Trauma ICU

Trauma ICU, aka TICU.

Ugh. Just thinking back to this month makes me cringe. My time there was just so painful. With the exception of my immediate team of residents, it felt like everyone there was miserable. All the time. I don't mind working hard. But I mind it when attendings mistake ridicule for teaching. Hence me not going into general surgery.

I did a bunch of subclavian lines,which was a good procedure to get comfortable with. I had the opportunity to do two chest tubes...until the visiting MICU resident stole one and the attending insisted the surgery resident do the other one. Grrrr. That was one thing I really wanted to work on while I was there. Since my other residents never screwed up their lines, there weren't any iatrogenic pneumothoraces giving us cause for chest tubes. I suppose that's for the best.

Most of the nurses were smart and reliable. Some were friendly and offered tips on dealing with different attendings. Some were loud, mean, and untrustworthy for reasons passing understanding. At least I made enough friends so that they would usually let me sleep an hour each night.

Anyway, there were no major screwups while I was covering the unit. No preventable deaths. And while I emerged as a more confident doctor, I'm not really sure what I learned. How to be a more efficient lackey, perhaps?