Finito

It's 0420, night 7 of my first ever week of nights and I'm glad to finally get the opportunity to rest for a bit. Not so much the physical bit, but the mental bit. We've just been fussing over 3 really (and I mean REALLY) sick patients who seemed to have subconsciously agreed to deteriorate simultaneously. One guy (who has a bilateral above-knee amputation) is quite sure that he's going to pass on and just keeps on telling us that all he wants is more morphine so that he can die in peace. The unfortunate thing is that he's not far from the truth.

Things seem to get busier as the week drags on. I don't quite mind being bleeped for actual emergencies, but last night was horrible for a number of reasons. Firstly, the bed manager screwed things up so we were left with a number of elective patients who had no beds and were stuck in a limbo. And for some funny reason, there were around a dozen emergency admissions at well. Needless to say, things were pretty chaotic.

I got pissed off with a couple of nurses, who weren't happy with the way I was prescribing magnesium. To cut a long story short, I prescribed a certain dose that did not follow hospital protocols (for clinical reasons). Fast-forward a couple of hours, and I find out that the patient had not only not received his Magnesium, but the nurses had phone a few people to ask about the dose.

I maintained that the dose I presribed was correct, and they said that it has never been attempted before, to which I replied 'that's funny, I've been doing it every week whilst I was at the stroke unit.' They then said that geriatric patients were different to surgical patients, despite this particular patient being around 70 years old. I asked, 'So you want me to reverse my decision?'. 'No...you're the doctor...'. Fucking twats.

I had even gotten the green light from the medical registrar on-call, but they weren't happy with the dose and since we had other things to do, we just gave in and prescribed the magnesium according to protocol. Who cares if the patient dies, as long as we follow protocol. I can't wait for the day when I'm senior enough and experienced enough to tell a nurse to fuck off when she's dabbling in things that she knows next to nothing about.

They just follow protocols blindly and learn things in a parrot-like fashion without considering the fact that protocols are there as GUIDELINES and that we're meant to use our clinical judgement. And the bloody Health Secretary now wants to allow nurses to prescribe all manner of drugs. Why don't you just shoot patients as they come through the door? I'm not criticising all nurses (the ones I worked with in medicine were superb) but if they're going to get all high and mighty when they've only touched the tip of the iceberg, you can bet your ass there'll be problems.

Needless to say, by the time morning came I was in a rather foul mood and I was quite tempted to slap the heroin addict who whined 'doctor, do you really need to get my blood? needles are so painful...'.

Was able to take a little time off halfway through the night though. I looked up and saw a very beautiful sky - it was crisp and clear, with a huge full moon and Mars situated next to it. The moment I saw it, I knew I had to go for a walk, which I did. The walk lasted a good 3 minutes I think, since I had only a layer of scrubs and walking around in subzero temperatures isn't exactly the most comfortable of experiences.

Hopefully, nothing serious will be turning up in the next few hours. I've more or less packed, just need to clear up my room a little and then Priya'll send me to the train station. And then I'll be off to put this week behind me. Of course my friends back in Newcastle has decided to organise their biggest open house on the weekend I'm not around (hmmph!!) but I guess I'll be able to devour food that's just as tempting. At this point, I seem to have a craving for some good nasi kandar. Mmm...