Just a quick post to update on what's been going on!
I started intern orientation last week. Here's what the schedule consisted of:
Sunday PM: Welcome dinner at Cozymel's. All 24 peds interns and the 5 med/peds interns plus significant others had dinner together, on the department of course! Several attendings were there and it was a great time of meeting people. They also gave out schedules for orientation and gave us our MedStudy books, a generous gift from ACH to help us study for boards!
Monday: ACH orientation, a great day. We were in the fancy-schmancy board room. We received our moving bonuses!, pagers, and our ipod touches already loaded with excellent medical apps that we'll need during residency.
Tuesday: UAMS orientation. Took pictures for badges, got shots, and listened to a lot of information about HIPAA (patient privacy), insurance, and more.
Wednesday: More UAMS orientation. Pretty boring. But Wednesday evening the Dept. of Pediatrics took everyone to the Travs game. We had a great time! Free food and it wasn't too hot. Great meeting some of the residents I didn't already know and catching up with others!
Thursday AM: ACH orientation again. We received our scrubs and learned about the ACH standards of care.
Thursday PM: Back to UAMS to turn in forms...now UAMS pays for my insurance!!!
Friday: Neonatal resuscitation training. We learned how to resuscitate babies who have just been born if they are having trouble breathing right after delivery. Very interesting!
Overall, a fairly good week. I've been trying to stay up later at night to get used to getting a little less sleep. Most of our days this week started around 7:30 AM.
And the overview for next week:
Monday and Tuesday: PALS (Pediatric Advanced Life Support) training. This is what to do if a child codes (heart stops beating, they stop breathing, etc.). It's supposed to be pretty intense I think. Luckily we already had adult ACLS (advanced cardiac life support) and some parts are similar.
Wednesday: computer training
Thursday: THE REAL WORLD STARTS! This is the day we officially start working. I'll be starting on an inpatient team (Team 1). I'll be taking care of infants and toddlers with general pediatric problems that need to stay in the hospital for a few days. I've heard great things about this team and the people I'm working with already, so I'm very excited. Also, Thursday night is my first night on call, so that's scary! Luckily, it's short call so I don't have to sleep at the hospital.
I plan to try to update a little more often now that I'm working, when I get a little time. I hope I have some interesting stories to share! I'll try to do a post later this week that explains some more about what I'll be doing. And then I'll try to update Friday about my first day on the job!
