I'm slacking on the posts

I promised you a post on Saturday and it's Monday. You hate me, don't you? The truth is, when given an hour of free time I can choose to nap or write a post. I love you, I really do... I just don't love you as much as napping. Don't take it personally, I basically only love my parents as much as I love napping and that is a REALLY close one. I would be lying if I said it was anymore than a tie. I'm sorry mom and dad...

So anyways... that was awkward wasn't it? I have a lot to update you on and approximately 15 minutes to do it. I could take more but I'm having a melt down about anatomy, you would think I would have a better knowledge of stuff that is currently occurring in my own body but apparently not. In light of the amount of information and time given I'm going to take a page out of Dr. Ambron's book and come at you outline style.

1. Patient interviewing!
2. Learning even more things!
3. Jet skiing!
4. Crazy Cadaver Catches! ALLITERATION! I had two coffees in the past 8 minutes!

Alright, not so much as an outline but a guide for my over caffeinated brain.

Let's begin! Exclamations!

Last week we had another ICM, this one focusing on communication between physician and patient. Now I know you're saying to yourself "Come on Katie, you don't need a communication workshop! Your gift of social interaction is matched by none" and I agree! But in case patients don't like awkward girl syndrome I decided I should probably take heed. After a brief workshop I watched my two colleagues (that's right, I have colleagues) go ahead of me interviewing their standardized patients. One interviewed a woman with a sore throat (definitely cancer) and another a woman with knee pain (probably lupus). They did well and followed our script of "open questions, leading questions, emotion seeking, emotion addressing" with few flaws. I'm sure they felt awkward, well I know they felt awkward, at one point Alec paused mid-sentence to very meticulously uncross and recross his legs, as a ploy to buy time. (I can call him out on that, he admitted it). Naturally, I was scheduled to go last. We walk in the door, I introduce us as student doctor blah blah blah on Dr. so and so's team and ask if I can take a history. She agrees (phew) and I sit down. Being the sly student doctor that I am, I already had my first question ready and, being the awkward girl that I am forgot her name. I took about 35 seconds to come up with her name (I know, I reviewed the tape) and casually worked it in with my second question. Feeling pretty smooth, I moved through the symptoms and questions about them quickly, I was certain I would have to order a CT for her headaches, definitely a subdural hematoma, when we came to the emotion seeking part. I managed to get her to talk about how her headaches were affecting her and her life but when it came to addressing those I really shone. She said she was frustrated and frightened. I replied, in a moment of sheer professionalism "Oh. I totally get that". Like, totally. I tried to recover by saying "I respect that you feel that way, we're going to do whatever we can for you"  but the valley girl ship had sailed flying a proud sparkly flag. No one else noticed or seemed to care, in my critique she told me my placid demeanor was comforting (score one for apathy face) so not a total loss. Just a personal faux pas. It didn't help my confidence that I had forgotten to take off my chipping navy nail polish. Emo girl on the run in the clinic.

Next! Learning even more things. It's exactly what it sounds like. Sometimes I swear, if I sit really still, I can feel my brain expanding and pushing against its meninges and inner lamina. And if I'm really quiet I can hear it whispering for me to drop out and work at target. I gently placate it by reminding it that we only like to SHOP at target, not stock the shelves. Apologies to any target employees I may have offended with that sentence, it just seems like a really hard job because I know how I shop at target: pick 10 things up and put them down in 10 random places. I'm indecisive, I'm sorry! There, now you all know I'm a terrible person. I've gotten off track. Learning more things... that's really it. Just learning more things. Apparently learning more things means I've lost the ability to communicate effectively. Ah well, you gotta pick and choose. I know you're more interested in today's installment of:

Crazy Cadaver Catches!

I'm not proud of how long I spent on that and how mediocre 2001 paint project it turned out.

We officially have cause of death for our cadaver: Massive subdural hematoma. It's crazy to read about something and then see it in real life. When I say massive I mean massive, there were two distinct impressions on the brain from where the blood pooled- it was incredible but also very scary because I cannot imagine the amount of pain that man must have felt. We also unzipped out bag to find someone else's brain by our body's feet. We literally stumbled upon it.... buh dun dun. I feel like I had more to say on this...

I'm out of time! And I forgot to talk about jet skiing. Google the caribbean sea, you'll get a really good idea of it. Then couple that with the image of me being too terrified to go over 40 km because now I know all the wonderful ways I can die and literally crashing through waves. Very painful. No one mentioned you're supposed to go fast to avoid sinking/flying/immense ocean spray. I was just trying to be a responsible driver, gosh.