And now what did you do TODAY?

[aardvark baguette]

your government is retarded

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

you're in good company

[grawk]

as is yours, of course.

[aardvark baguette]

and how

[Augsburger]

Doesn't that apply to most governments?

[aardvark baguette]

all of them that use force

 

i mean yes

[crappyjones123]

Just got out of the first long surgery I observed. Started at 5am. Finished at 1pm. Complete double mastectomy and reconstructive surgery. My feet hurt so freaking bad. I have no clue how the 67 year old surgeon did it all. So much respect for the surgeons and staff.

[swt61]

I have no clue how the 67 year old surgeon did it all. 

 

Good drugs, of coarse!

[jvlgato]

Yeah, those surgeons aren't human.

[Knuckledragger]

One wrong click just cost me $75, and wrecked a fairly rare opportunity.  One wrong stupid click.  I should never to financial transactions online when I'm tired.

 

$75 is meaningless in the grand scheme of things, and I'm lucky to be able to lose that amount and function just fine.  That said, I'm kicking myself for being such an idiot.

[Wmcmanus]

I'm 28... I cant access dating websites with it on. 

 

But you're quite advanced for your age.  I think you could handle dating.  They ought to make an exception for you. 

[grawk]

they don't want scots breeding.  Then there'd be more of them.

[swt61]

But where will I get my plaid shirts then?

[crappyjones123]

Yeah, those surgeons aren't human.

Got a call from his scrub nurse about an hour later asking me if I wanted to observe another similar surgery...I was already on campus so politely declined but holy shit. That man is a fucking machine.

[Knuckledragger]

After my favorite TF2 server (Black Magic Gaming 24/7 Doublecross) went down hard, I have most of the last 24 hours helping two friends get our own server up and running.  A few hours ago it hit critical mass and has been full or nearly full ever since.  It's got most of the BMG crew playing on it as I type this.

 

Now I need to switch gears completely and get a DJ set ready for tonight. 

[jvlgato]

Got a call from his scrub nurse about an hour later asking me if I wanted to observe another similar surgery...I was already on campus so politely declined but holy shit. That man is a fucking machine.

Yeah, it's crazy. They totally deserve to make whatever crazy salary they make. In my cardiothoracic surgery rotation, we pre-rounded at 5am, rounded at 530am, had morning case conference, started surgery at 7am until about 2-3pm (that's 1 or 2 x 3-8 hour surgeries), end of day rounds and meetings, with a brief dinner break, until 9-10pm. One night I was heading home to prepare for the next morning because I was presenting the AM case conference, and word came that there was a death, so a heart transplant was heading our way. Should I go home to prepare the case, or stay to watch the heart transplant? No one was around to ask, but the nurse said they had to harvest it, so it could take a while to even arrive. I stuck around until midnight ... still waiting for the heart, not here yet ... I went home to prepare the case presentation and get some sleep. I got like 3 hours of sleep, but was ready to present the case the next AM. Head surgeon glares at me - 'case conference is canceled, where the hell were you last night? We had a heart transplant.' 'I went home at midnight to prepare for the case conference assigned to me.' 'Oh, so you've seen so many heart transplants that you didn't need to see another one?' 'Really sorry, I wanted to be ready to present the case and had to make a decision.' 'Goddamn med students'.

Edited January 18, 2014 by jvlgato

[crappyjones123]

The SAME exact thing was told to our group by our Physical Diagnosis class preceptor who is a vascular surgeon at a nearby hospital - if a physician offers to let you see or better yet do anything at all, even if it is holding the retractor, you stay the extra time and you do it. It was a pre med scribe working with him whom he offered a chance to observe a stent repair surgery and the scribe turned him down because his shift was over. The surgeon took offense and never offered anything cool to the scribe again. 

[jvlgato]

No one ever told me the secret code. But also I just wasn't meant to be a surgeon ... 

 

I told my friend who was going to go into surgery that he better like the O.R., because he'd be spending his entire life in one. He smiled, and said there's no other place he'd rather be. 

[crappyjones123]

I recently started shadowing an ortho surgeon with a very busy practice - 16 patients before noon. He said he spent his residency in the OR and then the moment he started working at a private practice, the senior partner told him that the office visits was where the billable hours were. Further, 85% of his salary comes from office visits and he spent just a few days a month actually doing surgeries.

I find procedures waaaaay more fun than practicing medicine without them but I am also happy that unanimously every single surgeon I have spoken with has warned me that to be able to do surgery, one must bill plenty of inane office hours first. The four hours I spent with him were spent running from room to room and frantically dictating notes when time permitted and just bouncing from one knee pain to another with a rotator cuff thrown in. Emergency medicine seems to offer a compromise of "more" interesting cases and procedures but trauma surgery seems to be perfectly fit the bill for what I want to do. If only it weren't so ridiculously difficult to get a residency spot in it...either that or psychiatry. No procedures but I love the subject matter.

