. zzz.

medicgeekland alert: smsl dinner 01032009
please ignore the left side of the pictures lest you get sick of my face.
grand total of 12 pictures taken, question of the day: where's tamara?? -_-

say hello to misery personified.
hello mesery.