Everyday Life

I pride myself on being a good citizen–and in voting in every election. But today, for the second time in a row, I almost missed an election.

My brother sent me a text message reminding me to vote in the primaries in April. It was a good thing he did–because although I was up on the ballot issues, I had forgotten that the day was THAT day.

Today, I was walking out of work when I spotted someone else’s “I Voted Today” sticker. Thank goodness for that–elsewise I’d have never remembered today was election day. I’ve been on top of this election too–everything except the date, that is. I’d never fixed the election schedule in my mind, or scheduled it in my planner–and so, I almost missed it.

That’s the hard part of being a conscientious citizen–remembering to vote. You can be a registered voter, you can follow the issues, you can be informed about the candidates. But when push comes to shove, you have to remember to vote. And you have to remember to vote even when the nation isn’t deciding on its president.

Face it, it’s easy to vote for a president. You’ve seen the names for a good year, at least. You’ve heard the date at least a bazillion times. Everyone is talking about how November 2 or 4 or whatever has the potential to change the destiny of the nation. And when the day comes, everyone is proudly wearing their “I Voted Today” sticker. And if you happened to not come into contact with anyone, the TV and the Internet are awash with the latest exit polls.

The harder elections are the spring elections in the off years–the elections in which you vote for your city council members, school board, and airport authority. The elections in which someone tries to sneak a bond issue past an unsuspecting public. Those are the elections that are hardest to make–and the ones it’s most critical that you attend.

Face it, one vote out of millions doesn’t make quite as much difference as one out of thousands or hundreds. And face it, most “little” elections like the one today are attended by only a few hundred voters. That means YOUR vote means A LOT–as long as you actually get out to the polling place to vote.

So here’s a word of advice. Next time you hear of an election, put it on your calendar straight-away. ‘Cause it doesn’t matter how much you CARE, or how much you DEBATE, or how much you FOLLOW the news–if you DON’T VOTE, your opinion DOESN’T COUNT!

Five Indicators You’re in a Female-Dominated Profession

You attend your state professional meeting and…
1. everyone’s dressed in their professional best–and no one is wearing a tie.
2. dessert means chocolate–lots of it.
3. awards include handshakes–and hugs.
4. speakers refer to the audience in the “neutral” ladies instead of guys.
5. of the 100 attendees, 3 are male.

Five Advantages of Being a Male in Dietetics

1. Even shorter lines than usual at the bathrooms during professional meetings.
2. A chance to be groundbreaking–to go where few men have gone before.
3. Fawning female instructors, ’nuff said.
4. Who wouldn’t want to be surrounded by that many women?
5. Men need nutrition too.

I don’t know what a “typical” dietetics internship looks like, but I’m willing to bet that this isn’t it.

I arrived at work on the first day of my fourth week of clinical rotations to discover that my preceptor’s mother had died–which meant my preceptor would be gone for a week. Which meant the medical-oncology floor would be missing a dietitian.

I have to say the experience has knocked me off balance a bit–but I think I’m finally finding my feet. And I’m sure I’ll be a stronger dietitian because of it. Allow me to elaborate:

Monday

Site visitors from ADA came to inspect the internship. The interns ate breakfast with them and answered questions.

I arrived at work an hour and a half later than normal. I discovered that Mary’s mother had died. I realized that two other dietitians were already off. I realized that left me and two dietitians to handle the whole hospital. I freaked out. (Okay, not exactly–only in my mind.)

I’m not sure what I did on Monday, except that I saw a lot of patients and looked over a lot of charts. And stayed an hour and a half later than normal.

Tuesday

I arrived at work ten minutes earlier than usual. I knew I needed to be at the top of my game. I gathered up the new referrals for my floor. Dear heavens, there were about a hundred. And all my old patients were still around. I ran around like a chicken with my head cut off. But I did manage to see all the patients.

I realized there was no way that I could continue seeing every single patient every single day. There are just too many of them. I noticed the system the other dietitians were using to determine when they needed to see a patient again. It’s brilliant. Crazy I hadn’t figured that out already. And kind of funny that no one showed me. Oh well!

I had a collection of patients that I wasn’t sure what to do with at the end of the day. One of the other dietitians walked me through the process. I felt like I was learning in hyperdrive. Just watching her flick back and forth, hearing her questions went loads towards helping me develop the all-important clinical judgment.

What about their BM’s? I’d never even thought to check on those before. Considering IV fluids to account for sharp drops in blood values. Balancing one diagnosis with another. It was fascinating. I worked an hour and a half longer than usual.

By the time I got home, I’d determined that I needed a new assessment worksheet. I needed a worksheet that would enable me to arrange my information in a way that will allow me to RAPIDLY reassess a patient–instead of wasting so much time trying to figure out where I’d written that particular bit of information. I drafted a new worksheet while watching “That Thing You Do” with my sisters.

