There is no way, that I could have imagine that I could become like what I am today when I was a medical student.

LOL

Don’t know it is something good worth celebrating or something bad worth pondering upon.

Anyway, it’s Saturday and I’m home =)

Richard Long (Ah Long) ganti me for one day. And I’m going to do back the favor for him tomorrow so that he could go to church. So nice of me right.

Anyway, getting home for the first time since work, is nice. Even thou I woke up early as if I’m going to hospital, I get to spend the breakfast on the table with my parents and ah ma. That’s what I call family.

Woohoo..

Once in a while it is ok. I think parents need to be pampered, like you can belanja them eat pizza hut, which I’m going to do later. LOL. Initially thought of Sushi King, which no doubt would burn a hole in my already small pocket but nevermind la, pizza hut is better. And gotta give pocket money to grandma, cos she always give me pocket money when I was not working.

Told my bro to wash my car. And it ended up like a disaster that I gotta go do the job myself. LOL.

Going back to Malacca by evening :)

One day trip home. No pictures.. Hopefully I can get some later. Wakaka.

-Updated pics-

BBQ honey chicken wings.

Same old garlic bread.

I think for the first time mum tries something new.

I think it is not bad.

The Queen.

The new tagger walked pass and told me that she thinks somebody just collapsed.

Me being me, all gan jeong and all, went to find out properly. The woman was there lying on the bed, static, in a very weird look, mouth half open, eyes staring blindly up. My fren was clerking her. He said that she just suddenly became like that. GCS full to GCS not more than 4, in less than a minute.

Crazy.

Checked pulse.

At first nothing.

Then there was something.

Ok.

Tried waking her up, or making her to look at me.

Unresponsive.

Tried harder.

Same. Unresponsive.

Eyes open upon call. But no verbal sound or motor movements.

Next thing to do? GM stat. Turned out 6.7.

BP 170/100

SPO2 100 under RA.

Came in with hypertensive emergency.

First thought. CVA?

What to do next?

Told another HO, named her as S, to inform MO. Sudden drop of GCS what..

And this is what she told the MO over the phone. “Doctor, patient’s GCS suddenly drop, please come and see her. Dr. Ng is attending to her now.”

WALAO.

Din inform any premorbid, no history, no info at all, and call the MO to come. Siao. Mau kena extend ka?

I found out later that was what she told. I don’t know I should laf or cry.

She makes me sounded like I’m some MO like that. -__-’

Well, what happened next, patient regain consciousness after 5 minutes. Back to GCS full. But have retrograde amnesia.

Absence seizure?

She can’t remember my friend who was clerking her just a moment ago.

And I called the MO personally this time. Explained that I’m not any MO but a HO who previously oncall with her before. Luckily she is one of the nicest MO that I know. But end up kena goreng a bit also, for making somebody calling her blindly like that.

How I know, I thought she was sensible enuf to know how to ‘inform’ an MO mar.

And she seriously made Dr. Ng sounded like some MO lah. Gila laa.. sedangkan I’m just 1 month plus into this job.

Later on another friend shared a similar story, when a fellow new HO asked him for some advice on managing a patient, which he explained and later on found out that the new HO documented it down as ‘consulted Dr. HF for prescribing this drug’…

LOL. Ingat apa? Consultant ka. LOL.

Got work, need to eat also right?

I think my hobby kinda bring me back to life. If I’m to work and no play, I think I’ll stress myself to death.

Some nice view taken from seaside, beside the Portuguese Settlement’s gerai makan. They sell nice but expensive seafood there.

I think it is good to spend on food. It makes you happy. Hahaha.

People know their rights, and people keeps on demanding. We try to understand their problem, their worries, their understandings. But they never try to understand us, our work, and our responsibilities, and our feelings.

Luckily not all of them are like this.

There are certain kind of scenario that I would not like to handle.

