End of the First Week

I guess it's safe to say I survived my first week of internship. And no one died. At least none of my patients. I did feel bad for one intern...they came in one morning and one of their patients had died overnight. No, the intern didn't kill this patient. They were very sick and died of natural causes. But imagine how the intern must have felt. No one called to let them (I'm being gender neutral so there is no HINT of a HIPPA violation...I'll explain later) know that the patient had died. The last few days have been interesting.

In hospitals, the team of doctors taking care of patients changes every month on the first of the month. For me, this year...I will spend 5 weeks on the Renal Ward Team because interns started 1 week earlier. That meant that on Friday, me and the other intern got a whole new upper level staff. The resident was post-call from his June month, so he was at the house asleep. The Renal Fellow, who just finished her Internal Medicine Residency, was day 1 as a Fellow. And the Attending was new as well. Not a new attending, but new to the service. Let me explain the higherarchy that is Medicine.

Medical Students--what I was 2 months ago. Basically, can't do anything legal and therefore help their intern AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE!!! They are usually the ones running to x-ray or finding out lab results. We call this kind of work SCUT. And medical students are affectionately called Scut-Monkeys.

Interns--that's me--Graduated medical school 1-2 months ago. New MDs.
Interns are in their first year of their residency (3-5 yrs. depending on the specialty). Interns report to the Resident.

Residents--2nd,3rd,4th...yr of residency. They have supervisory responsibilities of the interns and medical students. Residents report to the Fellow (if there is one) or to the Attending

Fellow--done with Residency. A Fellow has chosen a sub-specialty--cardiology, Nephrology, CV Surgery, Oncology, etc. A Fellowship is 2-4 yrs and most always involves research. Fellows report to Attendings.

Attending--Staff--done with training. Could operate in Private Practice. Board Certified in their filed of training. Eligible to make more money than me, which is less than $40,000 during residency for 80+ hours/week.

So, it's a new month with a new team. My fellow intern was given 4 days of vacation around the 4th of July and won't be back until Thursday the 7th. In Internal Medicine, we all get 4 days vacation around a holiday...he just happened to get the 4th. That stinks for him. Mine are around Thanksgiving in order to attend the wedding of my friend and fellow (not Fellow) Pediatric intern, Jeremy Dalton. So, for the next 4 days, it's me, the resident, and the Fellow on the team. That translates into more work for me!

Happy 4th of July! I will work until noon and then go home and get ready for a little grill time.

In His grace.