An Observation Inside The Healthcare System

The last time I worked anesthesia for labor and delivery, I was finishing up some charting, and wondering when the next anesthesiologist was going to show up to relieve me.

Sitting in a chair, on the edge of her seat, three computers down, was the ward clerk. She had worked all night, and I thought it was unusual of her to sit there instead of at the front desk.

Seven a.m. came about five minutes later.

She logged in to this computer time card system, clocked out, and literally RAN out the door!

The nurses have to do this on this little machine in the hall. There is one by the elevators, and another by the main O.R.

I see them waiting near it at the end of the day, waiting to go home. I also see people clocking in and out for lunch relief at the operating room too.

I have to admit, the only way I can do my twenty-four hour call, is to count down, just like this, in my mind, 'they can only hurt me for seventeen more hours...' all the way down to the end of my call shift.

Is this part, the 'running a business' for a profit or non-profit facility healthy?

I read an E.R. Doctor's column on 'Wellness' today--and he said, 'I hadn't seen the beach in one year. I live five minutes from the beach, and to see the ocean, all I have to do is look out my window. But with my stressful life, and busy schedule, I hadn't seen the ocean, or been to the beach, for a whole year.'

That is was started his search to seek wholeness and wellness in his life. He says it's like a sitting stool with three legs--one is sleep, the other is exercise, and the last is work. Without all three, you're not going to have a stable chair, or complete health.

He has a good point.

What do you think?



Aloha and Mahalos,
Namaste,
Peace,

Reiki Doc

Why I Don't Have a Life ; )

I am in the active practice of Medicine. My specialty is Anesthesia. I am a board-certified Cardiac Anesthesiologist.  It took five years of undergraduate work to get my major in Chemical Engineering. I worked and saved money for more time before applying to Medical School. The application process is not cheap! You have to pay for the MCATs and you also have to pay for the applications and all of your travel to interviews. Once I was admitted, I spent four years pursuing my MD degree, followed by five years in Residency (one as Chief Resident) and one more in Cardiac Fellowship.

At the time of my training, Residents were encouraged to 'put the patient first' and therefore be a 'good doctor'. Long hours were encouraged! The reason that I left my surgery residency and 'switched' is that I was so busy I had given up time for family but I also lost time for going to church on Sundays. That was just too much of myself to be giving up.

Now, Residents have work hour limits that are enforced quite stringently by 'the powers that watch those things'. Attendings do not have any work hour limits whatsoever.

I blog. I used to wake up at four in the morning and go on the treadmill in my home (busy doctors don't have time to go to the gym, they buy gym equipment).  Now I go straight to the computer.

Then in the mornings I tend to the needs of the family and the house. Laundry, lunches, breakfast, searching for items for show and tell, etc. Mornings are always a race against the clock and the number one thing I am looking to disappear after the Ascension Process!

Once in a while, at work we have meetings for the entire department that works in the O.R. The last one, surgeons complained about the 'turnover times'. After a surgeon walks out of the room, they sit in the lounge. I wake the patient up, the bed comes in, we take them to recovery. One minute after I leave the room, cleaning crew comes in. The scrub tech takes out all the dirty instruments and readies a cart for clean ones. The floor is scrubbed. The new case gets set up once everything is clean and new (my circuit for breathing on the anesthesia machine, suction, are all new).  There is hardly any time to eat or take care of your body functions, never mind a phone call, since the new patient has to be evaluated prior to surgery in pre-op holding.

I asked my boss, in private, 'What do we sell?'. He looked at me like I was from Jupiter--he is so ingrained in the system. 'We sell Health. Wouldn't you agree?' (he nods yes). "Well, assuming the turn over times decrease, when are we going to eat?' (many times 'lunch' doesn't come until three p.m., and the last meal before it was five a.m.) He explained his way of going from PACU to the Doctor's Dining Room, getting a box and eating what he can after seeing the patient first and leaving the box in the Doctor's Lounge. He said, it's easy. Well, sometimes there is a four hour case to do after getting a few bites out of that box! LOL. 'Do you exercise? I don't. I don't get enough sleep. Do you? How can we be in the business of selling health?'. I knew that I made my point because he stopped talking and relaxed--and that as a man in his sixties, he will have to face the price of this lifestyle sooner rather than 'later'.

Oddly enough, it is this lifestyle that puts me in place for fascinating Reiki advancements. The circulating nurse is interested in taking one of my Reiki classes. She came to me during the long case while the patient was stable and things were going well, and asked me about Reiki. I shared about Usui, Hayashi, and Takata. She gasped at the story of Takata jumping off the O.R. table and cancelling her surgery! I gave her a copy of Reiki News, and she came back to me several minutes later saying, 'I had this happen to me!--contact from beyond with the smell of roses--it was in the car and all her family had to roll down the windows it was so strong!' She is one of the next 'phases' of Lightworkers starting to 'wake up' and doesn't realize it. I do. Right now, my 'wave' is strengthening--my buddies from Psychic Development classes from a few years ago--and we are the 'support' for the newer ones.

I had two chances to be relieved from my case last night. I declined them. I promised the patient I would be there for them. I gave the personal touch. I exchanged time spent with family (from six to nine at night) to be there with the patient. This is what makes Private Practice great. We go out on a limb for you.

Namaste,

Reiki Doc