1. Family members who are fighting against each other.

There is one patient. And there are a lot of people. One can explain the condition of the patient first to a few of people, and the next time, some other ppl will come and ask about it, and another time, another people would come and ask the same question. And this can happen EVERYDAY. Gosh.

2. Family members who do not trust doctors.

Aiyo, if it is like that in the first place, why come to hospital? I kenot understand.

If they think their understanding are better than us, why get admitted? And questioning everything that we do and say. And questioning in a tone which is even more intimidating than those professors in the university during med student life. -__-”

3. Family member who is just a pain in the ass.

They know what they come to hospital for. They are paranoid. They jot down everything u get about the patient. They question u all the lab results. They even open the case sheets and read without authorization. They even question you things that you wrote.

And if they want something to be done, they thought it is a private hospital and you doctors only attend to them only. Anybody who is in resuscitation and distress will be less important. When you are doing reviews they say why u r not doing anything.

And on top of them, when you are all tired and wanna go home, and when you see them on the way out, they will ask you whether you are really tired of doing so many things, or just tired because of doing nothing.

WTF.

4. Family members who want the best.

They demand air con room, they demand room with only 2 people inside. They will say ‘people can pay, i also can pay, why am i not getting that?’.

They don’t know what is first comes first served.

They act like they are so so so rich.

But get poor because of private hospital charges. Irony right?

Looking at all these cases, now I kinda think that private sector is a must. If people would like to demand, they should pay for their demands. It is easy math. If you can’t wait and you can’t handle some hot air and fan, go to private, you get everything stat and everything done nicely; with a price.

It makes the transition fair. Isn’t?

Because of Deepavali and a lot of senior HOs taking their end posting leave, I was left in a 30 people ward with only 1 partner. Stress.

I do things slow. What to do.

Tak sempat. There are few times when the MO came to round and I didn’t even finish or didn’t even reach that patient yet. So cham.

Had been working and working and working and still there are stuffs not done and there are stuffs missed out. And I still got a few pending discharge summaries to do. :(

Was oncall yesterday so forced myself to come back and have some rest before the next on-call, which is 2 days from now. Sigh. I wonder how I am going to survive this in the long run. I always told myself to prepare food whenever I wanna on-call since the first call but I always end up with minimal bread, and the next day will be so busy until my only meal since before call end up around 7pm or 8pm.

I wonder I can do things any more faster.

BUT…

Today 2 taggers came in. First posters just like me. But my boss told them not to review patients but can only tag along with us. So unfair. He gave me 5 beds the very first day I walk into his ward to ‘register’ myself. Anyway, with the ending of Deepavali, most HOs came back and now it is 5 persons a ward, and now I have less to cover, thus less things will be missed out, and can concentrate more on increasing the medical knowledge instead of working with my backbone onli. Hmm..

Had been scolded by MOs here and there.. LOL. But luckily so far most are reasonable. And at the same time met a few who is really cool and friendly as well.

MO-ship…. it seems so far away. But 1 month seems to pass very fast like this. Scary.

Scenario 1 - Self induced pain

Me : Dik, I nak cucuk ambik darah skit eh?
Patient : Ok ok.
Me : *Get into position with needle*
Patient : Doctor, perlahan skit, sakit lah.
Me : Bukan nak cepat baru tak sakit ker?
Patient : *Diam*
Patient : Aduuuuuuhhhhh, sakit sakit SAKIT!!! Sakit lah doctorrrrrrr..
Me : Rilek, saya belum cucuk lagi.

Scenario 2 - Misi mana?