Today

I arrived at work to find a whole new slew of patients. But I already had at least 8 patients that I needed to follow up with and chart on. That means I wouldn’t have time to handle all 7 or 8 new patients. So I picked out three and got started.

I only used my personal assessment sheets on the new patients–I didn’t want to waste time copying information that’s already there. But I’m noticing that it takes half as much time to do a chart review with my assessment. Yay for efficiency!

The only thing I can’t speed up is the other clinicians–and the patients and their families. I still wait outside of doors for the doctor to finish his consult. Or, even worse, for the entire family (of a dozen or so) to leave the room so I can speak to the patient in relative peace. I still spent plenty of time criss-crossing the floor waiting for charts and patients to become available.

But I got nine patients seen and charted–and I didn’t even need to ask for help (except for one patient, for whom I couldn’t discover a nutrition problem warranting charting). And I left at the time I normally do (did). I had to defer one new admit and one follow up visit due to the patients not being available. But all in all, I felt good about how things went. Especially because there are only three follow-ups due tomorrow.

But then…

On the way home, I realized that I’m going to be gone all Friday at a conference. Which means I need to follow up with everybody who’s “due” on Friday tomorrow. Except that on Fridays I have to follow up with everybody who’s “due” over the weekend. Meaning that tomorrow, I have: 1 new admit left over from today, 1 follow up left over from today, 3 Thursday follow ups, 6 Saturday follow ups, and 7 Sunday follow ups That’s a grand total of 18 patients–all of whom I have to document. And that’s not including new admits.

Yikes!

So if you have a few prayers to spare, you can drop a line for me and my patients. Pray that I’ll have clarity of mind and efficiency–but that I’ll provide top line care. Pray that I’ll know who to cover myself and who I need to hand off to another dietitian. And above all, pray that my patients show dramatic improvement and can be discharged before I have to see them tomorrow! (Not all of them–I’d settle for half maybe ;-P)

Mm-hm. This is what you could call a steep learning curve. I’m just praying that tomorrow doesn’t knock me off the balance I’ve so recently started to attain.

I’d be glad to work every Saturday!

Just imagine it with me.

It’s a busy day. I have half a dozen follow-ups, half a dozen new admits. Nonetheless, I don’t have to jockey for charts; I don’t have to fight for a computer. I just grab the chart and jot down a few notes, see my patients and write down a few more notes, sit down at a computer and write my official “note”.

I’ve got a lot of patients–enough to keep me busy all day–but without all the people that are around on weekdays, I’m twice as efficient. I eat lunch when I’m hungry, and enjoy a book while I eat–I can actually spend time alone at work. It’s amazing.

Then there’s the interaction with patients and staff. Weekends are a whole different game. Instead of a hundred assortedly garbed health care workers busily running about, anxiously buzzing, a skeleton staff does their work with quiet efficiency–but not so much efficiency that they can’t be decent to each other.

They say, “Did I hear you say you’re with dietary? Do you mind stopping in to see so-and-so? She was asking to talk with a dietitian.” A doctor, a nurse, and I confer briefly about a troublesome patient. Another nurse reassures me that she’s taking a tray in right now for the fellow I just saw, who was anxious because he hadn’t eaten yet. I chat comfortably with one of the environmental services workers as we walk the same hallway together.

It’s a nice change of pace. Comfortable, efficient, friendly. I really would love to work every weekend, if this is what weekends are like.

Today, at a mini-conference/workshop thing we were holding at the health department, this guy came up to me and introduced himself: “You must be Rebekah. I’ve heard good things about you.”

Which is wonderful. I’m flattered.

But it also makes me wonder why. I mean, I’m familiar with name-dropping. I get it. What I don’t get is why people would bother dropping MY name.

For the uninitiated, allow me to reference Wikipedia on Name-dropping: “Name dropping is the practice of mentioning important people or institutions….It is often used to create a sense of superiority by raising one’s status. By implying (or directly asserting) a connection to people of high status, the name-dropper hopes to raise his or her own social status to a level closer to that of those whose names he or she has dropped…”

Which is why I’m so confused about why people would insert my name into their conversations about anything. My position, “Dietetic intern”, is far from elevated. My experience is miniscule. I can see no reason why anyone should reference me in conversation with another health professional–and especially to reference me in a complementary way.

Name-dropping down. Maybe it’s the new thing in corporate health care. Perhaps I should begin regularly referencing the janitor in my conversations with fellow professionals–after all, that’s not too far below my rank in the professional pool.

I should probably just accept it and go on–but the cynic in me still asks why. Why would someone bother to talk me up to the coordinator of one of the nation’s leading worksite wellness programs? It just doesn’t make any sense.