Just a few more months....

So there's a lot I have to write about, but it's late, and i just got off a long shift. But I just wanted to comment on the 2 things about my shift tonight that stood out more than anything:

1. "are you a real medical doctor? As in, you went to medical school? Because you don't really look like someone who would become a doctor."

I don't take personal offense to really anything a rude patient or even more rude family member says to me. This isn't because I have no emotion and am an "ice queen" as most would say. But mainly, it's because 99% of the time, the people being rude jerks in the ED are just not smart, at all, but they somehow think they have this wealth of knowledge because they have a 4th cousin who is married to a guy who knows a doctor, or something retarded like that. Anyway, tonight I went into a patient room to see a kid with a rash. No big deal, he has a rash. My first thought was (as I'm seeing this 5yr old kid, with no apparent rash, jump up and down through the door screaming along to the cartoon on the tv)..."wow, this kid couldn't be farther from having a life emergency, dandy." This also give me the first clue that his mom probably is not the brightest crayon in the box. So I go in, start talking to the little guy and mom. Before I can really start asking questions, mom flat out asks me if I'm a real medical doctor and proceeds to clarify that she's asking if I went to actual medical school. It was funnier than insulting actually lol. I had to stop myself from laughing almost. "did she really just ask me if i'm a medical doctor that went to real medical school?"

I explained I was in fact not a doctor yet, but am almost finished with ACTUAL medical school (the kind where you learn medicine and stuff). She was shocked because apparently, "you don't look like you would become a doctor."  WTF? I'm still not sure if that's a good or bad thing, i'm still sort of laughing at the whole encounter. But i assured her that despite my looks or whatever, I am qualified to be asking her questions about her son's non-existant medical emergency that she calls a rash. I basically told her some benadryl would clear up the miniscule red spot and "itching" her boy was having. 5 mins later, the attending comes in (only to appease her because I could tell she didn't believe me), and says the SAME EXACT WORDS, almost verbatim. I wish I could've had a camera to video her reaction that was SO appreciative and relieved and made it seem like the attending had just told her how to win a trillion dollars and I had told her nothing. SO...what did I learn from all of this and this crazy lady, other than the fact that apparently I don't look like a doctor and 95% of the people I see in the ED are very very unsmart. I learned that i CANNOT wait until somebody asks me that question and I can answer, YES DAMMIT I'M YOUR FREAKING DOCTOR! :-)

2. So tonight seemed to be "vaginal bleeding in pregnancy" night in the ED. We had about 5 women in a row come in for vag bleeding all less than 15 weeks or so. I got lucky enough to work all of them up and by the 3rd one, the doc was letting me pretty much solo the patients, meaning, I'd do everything, orders, exams, and they would just say a quick hello at the end, when OB/gyn came down.  My 5th lady that came in though, she was the one that gave me an experience that I don't think I'll soon forget.  She was bleeding pretty badly, hadn't felt the baby move in a couple days. When I told the attending about her he sort of grimaced and said in not so may words, he was pretty sure the baby was not viable anymore. So, with this in mind, I go in and do the pelvic to work her up just like everyone else. Mind you, this poor girl had been crying from the second she put the gown on, she had 2 previous miscarriages at around this same time. I set up the ultrasound, trying to console her without giving her false hope, but also without being unrealistic, she had lost a ton of blood. So as I'm getting the probe on her belly, doc walks in and stands there waiting to help me give her the bad news that her baby's heart isn't beating. So I look around for a few seconds and seriously, it was the craziest, one of the most emotional moments I've had in med school for some reason. Not sure if it was because you could feel the fear in the room from this girl at the thought she lost another baby. Maybe it was because it was my first time or so really being the one to find or not find a heartbeat. So after looking for about 2 seconds, I found it...it was beating strong and baby was moving. Right at that moment lots of things happened...i'm pretty sure my own heart stopped for a quick second, the patient screamed/sobbed louder than crap, and even the attending let out a "wow."  It was amazing and i was so happy that I let the probe slip and I lost the heart lol...but I found it again fast! So everyone was happy, not totally out of danger, but the baby was alive, unlike we all expected. I guess I never really grasped/felt how surreal it is to see your baby's heart beat on a screen. I've seen tons of them, but tonight it really hit me. I've never seen my own baby's heart beat (obviously!), but if this is even an indication of what that is like, all I can say is life is really a miracle. So yea, I'm pretty confident that I won't forget those couple of seconds for a long time. I should also not forget to not drop the probe during such crucial moments lol.

More updates to follow :)