Me : Pakcik, nak ambik darah skit eh.
Patient : Yaya, tadi doctor ambik 3 kali pun tak dapat. Urat saya memang susah nak carik.
Me : *Look here and there* Ah aaa.. Betul lah pakcik. Memang tak nampak apa apa.
Patient : Tu laa, dulu misi kat ward lain tu pun tak dapat. Akhirnya datang satu sister Cina, dia ambik sekali dapat.
Me : Yeaka, mana nak carik sister to?
Patient : Entah lah. Itu dah 5 tahun dahulu. Start dulu memang dah susah nak ambik. Masuk hospital memang sakit duk kena cucuk jer.
Me : Okay pakcik, dah siap.
Patient : Oh?!?!?!?!
Me : Tengok *hold up the syringe with fresh blood*

Scenario 3 - IVDU and RVD

Me : Doctor, very hard to get the branulla set. Can’t see anything at all lah.
My boss : Izzit?
My boss : *Took the needle*
Me : Yeala, The Radiologist MO oso tried so many times, so many people was there, kenot get also.
My boss : *Poke*
-Silence-
My boss : Done.
Me : -__-”

Scenario 4 - Uncle with hearing impairment

Patient : *Sitting and having shortness of breath*
My boss : *Going over and auscultate the lungs*
My boss : Tarik nafas.
Patient : Yeala, memang semput!
Me : Shhhh.. Pakcik tarik nafas. Jangan cakap.
Patient : Apa? Memang semput lah.
My boss : Tarik nafasssssss..
Patient : Apa? Tadi tak semput, sekarang semput lah!
My boss : *Give up*
Me : -__-”
Patient : Nanti saya ok. Bagi 5 minute. *Bring out aerochamber*
My boss : Refer for hearing aid.
Me : Oh.

Scenario 5 - The peritoneal tap

Boss saw me on the way to CME.

My boss : Why are you here?
Me : Going to CME lor.
My boss : Why? No need to do the tap ah?
Me : Oh, not you do meh? I thought I need to be under supervision one?
My boss : Wah, last time I HO that time I already did so many procedure…. bla bla bla.
Me : Oh.. Ok ok ok. I do I do.
Me : How much should I take out ah?
My boss : As much as you can.

The story end with 8840ml of peritoneal fluid. I think it is a record. SO much. -__-”

She rocks my world.

Hope today didn’t change anything.

p/s:

This month I got 7 oncalls. Walao. 4 weeks a month. Meaning one whole week no need sleep? And what makes it ‘better’ is I’ll be oncall for all the coming weekends after next week. This is so cruel.

WTH.. i just got a stranger HO coming into my room with a key and say wanna tumpang mandi. *Sweat*.. Meaning all the time my stuffs are unprotected! Gosh. Gotta move out faster!

-__-”

Actually, i found myself working for long hours and non stop for a long time. I wonder what is my motivation, my source of power. Is it the pay slip at the end of this month? Or is it I really have that bullshit noble idea of serving mankind?

I think I’m more to, trying to live up with the name of being a doctor. People come, see you in a white coat, with a stethoscope, and instead of calling your name, they call you doctor. And that is the magic word. No matter how much you dislike their attitude towards you, you still try your best to explain and tell them what they want to know, and try to ease their pain.

Even thou lack of experience is the main problem now, I think it is the title that makes me work on.

There are a LOT of KINDS of people. Each touches me a bit of here and there. It is a joy to see them leave healthy, even thou doing discharge summaries is yet another pain.

I have this uncle who I first thought was a psycho but later on turn out to be a pleasant old man. Everytime when I pass by him, he would shout out ‘Doctorrr… Tolong Lah…’

But when it is time to suck out his blood, he never gives any complain. Because he KNOWS that it is for his own good. And I’m just a small character fulfilling my job.

His kids never come and visit him. He has his own room. I like to run away from the crazy wards for a few seconds and would hide in his room for a while. We didn’t talk much. I just sit, and he just lie there, looking at the ceiling & occasionally looking at me. Most of the time I sat there doing nothing, or massage his distended stomach for him because he didn’t BO for few days. And funny is that he did BO after I rubbed his stomach for a few times.

He got well, discharged on a wheel chair, pat me on my back at the counter and didn’t leave a word to me. Maybe sometimes things are more than words.

It was more brutal than I thought.

