now are you sure you're warm enough?
ahhh.. there are few things nicer in a professional environment than coming to the end of a night-shift stint.
I even hung around in work 30 mins over my knock-off time so I could talk to friends coming on the day-shift and killing time before Costa opens at 8am. Cos, unfortunately the Costa's outside of London don't open early enough to catch the morning commuter crowd.
The last 4 nights have been great, and as there were the same 3 staff for the first 3 nights it proved good continuity for us all to understand and chat about stuff with each other.
We were incredibly fortunate though as there were no neuro cases on tuesday or wednesday night. And that's rare.
I only scrubbed for one case in 4 nights, either we had a quiet night or nothing came through the doors.
So we did our checks and just ate and drank gallons of tea all night.
And the tea is for more than the obvious reason.
It's not just nursing staff and surgeons working in the nighttime. The cleaners come in to hose down every available flat surface.
When else would they have the chance to clean theatres thoroughly?
They're cool people and very laid back. And thorough.
But when they clean our PIT of a staff room they open all the windows to make the floor dry faster. Which is great but this time of year it causes the temperature to plummet.
On the first night I tried to sleep in a chair and almost broke my back.
The second night I got 3 chairs lengthways and froze as I was only wearing my tracker.
So on the third night one of the more maternal recovery nurses went out and got armfuls of blankets and dolled them out to us all. I ended up with 2 blankets (pillow and coverlet) and my heavy green coat as well as my track top.
Hmmm... toasty.
I then proceeded to nod off for about 3 hours.
which was nice.
until the emergency bleep went off.
Now, there are few things more terrifying than being the soul person in charge of the emergency bleep when it starts bleeping at 5am.
It could be anything... car crash, triple A, or some nurse on ward 12 mis-dialing the bleep number of the canteen to see if they're still running.
That happened on Monday night.
But no, this is the real deal. Being woken up in this way sobers you up in 2 seconds flat. My heart starts pounding at 150 bpm due to the adrenaline influx and I just manage to punch the phone keys.
In the end I talk to the surgeon. Upper GI bleeder.
NOT ortho or Triple A, thank christ.
I guessing the silent prayer I uttered on the way to the phone worked then. But I'm not gullible enough to think that one day my number will come up on night duty and a Triple A WILL come crashing through the doors in the wee hours.
We call out the on-call Gastro crew who come down with their gear ten minutes later, set up the theatre and drink tea til the patient arrives. The bleeding is not serious and we take a specimen for biopsy.
Last night I scrubbed but didn't nod.
And now I have the weekend to recover (and post piccies of my BALL) before returning to the hell of days on monday morning.
I even hung around in work 30 mins over my knock-off time so I could talk to friends coming on the day-shift and killing time before Costa opens at 8am. Cos, unfortunately the Costa's outside of London don't open early enough to catch the morning commuter crowd.
The last 4 nights have been great, and as there were the same 3 staff for the first 3 nights it proved good continuity for us all to understand and chat about stuff with each other.
We were incredibly fortunate though as there were no neuro cases on tuesday or wednesday night. And that's rare.
I only scrubbed for one case in 4 nights, either we had a quiet night or nothing came through the doors.
So we did our checks and just ate and drank gallons of tea all night.
And the tea is for more than the obvious reason.
It's not just nursing staff and surgeons working in the nighttime. The cleaners come in to hose down every available flat surface.
When else would they have the chance to clean theatres thoroughly?
They're cool people and very laid back. And thorough.
But when they clean our PIT of a staff room they open all the windows to make the floor dry faster. Which is great but this time of year it causes the temperature to plummet.
On the first night I tried to sleep in a chair and almost broke my back.
The second night I got 3 chairs lengthways and froze as I was only wearing my tracker.
So on the third night one of the more maternal recovery nurses went out and got armfuls of blankets and dolled them out to us all. I ended up with 2 blankets (pillow and coverlet) and my heavy green coat as well as my track top.
Hmmm... toasty.
I then proceeded to nod off for about 3 hours.
which was nice.
until the emergency bleep went off.
Now, there are few things more terrifying than being the soul person in charge of the emergency bleep when it starts bleeping at 5am.
It could be anything... car crash, triple A, or some nurse on ward 12 mis-dialing the bleep number of the canteen to see if they're still running.
That happened on Monday night.
But no, this is the real deal. Being woken up in this way sobers you up in 2 seconds flat. My heart starts pounding at 150 bpm due to the adrenaline influx and I just manage to punch the phone keys.
In the end I talk to the surgeon. Upper GI bleeder.
NOT ortho or Triple A, thank christ.
I guessing the silent prayer I uttered on the way to the phone worked then. But I'm not gullible enough to think that one day my number will come up on night duty and a Triple A WILL come crashing through the doors in the wee hours.
We call out the on-call Gastro crew who come down with their gear ten minutes later, set up the theatre and drink tea til the patient arrives. The bleeding is not serious and we take a specimen for biopsy.
Last night I scrubbed but didn't nod.
And now I have the weekend to recover (and post piccies of my BALL) before returning to the hell of days on monday morning.