Oh heck, this thingy-mi-blog is still here. I'd sort of assumed that it'd self destruct if I kept putting off posting here, but apparently that's not the case. Well, you live and learn eh?
Give me a second to see when it was that I last posted and what I actually had to say (although I suspect that it wasn't an awful lot...)
**reads through piffling entries**
Yep, pretty crappy half posts for a little while really. I think this whole relaxed 4th year thing has spilled over into my free time too - I just don't feel motivated to write about all the oh-so exciting experiences in my life. If life were boring, I'd have an excuse, but so much has happened lately that I can't really pretend to be lacking material. Again, if it were the case that I had no free time, I could use that as my excuse but that's not the case either. Simply put, I've just not been arsed to update this thing. Nothing more complicated than that.
I had intended to move on at this point, but I'll have one last word. In mitigation, for the 6 weeks I was in Darlington, my internet access was next to non existent and there was
a lot of server downtime to contend with.
So, paediatrics in Darlo… I suppose I should post a picture of the hospital, as is traditional (yes, I am aware that previously posting one picture does not a tradition make);
Tada! Darlington Memorial Hospital (aka DMH for those of us "in the know"). Check out the 1950s architecture - I believe it's called "Prison Camp Chic". Would you believe that the buildings are owned by a PFI? You’d sort of expect nicer surroundings with all that private cash… Anyway, it’s decent enough inside and I’m straying off the point a little. Actually, was there a point?
In the absence of any clear direction from above, I’ll give a brief overview of my time in paeds and what I’ve been up to since then shall I?
...
...
Damn my easy distractability (is that even a word?) I've just spent an hour and a half playing Spider Solitaire. Yes, Spider Solitaire. Kill me now. I'll continue...
... just as soon as I manage to win one game on the difficult setting!
Anyway. Like the other placements during the SSC period (the others being A&E and anaesthetics respectively), I spent 6 weeks in Darlington and the vast majority of my time was spent on the Children's Day Unit (CDU - Acronym-tastic!). Essentially, I took on the role of dogs body and did all the initial clerking, bloods and cannulation for the unit - I should probably explain that all kids who were sent to the hospital by GPs/Walk in Center etc were seen by the CDU staff rather than A&E (except those kids that were involved in accidents - they were seen in A&E first). The unit was scheduled to close at 7pm but I never got away before 9pm - it was just that busy!
Aside from the CDU stuff, I also attended the daily ward rounds where I was constantly reminded of just how little I actually know. It was a rare occasion indeed for me to get something right when put on the spot. We live and learn though.
When I wasn't busy on the ward, I had to put a bit of effort into preparing and producing an A0 (!) poster of my A&E Head Injury Audit as well as writing the complete report. I thought I'd make my life easy by producing the poster using PowerPoint - apparently that's how the professionals do it, so why not me? The poster looked great once I'd finally worked out a layout I was happy with ... like it?
Unfortunately, I'd not taken into account of the fact that I'd no way of printing an A0 poster in one go. I've only got a black and white laser printer, so what on earth I thought I was doing when I decided to make it in one piece I don't know! Simple, I thought, I'll pay a printer to print it for me.
Sixty Quid!
This, believe it or not, was the absolute cheapest quote for one printer at the lowest paper and print quality commercially available. I wanted to get a good grade, but not that badly! In order to avoid a total disaster which would require a major rethink (oh, did I mention that this all occurred with 4 days to go before the deadline?) and muchos effort on my part, I prostrated myself before the feet of the lovely people at medical imaging and asked, nay begged, them to find a way to print it for me on the cheap. They were a little reluctant at first but, to give them credit, they managed to print it for me. Yes, what should have been a single sheet came out as 12 A3 sheets which I had to stick together, but I was over the moon. Ok, not literally over the moon - that would require several tons of highly volatile rocket fuel capable of generating millions of pounds of thrust. Then there's the need for a space suit of some sort... so, in all, not worth the effort or cost involved... Argh, off topic again! Bad Mark.
The finished article (ignore the funky duvet);
Total cost to me: £24 (inclusive of whacking great card boards to mount it on), quite a lot of sleepless nights and, very nearly, one very pissed off other half. (It's not my fault he's no good at sticking things to my satisfaction!)
In addition to the ridiculous effort required for the poster, there was also the little matter of an assessed oral presentation to prepare for. Not wanting to cast off my "Mr Last Minute" mantle just yet, I held off doing any work until two days before the presentation (which brings us to a week last Wednesday if I'm right...)
I'll hold off finishing this tonight - I don't want to bore you all to death!