Dreaming through the Noise

no matter how trivial or menial our tasks as medical students may be, we should not feel bad because in our own little way, we help our patients…

i have heard a lot variations of this statement time and again, from consultants or residents when they talk about the things we do in the hospital.  monitoring, extracting blood, iv insertions, pushing stretchers and wheeled chairs, acting as social workers blah blah blah.  sometimes they even add some statement that we are lucky to be able to ‘touch’ patients because in other hospitals, students fight over doing ABGs because they are not allowed to do procedures (di naman yata ito totoo).  there is always a part of me that thinks that this is just their way of making us feel better about our being treated as slaves sometimes. 

one friday high-risk OBAS duty, the clerks were gone all morning.  there were just 4 interns.  high risk friday.  so around 930 am, the high risk clinic already sent about 10 patients from the OPD.  there were a number of unregistered patients.  there were gyne patients from nowhere. basta there were a lot of patients.  by about 12 noon i think i already made 10 trips to the perinatology section (sampung beses na ako nagtulak ng stretcher/wheeled chair).  by 1PM, our lab master was already swamped with his work and the rest of us are tired from charting and conducting.  around that time, a resident asked me to conduct a patient to ward 16 for ultrasound.  i wanted to scream but of course i did not because that would be a waste of energy.  so i obediently pushed the wheeled chair up to the second floor.

on our way up, the patient relayed that she was really scared to have an ultrasound again.  apparently, the previous night she already had one and the fellows were suspecting that her malignancy already spread to her bladder.  this second ultrasound will be done by a consultant to confirm that finding.  i did not know that she is a cervical CA patient.  she said she is afraid that the transvaginal ultrasound will hurt her so much again. 

when we got to ward 16, there was the consultant, the fellow and a rotating resident.  i was told that i can sit down because i do not have to write down the findings because there was a resident to do that.  but then the patient asked me to stay.  “huwag mo ako iwanan anak, natatakot ako. masakit kasi.” so i stayed.  as the consultant proceeded with the procedure, she was screaming in pain.  the consultant was very apologetic while he was doing the procedure but he had to continue.  “anak hawakan ko ang kamay mo para mabawasan ang sakit”.  she held my hand.  it was a really tight grip that she almost buried her nails in my palm.  it sort of hurt me.  but somehow in the darkness of the ultrasound cubicle, i could see that it made a difference.  for some reason, i know that at that moment, my presence mattered a lot to her. 

after a while, the fellow explained to her that indeed there is some bladder involvement.  as we made our way back to OBAS, she thanked me.  and because of that, even for a little while, my leg pain did not matter.