Thursday 27 November 2008

Night Shifts as a HCA..

..honestly aren't tooo bad.

Yes, the patient number does increase, with the original 45 patients on the ward between 3 HCAs on long day shifts to now between just the 2 of us; but taking into consideration that most of the patients are asleep during the night, its not really too bad.

- On a negative side it means theres suddenly a big increase in the amount of obs. needed to be done, blood sugars to be checked, and catheters and nephrostomy bags to emptied; and not forgetting how it messes up sleep patterns, with 7.45pm starts and 8.15am finishes (same hours as long day shifts, but with the am and pm swapped around).

- BUT on the positive side of things, theres extra pay (quite important for an ex-student with debts!), and more "time dedicated to you" - meaning i have nothing to do.... (this to some extent is a double edged sword.. the rest now and then can be quite nice... but occasionally can make the day/night pass by very slowly, and the end of the shift feeling miles away) .... well it also means i have the spare time to sit, and to type this blog entry summing up my last 3 nights as im currently stuck alone in one of the nurses stations.

Ahhhhhh still another 6 hours to go - tonight has definately been the slowest night of the 3!

Tuesday 18 November 2008

X'mas ward rota

The long awaited X'mas ward rota is finally out!

- GLAD i'm off on the major dates : x'mas eve, x'mas day, new year's eve and new years!
...and only having to work on the 23rd, 26th and 27th, and then im off for a week from the 28th! So i'm a happy HCA during the main Xmas period!

Sadly i can't say the same for the upcoming next 3 weeks - with 7 night shifts in short space of 21 days, mixed in with a handful of day shifts... the worst part is having a long day shift on sunday followed by a row of 4 night shifts starting.. on the monday following! AKK! i expect a backache and bad moody patches.

in terms of med applications.. my track hasn't changed basically.

Still havn't heard anything yet since the interview, and i suspect i won't hear anything anytime soon either, but that doesn't stop me from stupidly checking track at stupid times of the day "just in case" - i doubt even the most zealous of admin staff will update track in the early hours of the morning... but oh well.. it helps me sleep better.

and something random
i want a lomography fisheye 2 camera! a bit of an expensive toy, but i want one!

Wednesday 5 November 2008

bmat 2008

OK... so it wasn't as bad as last year (i risk sounding really stupid now if i do badly in comparrison to last year *.*).

I woke up early with some time to spare, and rather than studying my list of equations, i went downstairs to have a pot of baked beans..them really lazy ones in a plastic microwaveable pot... yes i had no idea why, but with the prospects of having the bmat later on in the morning, i developed a craving for baked beans.

Anyways, i got there early, stood in a que for another 15 minutes or so, went into the examination room with a 50 odd other bmat-ers, and after a few complaints about not having a clock in the room and random problems with not having enough answers sheets etc, we finally got the exam started!

Section 1 - wasn't too bad... but the questions about breast cancer probability with right handed and left handed people was quite annoying!

Section 2 - was harder this year, probably because i hadn't revised the correct material, and had to make stupid random guesses at the last few questions as i ran out of time, and had to just fill in the circles without even reading the questions... oh and i didn't like the question with cycling and travel .. or was that section 1 .. akkkk i can't remeber now

Section 3 - was really quite generous this year, it has been the only section 3 i've seen where i actually understood all 3 titles.... i did just choose essay 2 at the end; mumbling on about quality of life, patient autonomy and benificence.

So in summary:
Section 1 - ok
Section 2 - crap
section 3 - ok

Now a wait till December 1st to find out exactly how badly it went!

Monday 3 November 2008

Post KCL-interview

So i had my interview at GKT this morning; i arrived an hour early and made myself comfortable amongst the 6 or 7 other interviewees in the small and cosy waiting room, watching others fidget, and waiting to be called in.

I tried to remain calm throughout, but i think my slightly sweaty hands gave it all away, though i did get a quick chance to dry them a tad on my trousers before the 1st and the 2nd handshake, and of course whilst they weren't looking!

I can't really talk about my experience in much detail today, as i signed a paper not to disclose information about the interview, and to be honest i think i rather not recall on today's experience, as i don't really know what to think of it - and i honestly think it can go either way.

So i'm just going to wait and see, it could be 2-3 weeks (according to the interview invitation letter), a month, or all the way til January!!! (according to my friends who had interviews last year) before i hear anything from them.

So again.. its just going to be an uncomfortable wait, constant ucas track checking, and some more time dedicated to hoping i'll hear from other medical schools soon.

Until then i have the dreaded BMAT this wednesday!