night shift#2

either I'm lazy or I keep getting residents who think I'm lazy, or residents who are lazy and don't want to deal with having a medstudent. in either case I finally got my own patient to talk to - but my resident decided it better he write everything down - as if i can't write or i might write the wrong thing. ugh. While talking to my patient the nurse informed me of all the other traumas going on - my resident didn't even tell me. one motor vehicle accident vs pedestrian, one bar fight, and one 15 ft fall after removing xmas lights. I felt so awkward as everyone seems to have a purpose and you are just there. and in everyone else's defense its not like they have time to tell you what your role is. later i asked my resident and he just said, he's some scissors you can cut their clothes off. ok. oh and bring warm blankets. so thats what i did. cut shirts off if the patient had a c-spine collar. That and paced around the 12 room circle, looking around, peeking into rooms behind curtains. Checking on my patient, making sure she was comfortable, makign sure someone was doing something for her. All she wanted to do was eat her food. But we had to wait for labs, Cxr etc and determine what might be causing her problem before we let her eat in case we were going to do "something." what i have no idea. finally after 4 hours in being in the ER we let her eat. And finally after being in the ER for 4 hours my resident went in to listen to her lungs. and even then she never got his full attention. neither did I. i hope to get more procedures next time. atleast a foley for petes sake. its almost a disadvantage being a fourth year becuase everyone thinks you just want to skip out and go home. and no! i just want to learn something, have some responsibility, before I become an intern and have no idea at all.