Letter 424: Venti-Sized Verbosity with No Sugar
My venti-sized latte is perched precariously on the edge of a makeshift table in the hall while I am furiously clicking away on my keyboard in an attempt to de-stress. It is still cafe sua in a sense, all but disguised under chocolate powdered foam and a recyclable plastic cap, millions of miles away from its condensed milk-infused Indochina counterpart served ubiquitously on the streets of Vietnam. It is contained in a crimson paper cup the shade of which is unmistakably associated with a certain coffee chain in South Australia. But I don't taste the coffee. I want the kick. I am de-caffeineted, even on a day when I have the luxury of sleeping till noon and not being woken up by the startling buzz of my alarm clock.
There is always time for cafe sua in Vietnam.
Surgery makes you appreciate the importance of off days. It is only the end of my first week in Surg, and already, I feel overwhelmed and exhausted. My body has been running around like clockwork, and my mind, in circles. Surgery demands a lot, and allows no space for breathing, nor room for mistakes. Clutching a multitude of patient summary lists, drug charts, IV orders, case notes, checklists and what-nots, while working my way around The System trying to chase blood orders, consults, lab results, radiology reports and wandering equipment, I had inadvertently realised that I could no longer afford the luxury of spending as much time with my patients as I would have liked to.
This depresses and frustrates me. A lot. Because I care, basically. I care about my patients, and I want the best for them. But it's hard to go the extra mile when your day is interrupted with a million other mundane things to tend to, such as "Bed 25's jelco's fallen out/ tissued, can you please put another one in?", or "Bed 7's bloods have hemolysed, can you please repeat another set?".
Sleep is a short-lived necessity; to dream of faraway places is an chance luxury.
On my first Surgical Long Cover yesterday, I was on my feet-- literally-- from 7.30am till 9pm. I was running a one-man show covering the entire surgical ward, plus the outliers (ie surgical patients on non-surgical wards). My pager was constantly beeping, sometimes to the point where I couldn't even answer it because I was busy tending to a patient's immediate fluid needs.
Towards the end of my shift, I came to the stark realisation that
1) I hadn't eaten nor drunk anything since my morning cup of coffee at 7am-- my fluid intake was less than sub-optimal, even going by fasting standards;
2) I hadn't gone to the toilet for the entire duration of my 13-and-a-half hour shift-- my urine output was probably less than some of my post-op patients';
3) The last time I ran a marathon wasn't even half as tiring as compared to my cover shift;
4) It is humanly impossible to finish all the tasks listed on the whiteboard, no matter how much a perfectionist one is-- non-urgent jobs will just have to wait;
5) It's called a Cover because, for all intentions and purposes, it also carries a deeper connotation of which I shall let you clever people figure out.
Life is not easy in a remote fishing village where its main source of income depends heavily on only a handful of tourists who are willing to part with their few million Dong for a clay whistle, yet this little girl of no more than 6 manages to smile ever so sincerely and unsuspectingly at the world.
Earlier in the year, as I was ending my previous 2 rotations, my nurses came up to me and told me to "keep smiling", saying cheekily "don't you forget that smile young lady!". And I had been naive enough to believe that this would never happen. I now know why I had been warned. Something inside me had died over the past week. I had ceased to smile. That flicker of hope somewhere deep down inside me had been snuffed out by the burden of expectations heaped upon it. It had fizzled, and I had blatantly refused to relight the fire of probabilism.
And I am afraid, afraid of turning out to be the embodiment of misanthropy like so many others that I have witnessed; afraid that my ideals of medical ethos are clashing with the practicality of medicine in the real world-- is this how medical practice is supposed to be?
*This post is written without the intention to vent. Writing is one of my many forms of stress relief, and right now, my inspiration comes from the wards. I do realise I have no grounds to rant when my Malaysian/ Singaporean counterparts are working 36-hour shifts (or more) when they're on cover. It is merely to provide insight into hospital life and reveal the disappointingly hurtful truth that sometimes, reality and the nobility of the profession do not blend well.
**Pics taken at Hanoi, Halong Bay, Hoi An and My Son Sanctuary (UNESCO World Heritage Site).
There is always time for cafe sua in Vietnam. Surgery makes you appreciate the importance of off days. It is only the end of my first week in Surg, and already, I feel overwhelmed and exhausted. My body has been running around like clockwork, and my mind, in circles. Surgery demands a lot, and allows no space for breathing, nor room for mistakes. Clutching a multitude of patient summary lists, drug charts, IV orders, case notes, checklists and what-nots, while working my way around The System trying to chase blood orders, consults, lab results, radiology reports and wandering equipment, I had inadvertently realised that I could no longer afford the luxury of spending as much time with my patients as I would have liked to.
This depresses and frustrates me. A lot. Because I care, basically. I care about my patients, and I want the best for them. But it's hard to go the extra mile when your day is interrupted with a million other mundane things to tend to, such as "Bed 25's jelco's fallen out/ tissued, can you please put another one in?", or "Bed 7's bloods have hemolysed, can you please repeat another set?".
Sleep is a short-lived necessity; to dream of faraway places is an chance luxury.On my first Surgical Long Cover yesterday, I was on my feet-- literally-- from 7.30am till 9pm. I was running a one-man show covering the entire surgical ward, plus the outliers (ie surgical patients on non-surgical wards). My pager was constantly beeping, sometimes to the point where I couldn't even answer it because I was busy tending to a patient's immediate fluid needs.
Towards the end of my shift, I came to the stark realisation that
1) I hadn't eaten nor drunk anything since my morning cup of coffee at 7am-- my fluid intake was less than sub-optimal, even going by fasting standards;
2) I hadn't gone to the toilet for the entire duration of my 13-and-a-half hour shift-- my urine output was probably less than some of my post-op patients';
3) The last time I ran a marathon wasn't even half as tiring as compared to my cover shift;
4) It is humanly impossible to finish all the tasks listed on the whiteboard, no matter how much a perfectionist one is-- non-urgent jobs will just have to wait;
5) It's called a Cover because, for all intentions and purposes, it also carries a deeper connotation of which I shall let you clever people figure out.
Life is not easy in a remote fishing village where its main source of income depends heavily on only a handful of tourists who are willing to part with their few million Dong for a clay whistle, yet this little girl of no more than 6 manages to smile ever so sincerely and unsuspectingly at the world.And I am afraid, afraid of turning out to be the embodiment of misanthropy like so many others that I have witnessed; afraid that my ideals of medical ethos are clashing with the practicality of medicine in the real world-- is this how medical practice is supposed to be?
Longing for some sunshine and sanctuary.
*This post is written without the intention to vent. Writing is one of my many forms of stress relief, and right now, my inspiration comes from the wards. I do realise I have no grounds to rant when my Malaysian/ Singaporean counterparts are working 36-hour shifts (or more) when they're on cover. It is merely to provide insight into hospital life and reveal the disappointingly hurtful truth that sometimes, reality and the nobility of the profession do not blend well.
**Pics taken at Hanoi, Halong Bay, Hoi An and My Son Sanctuary (UNESCO World Heritage Site).
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