So, I'm back using this blog again. Hello world, we meet again!
It's almost 60 days since we entered another world in medical school called Junior Internship. It's more known as Clinical Clerkship nowadays, just to keep us in check with the modern trends. Clerkship is considered the last stage (4th year Med) in medical school before graduation. Students in this level now assume the position of a clerk, whose tasks include interviewing and diagnosing patients, formulating diagnostic and treatment plans, perform various procedures that not everybody can do, and especially, monitor. Oh yes! Sounds a lot? You haven't seen anything yet.
Our group started out clerkship with the Medicine rotation, which is considered by majority of people that I've asked as the most "toxic," or more commonly, the hardest of all rotations. This is where 3 years of Patient-Doctor come into play.
If you ask what a Medicine Clinical Clerk does everyday in the hospital, well...
You initiate rapport with patients, handle them, and deal with them, especially the relatives. You learn how to do the "diskarte" factor when it comes to patient care, wherein you try to maximise your time handling more than just 1 or 2 patients. You also learn how to refer to different departments, where medicine is most of the time the starting point for all referrals. You also attend teaching rounds and subspecialty conferences to enhance your knowledge in certain areas of medicine. You answer to codes and either do chest pumping (for males) or ambu-bagging (for females) of the patient who's life is as thin as a strand of hair, in short, at the brink of death. Much more, you learn how to THINK. Yes, THINK. To use the brain, to think, to analyze, that's how we do it.
There's more to what medicine can offer to clerks, it's just up to you to discover.
This rotation of ours, which is set to end in a few days' time, is for me the best rotation...yet. There's a lot of learning in the Department of Medicine. Interns rotating outside of Medicine say that rotating in this department is hard, taxing, and most of all, "toxic." Yes it is, but learning is abundant because of the fountain of cases that can be found in the pay and charity wards, and don't forget the out-patient department. Rotating in the department has been a memorable experience, especially because of the friendly residents and consultants who are more than willing to teach what interns need to know. There are no dull moments with the house staff because they make you feel at home, despite the toxicity. The coolness of this department makes me think of pursuing Internal Medicine as a specialty in 2 years' time.
As the 1st chapter of our 12-month journey to graduation draws to a close, I'm proud to say that I've survived one of the most "toxic" areas of the hospital. What makes me a proud intern, a soon-to-be-physician, is that what was complex has been made simple because of experience. At the end of the day, the fund of knowledge is filled with new information and knowledge that is waiting to be shared to everybody who needs assurance from a person who knows health better than the layman does.
As seen in a Twitter user that I've been following for quite some time:
"When the complex becomes simple, it's pretty amazing."
Two months down, 10 months to go.
