On Monday I started my anesthesiology rotation at the newly renamed University of Minnesota Medical Center - Fairview. According to the director of medical student education, we should be able to handle ASA I cases (patient is otherwise free of disease; the simplest cases) by the end of our 3 weeks. We'll see.
We mostly just show up at 6:30 into our assigned OR room and spend the day with a CRNA, since the CA1s (first year clinical anesthesiology residents) are relatively young and not the best teachers right now. On day #1 I managed my first (human) intubation with a little assistance. That was sweet. Yesterday my room was an MRI suite, and do be in there requires special safety training which isn't worth going through, so I found another room. Got to do another intubation, this time on a 6-year old, which went well and with no assistance. Also got to mask a kid for his entire procedure (PICC line placement - they ran a large i.v. from a vein in his arm to just outside his heart for long-term antibiotic therapy). So we anesthetized the kid but then I had to hold a mask over him and watch his (spontaneous) breathing and help him breath if needed. It went well, but my hand ended up really tired after masking for 45 minutes. The good part was that I got to sit down for 30 of those minutes. Otherwise, I was standing for the other 8.25 hours straight - no bathroom break, no lunch break, no coffee break.
Posted by calv0016 at September 16, 2005 05:30 AM