A & E

So today, I finally made it for my first day in A&E, admittedly I was a week late thanks to being ill but I was glad to have made it eventually. Only then did I realise that my supervising consultant was in fact on leave all last week and is on leave all this week too so he doesn't yet know I even exist let alone that I was off all last week. His secretary had received all my messages and was pleased to see that I seemed to have recovered satisfactorily. I've been in the department before as a student so I had the briefest of tours of the department before being seconded to on of the FY2s. It is safe to say that as a student in A&E I stand out like a sore thumb, or perhaps more like a large grey blob in my beautifully coloured grey scrubs. I'm not sure whether or not they got a really good deal on awfully coloured scrubs or if it is intentional that we stand out quite blatantly so as not to look anything like we know what we're doing and we can be avoided at all costs.

Anyway I was promptly given my first majors patient and sent off to see them. The FY2 who was a bit cranky having done 8 days straight including a couple of 12 hour weekend shifts was very friendly indeed and not once made me feel in the way which is always a bonus. And so the morning continued and before I knew it lunch time had hit, although I didn't take all that long for lunch and was soon back on a now hectic shop floor. Things soon calmed and organised chaos was restored.

I didn't see any particularly interesting patients, in fact, it seems like the local GPs couldn't really be bothered this morning and had sent everyone to A&E. I was pleasantly surprised to hit some veins first time, although one 21year old almost collapsed after I'd finished with him. I enjoyed my first day, it wasn't too taxing, I learnt things and got in some good practice. I'm looking forward to the next 3 weeks...