O&G, easy as Fourier transform equations (Part 2)

What? A Part 2 with a different name from the Part 1?! How canneth this man pretend to be well versed in the finer points of English?!

Well deal with it. Punks.

More ranting about O&G, then.

So yes, the background you have. Essentially losing the will to live due to there never being anything to do. Furthermore, the hospital also had in place some kind of 'booking' 'system' for all and sundry things such as theatre that, by the time I knew what was happening, was choc-a-bloc (much like a choc-ice I suppose) with bookings from nursing students, widwifery students, and Duncan Adshead (pronounced, for the purposes of this blog, ad-sheed).

On top of the chaos, we started to worry that, perhaps, we might not be learning enough. Certainly, I had forgotten what a vagina WAS by week 2 (I'm still reasonably unsure) and as for paroxysmal nocturnal haematuria, well, that was just a collection of long words unrelated to this topic. Into the breech, then, came Laura Anthony, or was it Anthony Laura, or maybe Anthony Lynch. Someone, anyway, who wouldn't take 'go off home and watch your porn' for an answer. She, very kindly, because the rest of us were a bunch of fags who couldn't tell an e-mail from a benign uterine polp, sent off an electronogram to the grand uberfurrer (forgive the missing umlaut) of O&G. Dr P.

Now, Dr P, well I'm not going to say anything on here because she'll probably find me and hurt me.

Hurt me in the face.

But Dr P was having none of this. She dragged Laura into her office (which is located in the depths of a volcano, as you could imagine) at 8:30 and yelled at her, suggesting that requesting teaching that has been detailed to us in our timetable pack, and that the NHS pays the hospital £1,200 a week per student for, is an unrealistic expectation and that she should go, frankly, die in hell. Furthermore she insinuated, and by insinuated I mean explicitly stated, that Laura was making a bad name for herself in O&G and that her future prospects as a doctor, nae person, looked pretty bleak if she continued in this rash and rebellious manner.

So Laura, rightly, stabbed her in the face, as is the custom with annoying people.

Around this same time, I too was being dragged into the sulphurous fires of Dr P's office to have a 'discussion' regarding my attitude towards patients. Now, as a fluffy arty type, I had always held my attitude towards patients to be my best skill, and even if people beat me in exams (which, of course, they do not) at least I'll be a nice doctor that patients will like.

DENIED.

Apparently I'm far too nice, and if I continue along this way, law suits, rather than Armani suits will fill my wardrobe and my life will be a sad sad thing. To Dr P's credit, she did state this in an incredibly nice way and was very keen to assure me that it wasn't a problem and that I merely had to keep it in mind in future and that I shouldn't worry.

Shouldn't worry? I'm ME for god's sake. I always take things in the worst possible way, it's my raison d'etre (excuse the missing hat thing). If I didn't take everything in the worst way how would I moan all the time and be a general pest to society?

Hmm? Tell me.

Well, anyway, that was all a bit of a downer too.

The final straw came on labour week, I had done two 12 hour night shifts and had no sleep due to having to come in during the day (sleepy time) for this meeting with Dr P. I returned from theatre where they had been stitching back together a woman who had been QUITE LITERALLY RIPPED WIDE OPEN, YES DOWN THERE, I KNOW, PAINFUL SOUNDING ISN'T IT by having her beautiful and awesomely named child, to find the midwife who was running the place ushering me enthusiastically towards room 101, where a lady was giving birth to twins. Now the way it works on Labour Suite is that the midwives meet the patients, then ask if it's OK if a medical student comes in, bla bla. All the midwives knew I was around and had been told by the in-charge person to ask permission for me to be there, so when I was sent to the room I assumed this had all happened.

I realised that this was, perhaps, not ENTIRELY the case when the consultant (who is very tall, very scary and very female) half-whispered to the midwife 'do you know anything about this student being in here' to which the midwife SHOULD have responded from the below options

a) 'Oh yes, he's been around all night, I asked permission for him to be here and it is/isn't fine'
b) 'Oh yes, he's been around all night, I didn't get a chance to ask permission. Excuse me, Ms Patient, is it OK for him to be here?'
c) (Common niceness option, that, even if she had no idea who I was, she could have used) 'Oh..er... yeeees, yes he's fine come on in'

Instead she said 'pfft, no?'
(Especially shocking, given that I'd spent £20 by that point on cakes & biscuits for the midwives.)

The consultant then turns round to me and says, agitatedly, 'Look, you can't just stand there, either come in and introduce yourself or leave, one or the other'
Me: 'Oh hi, sorry, I'm Geoff. I'm the medical student on tonight'
Her: 'Yes, but have you got consent to be in here for this birth'
What I WANTED to say: I assume so, because otherwise the midwife hasn't done her F**KING JOB PROPERLY
What I DID say: Er.... well....
Her: 'Well you had better ask the patient then'
Patient *AGHHHHHHHH SCREEEEEEEAAAMMM I'MMM IN SO MUCH PAAAAIN OH GGGGOD AAAAAAAAAAGGGGHHHHHHHHHGHGHGHGHGHGH*
Me: *waits for opportunity to ask patient when not screaming*
Her: 'FINE, WELL IF YOU HAVEN'T GOT THE COMMON DECENCY TO JUST ASK THE PATIENT THEN YOU'RE JUST GOING TO HAVE TO GET OUT. NOW'
Me: Ok, I'm sorry, I'll leave.
Her: 'NO, JUST ASK THE PATIENT PERMISSION!!!!!!!!!!'
Patient (Thank, f**king Jesus): Oh is that a student yes he can come in.

At which point I almost left anyway because I felt like total and utter shit.

And that is, more or less how Obs & Gynae ended. Fun times for all, it also didn't help that the one consultant who actually knew I'm not a complete idiot didn't manage to make it to my final appraisal so the consultants there were, like, 'So, Jif, I can't say I've seen much of you, and when I have seen you you seem to be a complete moron. Tell me, can you spell 'Failure' for me?'

Gah.

Anyway, over now, and all is happiness and rainbows.