Tales of a Brown-Haired Freak

Last day at the hospital, and it's been fun. On monday we spent a bit of time in the OR (general surgery, nothing terribly exciting but we did get to poke at a lypoma when it was taken out (felt like a very small sack of pudding), and then moved down to the wards to practice our venipuncture on the poor, hapless patients.

Today was all in the orthopedic OR. We headed out right after class and got there relatively early, then split up amongst the theaters. I started out helping to set a shattered elbow and got to help put the cast on, then ended up on a radius fracture. It had been a nasty break and was set with an odd metal stabilizing contraption, 4 bolts that went straight into the bone and clamped together at the top to keep them in a straight line. The other two students got to inject the anaesthetic (while I resolutely turned away - I don't mind using needles my self but watching other people do it squicks me out ) and pull the bolts out (while the patient swore and shouted and gritted his teeth in pain), but we all got to take turns stitching the holes back up (I was complimented on my "steady hands" - apparently sewing has turned out to be good for my career!).

Next we got to see a somewhat rare, moderately dangerous pubic symphysis diastasis surgery. Rare, because normally they heal well with stabilization and support (our patient couldn't do it this way because she also had a fractured femur - this one was traumatic), and dangerous because there's tons of important stuff nearby that can get nicked by an uncareful surgeon. (If you're curious, This is what it's supposed to look like. It was really misaligned and required a lot of brute strength to get everything back in place to set the pins and plate, but when we left everything was proceeding nicely.

Finally, we (only the girls) got to see a D&C in obgyn. Ick, ouch, and ew. This was done with no anesthesia or pain control to remove the retained POC after a 5th month miscarriage, and after watching it I think I'd rather remove my own uterus with a rusty steak knife that go through that, as long as I got anesthetic. According to wikipedia, it normally IS done under general, but apparently that sort of thing isn't considered necessary here.

And that's the end of my hospital time. I've learned that I'd gnaw off my own foot before going into obgyn, but I still like surgery. Dammit. In other news, 35 days till I get to come home!