K-ankles

So I think i may be developing "kankles". You know, where your ankles become so big they look like they are as big as your calves....well I guess Kankles should be spelled with a "c" then...hmmm SO as a surgeon standing is the norm. I probably stand for eight to twelve hours a day, much of the time in multi-hour blocks. Yeah, it's not easy, and it takes some getting used to. I remember when I was in medical school I was a total fainter and it was a serious problem. I would be in a big case assisting...then something would happen. I don't know what it was, maybe I saw something new and absolutely gross, or maybe I just locked out my knees for a little too long. But either way I would just turn pale white, sweat through my scrubs and the world around me would begin to tunnel in. I never ended up flat on the floor, but I'm sure given another minute there were many times when I could have been.

So it's kind of expected that most surgically associated activities are done standing (unless you're a hand surgeon I suppose). This of course includes rounds. Now I'm currently on a SICU rotation, and that means that there is more of a medicine feel to the course of the day. It also means my attending is a medicine doc running a SICU. I was always more of a fan of surgeons that ran SICUs because I always felt that if they had actually done the surgery at some point in their career they would have a better understanding of the patient and their problems....plus it's truly a different style of practice. For those of you in surgery or medicine, you know what I mean....it's not that there is anything wrong with either side of the coin. Granted I think the surgery and medicine residents spend countless hours throughout residency mocking the other for their ridiculous consults whether they be for lactates not associated with any other symptom, or for DM that for some reason they can't control. But regardless, my current rotation involves a lot of rounding. Surgeons make fun of medicine docs for all of their incessant rounding and hours and hours of differentials and deep discussion into a BS of 99. But it looks like I'm currently doing the same....whether it be by choice or not.

This week was out of control and completely off the hook. Our attending (who I'll refer to as Dr. Cupcake) is the most strict, anal retentive, scares the crap out of you on a daily basis SICU attending in our hospital. Needless to say I am so happy to be done with his torture. Granted I did learn some important stuff this week....but I never like it when attending treat you like the scum of the Earth. It's not like I want to be scum. I'm actually quite interested and trying as best as I can. I really don't give the wrong answers just to ruin your day. In fact I feel bad and embarrassed when I don't know how to read your mind and give the answers required. See...I'm working it here. Of course this guy likes to round for multiple hours a day. This is after the residents have already seen the patient and written their notes. So we end up standing in the SICU for multiple hours at a time. There is no cool surgery going on, there is nothing to really lean on, it's just you and the constant pain and humiliation.

Being pregnant makes this even more difficult. I'm pretty used to pain and humiliation. I'm pretty thick skinned and just try to take crappy comments as a refection on the person they came from, and focus on the info I failed to regurgitate, and try to do better the next time. Otherwise I would be a wreck and wouldn't be able to to sleep at night. But the standing is killing me. I think I'm getting some swelling in my ankles too. Hence the worry about kankles. So I'm going to sit during rounds from now on (if I can manage it)....I think I'm going to steal one of the nurses rolly chairs and drive myself around the unit. Maybe I should even sport my suport hose from back in medical school. Let's see how this goes.