Medics.
Have been taking EFR lessons to get myself re-certified because my licenses have expired this July.Should have done that last year... though last year I was hoping that I could get directly to the tests without the need to go through the lessons. Apparently they ignored me after a few emails and I didn't bother to pester them further.
Haha so, I became a student again after practising for 2 years and trained people for 1. It is, hmms, quite dumb to sit through lessons which I used to teach... And there will be people in the class who (I assume they have taken first-aid courses before) try to insist that they should administer aspirin to patients displaying symptoms of angina pectoris.
Hello. I went through 1.5 years of training and practice to get to the stage whereby I am allowed to give aspirin to patients with angina pectoris who have been prescribed that before and have a confirmed medical history in which they don't have any NSAID related allergies. Since you are so good, go ahead and administer warfarin or heparin as well. IV. Since they kind of work similarly - all anti-coagulants.
Oh don't forget, nitroglycerin at 3 minute intervals sublingual. Ultimate combo. Bet the guy will start leaking blood from his ears.
Haha suddenly I feel that the SAF is actually pretty professional. They have better equipment too (Better BVM? Better manikins? In the CPR room we even have electronic ones which will start blinking red when you do something wrong :P) Anyway I used to train with the SCDF guys so hahaha when you call 995 those people responding to your calls are basically at my standard :P I didn't get to the crew leader level though...
Haha as you can see I am quite proud to be a medic (I'm sure some of my friends are too! But yeah quite a lot aren't :P). It's true that basically we are nothing - we have to address any doctor Sir or Madam, seek his/her permission to do almost anything, and do almost anything he/she asks us to do - but it's also true that people like us do make a difference.
I have cared for patients in the jungle of Malaysia with severe infection on his feet, so much that he couldn't even walk; someone in the same jungle with 40deg fever (NOS viral infections usually :P); ran with all my equipment for hundreds of metres to reach a patient with heat exhaustion; sent a guy with some maniac disorder to IMH after helping my MO drug him with haloperidol ; helped to do CPR on a patient with cardiac arrest in SGH - and my life as a medic is still not the most happening yet. Missed almost all the most serious E-cases in my medical centre, and hahaha luckily I wasn't there if not I would have less ridiculous stories to tell :D
Though the best thing that I as a medic have ever got is the trust that people give me. They trust what I told him, they trust that I know what I am doing - and I am happy that I can give them the confidence and the reassurance they need the most. Of course, I have to get the trust from the doctors that I work for as well - I am quite cool with them actually :D Learnt a lot of stuff from them! I should admit that I have forgotten some but I think most retained :P
Haha there is one thing fundamental which keeps me from actually becoming a medical doctor - I believe I have some unknown neurological problem which causes my hand to shake unvoluntarily at certain positions. It happened again when I was injecting a mouse and dissecting mouse stuff today - it is seriously quite annoying. My MO always used to laugh at me for that; my hand will shake automatically when I set plugs and give jabs because I have to do those things in those positions and it is not because I am nervous. Usually I can get the job done but well, if you are a 80-years-old uncle and you see the doctor shaking when he is doing your catheterisation, what trust will you have on him?!
Despite still being quite sour about A*Star shutting the MBBS-PhD door on me in 2004 and pondering hard over MD-PhD in the US, I found another alternative called Harvard LMS. It's a Harvard PhD programme with an extra clinical component - basically you meet patients, study what the medical students study, and do your PhD at the same time, but in the end you get a PhD 'with a distinction' and not a MD-PhD. 5-6 years. Now mum and dad have different opinions, my friends have different opinions, and I am hmmmms confused.
Though still have one year to decide... Haha anyway should be taking 19th Century British Fiction next semester for the extra 3 random humanities credit (i.e. non-history) that I need, and that is an English class. P-Chem and prob-stats shouldn't be a problem. It's just that stupid physics requirement! Argh.
Labels: Life
