Retroactive Post

As promised, I got my camera mailed back to me so here's another post about my fun and busy visit to the Bay Area in February. Fun because I got to spend time with an old friend from med school/internship, and busy because I had two interviews.

We went on a day-trip to Santa Cruz through a local community college for a "wine tour." We visited three wineries, had lots of wine, and port salut. Oh my. Port salut is my new favorite cheese. I'm currently on a hunt for it in Chicago.

Today, I got home from working in the peds ER at 2am, went straight to bed, and woke up just in time for our PICU team off-service brunch at The Bongo Room. It was so nice to see the team outside the hospital, outside of that stressful, hair-raising experience, at a nice sunny place in the South Loop for one of the best brunches in Chicago. I had the BLT benedict, and luckily for us the kitchen made a mistake and our waitress brought us chocolate-carrot pancakes that tasted just like carrot cake. MMM. We devoured that, in addition to what we ordered in minutes.

I rented Atonement for tonight! and tomorrow, I'm moonlighting in the NICU! Can't wait for the extra cash... that I already spent!

I survived

Thank goodness my ICU month is OVER. Looking back, it was a great learning experience and I had a great team and I think I was pretty lucky in not breaking any admission records or anything. The most I admitted was 8 in one night. The most sleep I got was like... 2 hrs. The average sleep? Probably more like 5 mins since there were many sleepless nights. That's the thing that was the hardest... The sick patients, they were interesting. The NO SLEEPING for 30 hours thing? Not fun. at all. It was worse than any month as an intern.

Moving on... Last night was Phil's birthday. He's an old man. Lis made a wonderful chocolate cake with the best frosting I've had in a long time. YUM.

Tears

I've been meaning to write but this month is wearing me down.

In pediatrics, we don't see that many deaths. Or at least compared to our adult-counterparts in internal medicine. But a couple weeks ago, I had a baby that died. The horrible part was the way it happened. There was a pediatric code called in the adult ER (which usually means something bad). I was on call that day so I had to stay in the unit, but many of my colleagues went and found a baby that was in full cardiopulmonary arrest, i.e. not breathing and with no heartbeat. To make a long story with too much drama short, the baby was brought to the unit and died.

I had admitted that same baby to the unit not even a full week prior. I had done a full sepsis work up, including a spinal tap that I myself did, before transferring the baby to another team, where the baby was discharged home. In good health.

So how is it that this same baby shows up to the ER, dead?

It's something that I've been thinking about daily since it happened. As I watched the other doctors doing CPR and then declaring that it was futile and pronouncing the death, I cried because it just wasn't supposed to happen that way. Kids, and especially little babies, aren't supposed to die. What did I miss... what did I do wrong... what could I have done to prevent this. How could this baby have been seen by multiple doctors, discharged home, and then die less than a week later?

I don't have any of those answers. I think I've come to a place in my mind and heart that we didn't miss anything. The baby just got really sick again at home and babies are fragile. But it's still hard to walk away.

That same day when I was on call, one of our cancer patients died. And it reminded me of why I like oncology and why I hate working in the intensive care unit... at least in oncology, most patients have a chance to fight. This baby didn't have a chance. She just showed up already dead. One day fine, and the next day, not. That's a lot harder to accept than the death of someone who's been fighting for a long time and for whom we've tried everything.

On that depressing note...

Visit to the Bay Area, Part I

A couple weeks ago, I made my first visit to the Bay Area for my interviews. I heart California... One program I loved; one program I hated. But I had a great weekend with my med school/internship friend. We went to the Ferry Building and enjoyed the weekend farmers' market. I found olallieberry jam which is a favorite of Davey, my displaced California friend who lives in Chicago, so I bought him a little jar. Which got taken away from me as I went through security at the Oakland Airport on the way back. Apparently, olallieberry jam is considered a "gel."

I was so PISSED. Not to mention, Southwest canceled my flight and I got rerouted to Las Vegas. I didn't land in Chicago until 2am. and then Armand went to the WRONG airport to try and pick me up so I ended up taking a cab home anyway. Sigh.

On another depressing note, I'm currently in the pediatric intensive care unit. It's slowly killing me. I didn't even have the energy to count up how many hours I've been working per week. I have just a little over 2 weeks left and I don't know how I'm going to survive.

I left my camera behind at my friend's house in the bay area so I'll post again when I get it back... we went on a Santa Cruz winery tour, which was fun!