intern stories

Every Doctor’s Nightmare

Bobak Akhavan August 9, 2019 10 Comments

Bobak Akhavan ~ I was an intern, doing a rotation in the coronary-care unit (CCU) of a large urban hospital. It was very challenging: The patients had complex medical issues, and my fellow residents and I were given lots of responsibility for their care. Still, I felt I was finally getting the hang of residency. One of the first patients I saw was Mrs. Smith, a middle-aged woman who had come to the emergency room with chest pain. We admitted her to determine whether she was suffering from coronary-artery disease that might lead to a heart attack. Mrs. Smith was a kind, soft-spoken woman. Her daughter, Crystal, in her twenties, had inherited her mother’s brown eyes and hair. She lived with her mother, was very

Deadlock

Zachary Reese August 17, 2018 7 Comments

Zachary Reese ~ “Does a rock float on water?” I asked the haggard woman lying in the ICU bed. I was an intern, in the first rotation of my medical residency, and Mrs. Jones had been my ICU team’s patient for the past week. Over that time, she’d looked more and more uncomfortable, constantly gesturing for her breathing tube to be removed. Mrs. Jones tried to form words in response to my question, but the plastic tube in her mouth prevented it. Her chest rose and fell in rhythm with the ventilator’s hiss as the machine pumped air into her lungs; her muscles were too weak to do the work themselves. After several attempts at speaking, she gave up and shook her head. No.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Holland M. Kaplan February 23, 2018 11 Comments

Holland M. Kaplan ~ I’m sitting in the ICU team room, staring at the computer, trying to look like I’m writing a note. But my head is pounding. As an internal-medicine resident doing my first month of residency, I’ve found the ICU of the bustling county hospital a jarring place to start my training. Although I’d anticipated the clinical challenge of caring for very ill ICU patients, I was unprepared for the emotional burden of having to deliver devastating, life-altering news to them and to their family members. Faint yells emerge from Room 7. They have an almost rhythmic quality: “Ahhh!”…(three seconds)…”Ahhh!”…(three seconds)…”Ahhh!” It’s Ms. Burton. I’ve just gotten back from checking on her, but I plod back again.

Birthday Boy

Joe Andrie December 1, 2017 6 Comments

Joe Andrie ~ It’s another day for me as an intern on the labor-and-delivery floor of my large urban hospital–another day scrambling to help pregnant women deliver and trying to keep pace with the unpredictable timetable of the birthing process. My hospital phone rings. I’m really starting to dread that sound. It’s the triage nurse. We’re admitting a patient: Mrs. Harris, age thirty-four, who’s had several prior deliveries and therefore carries the label “multiparous,” or just “multip.” Flipping through her records, I see “G5P4” noted. “G” means the number of pregnancies; “P” indicates how many children she has. A mother of four who’s at term and having contractions…I’ve seen such women give birth within a matter of minutes. In plain language, Mrs. Harris’s chart means

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

Tag: intern stories

Every Doctor’s Nightmare

Deadlock

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Birthday Boy

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

fostering the humanistic practice of medicine publishing personal accounts of illness and healing encouraging health care advocacy

Tag: intern stories

Every Doctor’s Nightmare

Deadlock

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Birthday Boy

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