My working speed wasn’t really good so I took kinda long to finished up my tasks. But it is more like a way of doing things rather than remembering all those medical knowledge that I studied in med school. In fact I think I forgot a lot of them already, but from time to time, it is good that good theories stay and sometimes those left over knowledge still makes my day happier (like managed to answer questions shot by the MOs).

WALAO, got rumor in Russia saying I failed my interview? -__-”

Got people fail interview one meh?

Anyway, the working hours are not very good lah. During the first day I do stuffs and kept on doing stuffs from 8am till 1.30am. And the next day gotta wake up early again for the next day, and it doesn’t stop there. It goes from Monday till Sunday and Monday again. On and on, non-stop.

My patients actually noticed that. And they actually acknowledged my effort and time put into reviewing their case notes, memorizing who need what the coming morning and etc (new to this mar, always need to repeat).

But I think I’m getting better in it. If don’t know I say don’t know. If know I do it happily.

Basic medical sciences still apply lor. If no basic, you can go bury ur head into the hospital floor or go sleep in the rumah mayat d.

Anyway, had been doing a lot of CPRs. Sigh.

Wearing gloves is still something I need to force myself to do. It is hard to feel the veins or pulse when u have ur gloves on. I usually wear one side while leaving my left hand glove-less. I think it is not a good practice especially when we have HIV and Hep cases around quite often.

Tell you what. I worked here for 2 weeks, I leave the hospital compound less than 5 times. -__-”

That’s basically my work life lah.

Love life - errr.. gf beside me now, so I shouldn’t spent too much time typing this. So nice right, she is here to teman me. Haha.. where to find this kind of girl that can parcel herself to Melaka just like that. Must find a way to secure her. But even when she is here, I can’t get to teman her all day also. Gotta do my morning rounds and pm reviews. Sigh. Hopefully she wun complain too much in the future and start becoming lazy to accompany her bf. LOL..

Family life wise - called home only twice. Less than 5 minutes. I’m a bad son. Haha.. But sometimes I even forgot what day is today, so I think it is ok laa. People grow up, of course la care about the girl more than the parents right? LOL. Okay readers, you are not suppose to comment about this statement. I know what you all are going to say.

Personal life wise - My personal life starts at the time when I come back from the ward which is around 11.30pm - 01.30am and usually only lasted 30 mins, for me to bathe and jump into bed. My personal time in the morning is the time I used to iron my clothes and brush my teeth. Need to find somebody to iron my clothes lah, don’t know my gf know how to iron or not. Oh, she should know it lah hor, if not how she irons her own clothes leh.

Everyday there is multiple drama in the hospital. My MO advice is don’t be stupid. My HO advice is don’t be stupid. I think I’ll say, Don’t be stupid. I think I told too many drama to my gf d now I don’t know what to write here. LOL.

Okay she smiling here d. Wanna ciao liao.

Adios.

Pray tat I’ll be alive till the next post.

Dr. Ng

I think I’ll go back earlier today. Hopefully the highway is not all filled up with cars which would make the driving slow and dangerous. Hmmm.

Anyway, 4 days of rest is a bit bad for me because I forgot stuffs again! Better buck up on that. And there will be no off day for the coming days and if I’m lucky I’ll have my third week off tag and half day off on weekends which I already have a plan. Waiting for that day to come only. Sigh.

Nothing much happened. Just came back to Kluang and stock up some stuffs that I think I would be using in the future. Lotsa 3 in 1 and bread and etc. =)

This might be the last post before some hiatus since I do not have internet connection in the hospital. My iPhone’s wifi konked due to some 3.0 firmware upgrade (I suspected because the forum has a lot about this) and so I’m practically internet-less unless I go to KFC or something, which I think will be quite rare or it might involve me going out at 11pm after tag and come back home all tired again. Plus the hospital’s exits are all closed after 10 and I gotta take the only road in which is used for ambulances which will be driven with very high speed pass those small corners.

Anyway, wish me luck. I’ll come back strong and healthy and smart. LOL. Adios!