How to Do a Liver Transplant by Kellee Slater Read Free Book Online

acumen is something you have, doc, not something you get. I was born with it, were you?’ I hoped I was and if not, I wanted to be the exception to the rule and at least try and get it before I was much older.
    Dr Smith had eyes and ears everywhere in the hospital. His nursing staff were very loyal and very good, so therewas nowhere to hide and no room for cover-ups. Rounds were at 7.30 am sharp. My fellow interns and I would be there before the sun rose to ensure everything was in order for this round. This included having all the patients’ medication sheets written up neatly without any errors or overwrites, and all the orders for intravenous fluids charted. Not a single scrap of notepaper was allowed on the rounds because Dr Smith insisted that we have every detail about our patients memorised. We would practise by reciting the patient’s blood test results to each other over and over, deliriously happy if the sodium was 145 and potassium was 4.5 because at least that made it easy to remember. Even though it seemed harsh at the time, I eventually recognised the benefits of training my mind like this and to this day I can automatically recall any important blood test a patient has had for the last month. Dr Smith was teaching me to know, almost instinctively, the important issues for each particular patient. After a while it became effortless.
    On these early morning rounds, we were also keen to ensure that all patients were showered and sitting in their beds, ready to be presented when Dr Smith came around, as he did seven days a week. No one could be on the toilet or wandering aimlessly around brushing their teeth when he came past. A fast round was a good round and anyone not in their bed would slow things down, making it more likely we would be asked more questions that we may not know the answers to. A hilarious quirk of the ward roundswas banana pillows, which Dr Smith disliked intensely. We took it upon ourselves to always ensure that there were absolutely no patients propped up on these oversized frilly bed accessories that were popular at the time. It seems that banana pillows were a sure indication that the patient was ready to settle in for an unnecessarily lengthy hospital stay. Years later when I returned to my hospital room after giving birth to one of my children, I found a banana pillow on my bed and I had to hide it in the cupboard because of the flashbacks it gave me of that time.
    At the end of the day, we would all loiter on the ward long after dark to make sure that Dr Smith would not launch a surprise evening ward round and quiz us about a blood test or x-ray result. We would be ready if he did. Each night, someone would be anointed the ‘car park resident’. This person’s job was to run out to the parking lot to see if Dr Smith had left for the day. Only then was it safe for the rest of us to go home. The long hours seemed really difficult at the time, but now I realise that without Dr Smith’s training, I would never have become the doctor I am today. I was sensible enough to understand the lessons I was learning. Now when my junior doctors are rifling through sheets of paper looking for results they should already know, it is my turn to get upset at them.
    As he watched my enthusiasm and aptitude for surgery grow, Dr Smith was eager to get me started on learning how to operate. He suggested that I tag along at night withthe on-call surgical registrar. A registrar is a doctor who is four or five years out of medical school and is formally training to be a specialist general surgeon. In those days, the surgical registrar would stay in the hospital overnight and often have to operate into the wee hours. It was their job to see all the surgical patients and accident victims that came through the Emergency Department and to figure out what needed to be done before calling the boss to get their plan approved. The hours that registrars worked were heartbreakingly long, but