Peds

So my pediatric rotation is over! bye bye York - Hello home!!!!! I'm so very happy to be back in my own bed at my own place. Once again I am able to take a shower without wearing sandals and can fall asleep without the sound of a flying helicopter. Oh the luxury. I took my Peds shelf exam (test at the end of each rotation) on Friday and then enjoyed my weekend. I do apologize for the long hiatus without writing.


the view from my room at York. Please note the helicopter pad not more than 500 yards from my window.



Here's my beautiful room - we've starting the packing process and were getting ready to head home!

Now the question arises, could I see myself as a Pediatrician? My answer is I don't think so. I do enjoy kids and the newborns. Healthy little kiddos can be very cute and entertaining. There is also a lot of parental education involved in Pediatrics - more than I realized before. Patient education is very important and an aspect of medicine that I do enjoy. Ingrained in the specialty is the concept of preventative medicine, which I think is of the utmost importance. So you're probably wondering why not peds? For the most part there are happy little tykes who come to the doctor for their well-child visits, but those kids in that age range where stranger anxiety has set in and they scream throughout an entire encounter are not for me. I'm talking about kids who shiver in fear of the doctor and sit there crying while I'm just talking to mom - not even touching them. I'm sorry, but I would rather not deal with that a few times a day. Once in a while I could handle it, but not everyday. There is also too much talk about poop! All babies - are they drinking/eating and pooping ok. Mom's will come to you with all sorts of questions about poop. The frequncy, consistency, color, etc. Heck, they'll even bring in diapers to show you. I myself may one day fall victim and become a poop watcher if I have my own children. But I don't feel the need to hear about poop 15x's a day. An adult conversation is needed every once in a while. I think peds is a good speciality with a lot to offer certain people. It's also needed, because raising healthy kids and educating parents on how to do that is a difficult thing.

There is more. I learned that I highly doubt inpatient hospital medicine is for me. I hate waking up patient's early in the morning who are trying to recover in order to get a history of the previous days events and perform an exam. Discussing patient's during rounds is alright. (rounds - is where the team who is caring for the floor or a group of patient's gets together and goes over all of the patient's on the floor and what the plan is for them, etc). Then during inpatient you order tests that need to be done that day and then you sit and wait. Wait for one of the patient's to need you or you wait for new patient's to be admitted. I do not feel I see enough patient's while on service in the hospital and you only know them for a brief bit before they are off and on their way. The other big deterrent from inpatient is the smell. Thank goodness the Peds floor didn't smell, but there was another adult unit I walked through to get to peds that reeked. Not cool.

So there you have it a brief summary of my peds experience. I still have more stories to tell from there and will hopefully get to them soon.

Now I'm on to my next adventure (if you want to call it that) - the world of obstetrics and gynecology. I have heard my classmates describe babies looking like aliens and placentas smelling like egg yolk. Oh the fun I have to look forward to!