horsin' around

Seems to be the trend that I find a horse to ride on my various rotations, wherever they may be. Well, this time it was the Doctor himself who provided the fun horse to ride! This horse's name is Dusty, and although he hadn't been ridden in a couple years, he was a perfect gentleman! It was rather cold that day, and it took my legs about 4 hours to defrost after the ride, but it was great fun. I love riding :)
He was a sucker for a good scratch and would curl his nose in delight. What a cutie!

New Favorite

Greg is so amazing. For Valentine's day he sent me just what I wanted. In fact, he sent me a myriad of appreciated items! One of the many things I love about Greg is his incredible sense of what I would absolutely love. An example of this is when he gave me Dance Dance Revolution for Christmas. I love that game, and I've had so much fun with it!
He sent me booties pictured below (almost exact). They are amazing! They're like sleeping bags for your feet, and they are instantaneously warm. My feet seem to have always been cold, but not any more! As soon as I get home in the evening, they're on my feet. I would totally wear them to work, but I might get blood or something even grosser on them.



Don't get me wrong I love Greg for more than just his gift giving abilities :)

clarification

As to the below posting, there were a few factors in the event of my temporary lack of consciousness. Since it was the first day of my rotation and the location was about an hour from my house, I decided to drive there in the morning. Being the procrastinator that I am I didn't finish packing until quite late. Then, had to arise quite early to be beautiful and there on time. Breakfast for me was around 5:30 and consisted of quickly eaten cold cereal along with a rather large cup of coffee.
Upon the event of my passing out, I was hungry, thirsty, tired, and there was quite an unpleasant smell emanating from the examined portion of our patient which was making me nauseas. It was too much for my poor system to handle.

White Fluffy Kittens

Yesterday was my first day of my surgery elective rotation. I am with a new preceptor and, well, everyone is new. On this, my first day, I fainted cold right in the middle of surgery. When I awoke I was stretched out on the OR floor with concerned faces peering down at me. The first thing out of my mouth was "I was dreaming of kittens." And what a nice dream it was.

Almost

I performed surgery. Wow. It was the last day of my surgery rotation, and we were doing a lipoma excision. Basically, we were taking out a benign, fatty tumor. Usually, I get to retract things or control the camera, or suction or hold intestines (see last post). But this time, the doc handed me the scalpel and said, "Here, take this." And I thought, that's weird. And then he let me perform the whole surgery! From the initial incision to the final sutures. Ah! It was amazing. The PA later told me that I've officially performed more surgery than he has as a member of staff. Wow. I love surgery. It almooooost, makes me want to go to Med School and become a surgeon. Almost.

Indigo

I held intestines.

We were taking down a colostomy, which is basically attaching the colon back together. There is a very large midline incision for visualization, and those darn intestines just keep getting in the way.

This surgery, in itself, is a pretty interesting surgery - cool procedures, nifty equipment, but it became a much more interesting case when, as we were dissecting around the rectum to clear a spot for anastamosis, we could see the foley (catheter placed in the bladder). Uh-oh. Apparently the bladder had, after the origional colostomy, adhered to the blind pouch which was the rectum (I wish I could draw a picture so you could know what I'm talking about). It was basically wrapped around the rectum - the site we wanted to reconnect to. So now there's a tear in her bladder.

After some swearing, we sutured it shut and consulted the urologist. He came in to take a look, put a camera inside and filled the bladder with saline. It was amazing to see the bladder looking down from the open abdomen! It was full and you could see the light from the camera inside. Up on the screen the images were being shown of the interior of the bladder. The repaired tear was identified and it was closed well, and then we looked at the inlet for the ureters.

Just as we were looking at one of the ureters it shot out a blue liquid! The urologist had ordered Indigo blue when he got in the room and apparently it takes about 5 minutes to get through the system and through the kidneys. As we peeked over to the other ureter it shot out some blue urine as well. Wow. It was pretty much amazing! We now know that we did not cut any of the ureters, and the bladder is in wonderful condition. The patient peed blue for quite a while.

The rest of the surgery was, although amazing, uneventful (which is good... for the patient).

I like surgery.

lap banding

Today was my first day of Surgery. It was so exciting! I was able to scrub in on various cases from a sebaceous cyst removal to laparoscopic banding of the stomach. Good times. I really think I'm going to like this rotation.
Tomorrow I'm taking out a few gallbladders.