Week Thirteen: February 9, 2010

This week I was only at my clinical rotation one day and it went by very slowly. Autum and I were in the ER and were trying to keep busy for most of the day because it was very quiet. We were able to meet some new nurses, doctors, and emergency medical technicians. The EMT was especially appreciative of our work because we were able to take care of the EKGs that he was responsible for. As for the patients we saw; there were a few toddlers with colds, a young woman with anal hemorrhoids, a teenage girl awaiting for a psychological evaluation, a homeless man with chest pain, an older lady with abdominal pain, a young lady who took way too much acetaminophen because her tooth was hurting so bad, and a few others. Sounds exciting but there weren't a lot of things we could do let alone not too many procedures taking place in the ER. There was this young guy who came in because the weekend prior he had accidentally shot himself with a BB gun and I was able to watch the doctor remove the BB from the patient's hand. My favorite part of the day was when this guy came in with visual disturbances. I saw his nurse attempting to give the patient an eye exam but the patient was silent, the nurse looked confused he then said he didn't know Spanish. The charge nurse walked around apparently looking for a translator she asked if Autum knew how to speak Spanish and she said no and the nurse kept walking (assuming I am sure-that this little white girl wouldn't know either...) I then so politely chimed in that I indeed did know enough to assist in the eye test. I was thrilled to walk over there, introduce myself, and ask the man if he could read the sign; he informed me that he had no idea what the nurse was wanting him to do, after asking him to read it he also said that he could only see the outline of the sign but could not read any bit of it. He told me he was seeing a lot of black dots in his right eye and a lot of gray dots in his left eye, I was so excited I was helping solve the problem! I told the nurse what he had told me and the nurse then informed the doctor. I asked the nurse what the patient's background was and he told me that the patient currently had very high blood sugar and very high blood pressure; both of which can have a tremendous effect on your vision. It is pretty cool when you learn something in class and then can actually apply it to real life! I will never forget the first time I saw a centrifuge in the lab at south coast hospital when I was in high school, I was so excited because I thought back to 6th grade when I thought good 'ol Mr. House was teaching me about something that would never apply to my life or to anyone else's. Funny how things work out, huh? Most the day was spent killing time and it was s bummer because at about 1:30 the pace started picking up but my class meets at 1:45 so it seemed like we missed out on a bunch of exciting stuff. Hopefully, next Tuesday I will have two patients and the day will be full of excitement!