The last 3 days of the year

Started with oncall from Wednesday into Thursday. Luckily it wasn't that eventful. Managed to catch 2 hours of sleep which was not too bad. Most sleep I got was 3 hours.

Was woken up at 4am cause there was a new admission. Naughty 2 year old put a small dice up her nose. Initially it was still visible in the right nostril but after she struggled so much while doing the head x-ray, the dice went in further and was not visible even on x-ray. ENT tried to dig it out but failed. In the end, admitted to the ward that I was covering for endoscopic removal under general anaestetics. Had to insert a cannula into a strong, struggling child with a dice somewhere inside her oropharynx which might have gone in even further after I stressed her out even more. Listened to her chest after....no stridor. So, all is still well. Sent her off for chest-x-ray. Might have seen some white shadow around the level just below her chin. Hmmm....it's gone in quite far. Had a really bad stomachache cause had my dinner too late at night when food has already gone bad but was too tired to think of my own health and just swallowed it down within 5 minutes cause new admission had arrived at midnight. Regretted that terribly.

Struggled to stay awake the whole of Thursday. I still don't understand why my energy level keeps on falling after each call no matter how much I rest. Found out during passover round that there was going to be an exchange transfusion that night. Made my friend promise to call me when it has started. Went back to my room, ate, showered, waited for call but fell asleep. Woken up around midnight....found out that exchange transfusion was going on, went back to the ward to observe and learn something. Went home around 2am.

Got called by friend who was oncall at 5.55am to ask for help to take 6am bloods. So, went back to ward, took first patient's blood and suddenly was called to sedate patient for reintubation as patient pulled out endotrachael tube. Struggled to sedate for almost an hour. Continued with the morning bloods and ward round. Couldn't be bothered to do much as was seriously too tired. Doctors in Malaysia don't get any public holidays, but at least I got a half day. Was at the verge of tears when had to take at least 6 mls of blood from a patient for some stupid research which HOs must carry out under orders from research assistants (which get paid to collect data and they by right should collect the bloods themselves) but we don't get any extra pay or recognition and patients lose more blood. Was asked to give up on my attempts at getting blood from a meningitis patient as I was ruining all the available veins. At this point, I couldn't care less for the patient. Will attack him again tomorrow for the sake of research. I'm so glad that today is the last day of this research.

Stayed back to complete a transfer summary for a patient who had been in PICU for the past 2 months. Made it super duper brief and packed my bags and disappeared from the wards before I was asked to do something else.

Counting down to New Year in my room after hibernating. Going to continue hibernation. Will go to wards by 6.30am to help oncall houseman to take bloods. Fingers crossed that my life will be smooth sailing for year 2011.

Happy New Year!!!!