A Bit More About Work...

My employer

The place I work

A patient I worked with...

(Seriously... sometimes I wonder where all the more

"normal" patients I saw as a student disappeared to...)

The good...

1) Half a day off every couple of months of so for "Professional Development". It can be spent reading journals, doing reflective learning, going on courses etc etc...

2) Patient contact/interaction. Ooohhh...job satisfaction.

3) Staff liaison: team working with the physios, drs, dietician, nurses, care coordinator, social workers...

4) The pay. And annual leave... Which reminds me (and u, if you are still reading), that I'm going to be home in a week for a week :P

5) When work goes smoothly and everything goes as planned.

The Bad...

1) When patients die. Oh... that's a horrible horrible feeling... The first time I was told one of my patients died, I had to excuse myself to the toilet to have a cry. Didn't help that his passing was completely unexpected and in fact, he was meant to go home on that day. The rest of the day was just crappy...

2) The stress that everything you do/say has to be documented and documented well because your notes are legal documents.

3) The sheer amount of paperwork.

4) Meetings. Errm... precious time that can be better spent providing therapy.

5) Getting up at 6am every morning.

And the do-you-laugh-or-cry?

1) When a patient poos and puts his poo in another patient's cupboard as a present.

2) When after struggling with a patient (who also happens to be a retired doctor) for 5 mins to remove her night gown to put on day clothes and her always trying to put her night gown back on, she asks: "Isn't this the gown in which you are going to execute me in?"

3) When a patient self-discharges against medical advice and after completing the paperwork, is dragged back to the hospital while on his way home, by a off-duty nurse who thought he was a patient escaping from hospital.

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Announcement:

I'm moving.

Yes, again.

So I'll be offline the next week.

Should be back the week after.

By which time, I'll be home.

Yeah, HOME.

So till then!

See you when I see you!