Let's see what the board exam gods have in store for me.

Edited January 19, 2014 by crappyjones123

[jvlgato]

Some of my favorite people are ER docs ... smart, really sharp, fun.

 

Don't know any trauma surgeons. But yeah, super hard to get into. And surviving the residency would be oh, so painful. But I always say, do what you love.

 

Psychiatrists are freaks. Nice folks, but freaks.

[crappyjones123]

While trying to find a topic for my philosophy masters thesis, I spent almost a year studying the philosophy of psychiatry before deciding to pursue the question of the existence of god. I had never really found a topic where the reading was so much fun. Well not until I ran across Christopher Hitchens. Without prompts, I wonder how many people could differentiate between the notes from religious zealots and the fringe thinkers (psych academics) I spoke with Could make for another interesting philosophy paper.

Psychiatrists are certainly among the weirder people I have met. But they all had conversations with me that I never wished to end.

Edited January 19, 2014 by crappyjones123

[Torpedo]

I spent a whole lot of ER on-call traumatology shifts during my Medicine School days. So many that despite I loved the specialty, I knew I couldn't stand that work load when I grew up and still at 50 I'd be doing that, which is the way things work over here. I love ENT, it has a great advantage, most physicians know shit about it, so you're not being constantly questioned, just consulted >D

[jvlgato]

My anatomy partner went into ENT surgery. Super nice guy, really smart. Among the surgeons that I know, Antonio included, the ENTs are definitely a nicer and friendlier lot. Not just saying that for Antonio's sake.

I agree, CJ, as weird as we are, we are also one of the nicer, friendlier docs around, and usually pretty interesting, if you can get past the weirdness. And if you like the subject matter (I love the brain and behavior and still do) then you're in luck! It's funny, though. I never took a single psychology course in college . no interest, thought it was all a bunch of crap. Still sometimes do. Psychiatry was the last thing I thought I'd go into while in med school. I purposely put it last in my third year, thinking I'd never go into THAT. I entered the rotation having not loved any other rotation. I thought I could tolerate Internal Medicine, but I didn't love it. Fell in love in a few weeks and still wouldn't rather do anything else.

So were you ever able to prove or disprove the existence of God? I took one philosophy course in college and dropped it in the first week. Seemed like they could intellectually masturbate about anything for a lifetime, but never come to a conclusion!

[crappyjones123]

The issue arises as the burden of proof falls on the believers of the world. The proofs arguing for existence - first cause, good and bad, morality and depravity, etc. all get tossed out very quickly. The only apriori proof for existence was offered by Anselm and it is a very fine proof. I struggled against it for a few months but eventually found holes in it that my advisor couldn't fill. That was my opportunity to call it my thesis .

Somehow I got around ever having to take the intro course in philosophy. They discovered it when I was about to graduate and used it for a writing credit at the time but given how many more papers I had written in other courses, they waived the intro class. There have been many much smarter people before me who set out to prove or disprove the existence of god - I wanted to make a decision for myself instead of going with what my parents told me was true. The process required reading a lot and conversing with those of faith and those without but this was the summary conclusion I came up with - I don't know if god exists for there is no apriori proof that proves his/her existence. The proofs against the existence of god can be destroyed with equal ease for they too make some grave assumptions - not being able to prove existence does not imply non existence. It does in a finite Boolean world but ours is one with time. Time for further inquiry. If believing in god or religion makes one a better person/puts one in a better state of mind, then by all means believe in whatever you please but no policy or rule should be made that is influenced by any religious motif whatsoever (open Pandora's box). As such the majority's view encroach the freedoms of those who may not share their beliefs. If god really does exist I doubt he wants someone to treat another unfairly in his/her name. I'll see if I can dig it up from my old emails and send it over if you would like to read it.

[jvlgato]

Sure, send it my way. It seems to me it can't be proven or disproven absolutely. But I can't go through the philosophical reasoning to prove that, either. It just seems intuitively true. And when I read books about it, I lose interest or fall asleep. The 'philosophy' books I can get through are usually the ones that look at the commonalities between science and religion. What you said makes sense to me, and anything deeper or more detailed just makes me dizzy or frustrated. I'd rather listen to music... that's when I feel something greater, spiritually, anyway. Whatever term one wants to call it is fine by me.

[blessingx]

Big night here with lots of high fives and dancing. Ms. Esmé climbed up on the throne and for the first time did her duty for god and country.