Busiest. Night. Ever.

Well, I can officially say that I survived my first night shift at the hospital.
But when I say survived, I mean barely.

The doc got in around midnight and from that time till 8am he was just an energizer bunny. Which in retrospect was good when you take into consideration that at about 3 in the morning there were 27 patients on the board with more coming in, and when I left at 8am there were 9.

That might not seem like much, but since he was the only attending (granted he had 3 really good residents), and not all of the patients were there for completely BS reasons, and there were a few parents who were just frustrating to deal with, it was one hell of a night.

Overall though, it was a good experience. I managed to stay awake and on my toes the entire night (because well, with a night like that, you don't have time to think about being tired, or even having to go to the bathroom).

I can't wait to do another one :3

Now that it's summer time

I figure I better get back on updating this.

I really had every intention of keeping up with this during the year, but it really just proved to be impossible.

End of OMS-I
The second semester really kicked a lot of people's butts, but I did manage to kick some of it right back with some considerable amount of force. Yeah, take that Neuro, and then Hematology and Immunology came along and just laughed at me.

But all is said and done, and I was able to go home on May 31st saying that I had officially finished one year of Medical School, and that I was officially A.S., OMS-II. It was quite exciting.

Hello vacation
The morning after, was the beginning of my last summer vacation ever. EVER.
So what was the most appropriate thing to do? Fly off to the Philippines. Naturally.

I have to admit, the Philippines was absolutely amazing, and after 2.5 weeks of sun, warmth, sleeping in, enjoying life, I really did not want to head back to NY. But there I was, sitting on a plane stuck with countless crying and screaming toddlers going back to JFK.

Being all science-y and stuff
Since I got back, it was a struggle to get back on a normal sleep schedule since I was doing nothing for a few days, but then I started doing research at school for the Summer Research Program, and I will probably continue working under him throughout the Fall Semester.  (Yay for money)

I have to admit, I hate grunt work, but as the days go on, I get to do more things and get more involved in the various projects that my PI is working on (including mine), and I find myself happy to be doing bench work again. Kind of makes me miss those days at undergrad.

Back to being a shadow
Anyway, between going crazy over the last block of classes, I was also running around applying to be a volunteer/shadow at a nearby hospital in the Pediatric Emergency Department, which just so happens to be where I want to eventually work, so it's really no big deal. (I wish)

 Now that that's all set up, I will officially start shadowing on Saturday night. Yes, nights. I'll start off with a 12am-8am shift.

I swear, I'm not crazy or anything.