Monday, August 17, 2015

That Wasn't Horrible

When I was planning my schedule a few months ago, I thought that I would "start off easy" by being on the consult service for the first two weeks and only doing one or two half-day clinics per week.  I spent months (and months and months) on the consult service as a fellow, so being on service as an attending shouldn't be all that different from what I was doing before, and it guarantees me a minimum income to help with the bills that have piled up after seven weeks of vacation.

The only problem with my plan?  I scheduled my first clinic for the morning of my very first day.  At the inner city clinic where I've only worked twice and therefore am unfamiliar with pretty much everything (like the bloody EPR).  The clinic with the very complicated patients who actually require time.

In the end, my two-and-a-half-hour-long clinic took four hours, followed by a full hour of charting and paperwork.  Amazingly, I stayed calm throughout it and didn't once cry or freak out.  And it was actually (dare I admit it) a tiny bit of fun.  My nurse is absolutely amazing with both me and my patients, and she was the main reason why I didn't go insane when my clinic ran horribly over.  It also helped that there was nothing pressing on the consult service, so it was okay that I showed up at the other hospital at 3 PM.

Maybe this attending gig will be bearable after all.

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