It's hard to get too excited about July. Hard, that is, unless you've never met new doctors. They were medical students who have completed rigorous training for six years.
But do we actually grasp the know-how of being a doctor after graduation? Hardly.
I have been reading the story of an intensive care doctor, Aoife Abbey, who reminded me the first time we experienced fear as a doctor at work. My first job as an intern was on paediatric care ward, and for obvious reasons, it took me quite a while until the issue of a dead patient presented itself during my internal medicine rotation. Both Aoife and I were confused and frightened by the steps we had to go through to verify death for the very first time.
What did Aoife do? She stared. The more she stared at her patient, the more she became convinced that her patient was going to open her eyes. Aoife pictured them snapping open, her hand lurching towards where she had her hands on her neck, and her grip closing itself around her wrist. She stood frozen, waiting for the requisite two minutes to make sure there was neither respiratory effort nor heart beat. After the ordeal of two minutes, she raced out of the room, heart pounding.
I wasn't any better than Aoife. After my first announcing death of a patient, I had to convince myself that I did everything properly until I was taking a short nap in the hospital call room. My patient woke up and went straight from mortuary to find me in my dream. My heart was thumping like a cat in a clothes dryer, when my patient stared at me, face crimson with rage, "Doc, why did you certify me when I wasn't dead?" After the nightmare, I never went back to sleep that night.
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