Gombak Posting - Not What It Seems

Yesterday marks my 3rd and last day in gombak hospital.

And I gotta say this, whoever who ever said that gombak hospital is boring were wrong! We had a really great time there! Don't forget the many interesting cases we were so lucky to see there.

In case you didn't know, gombak hospital is an orang asli hospital (it's for the aborigines of the land) so everything is free for them there. And it also means that there is an enormous language barrier when we were taking history from them! o.O

Our only common language is malay. My spoken malay wasn't so hot to begin with, add in with the fact that their malay wasn't so great too. Many many questions were met with "tak tau" or just shakes of head.

And they don't keep track of time. at all.

I'm serious. Ask them how old they are, when they were admitted, how long everytime the pain lasted etc will just get incredulous looks from them. *pulls hair*

Anyway, abt the interesting cases. On the first day, my group was considered lucky to clerk this pediatric case of a 17 day old baby with an imperforate anus, hole in the heart and most of all, Down's Syndrome.

Isn't it so pitiful? A baby having so many problems. *sigh* I'm not sure even if the mother knows abt the other problems, she seemed pretty preoccupied with the imperforate anus only. She never mentioned the rest, we only got to know them thru reading the case notes.

Not so luckily, I was the first one asked to present my case in front of the entire group (imagine standing in front of 30 of your peers who are sitting down). However, that wasn't the thing that put me off. Try being asked to greet your peers "good morning" 5 or 6 times before I could even start. That definitely was enough to put me into a jittery mode about my presentation.

Okay fine I was stupid enough to start without greeting (but I really didn't think of that!) and didn't present my case according to the format we were taught. But I'd never clerk a pediatric case before... and lemme tell you know, it ain't easy. So yeah, cut me some slack.

I was asked to stop in the middle of my case presentation. Apparently, it was too bad to continue. ='( *shamed face*

Defeated, I returned to my seat, looking at the floor. I didn't want to see the pitying faces. [but I'd prefer pitying over smilling faces, thank you very much] I felt my entire self-esteem was on the floor, destroyed, stomped - out of shape.

Don't you tell me: if it were you, you would just deal with it as though nothing bad has happened. Just smile and get on with it.

You were not the one who had to be the first to go out, so that others can learn from your mistakes. You were not the one standing alone in the firing range, being "humiliated". You were not the one being forced to go back in the middle of the case presentation.

Most of all, you are not me. So we don't see things the same way anyway. so hey, let me deal with it in my own way okay. All I needed was a smile, maybe some comforting words. that's all...

I will admit here, that wasn't exactly the most pleasant thing to ever happen to anyone. period. But after some thinking back, I guess I needed that "scolding" to put me back into the frame of mind.

That when I chose this field, I knew it was not gonna be easy.

CSUs and PBLs recently has been quite smooth sailing (as in no harsh scoldings) because I have been doing my work. Preparing beforehand. Something I never did during sem 2 CSUs and got a lot of flack from that. After that, I vowed to try my best to read up before going to CSU. And the preparation paid off, nowadays don't really get much scolding for not knowing the basics.

But I guess that has made me rather quiescent lately. The fact that I'll still get a lot of harsh reprimands, like it or not, when I'm a housemen, medical officer etc somehow slipped to the back of my mind. But now I remember.

I guess, the overall of result of all this melodrama was that at least it managed to make me feel like studying for the benefit of my future patients. Fire up that spirit, girl! so guess it did more good than bad after all, huh? =)

oops I seemed to have digressed from the rest of the cases that we'd encountered. I'll just list them down here, for convenience's sake.

• Right sided heart failure caused by pulmonary hypertension = Cor pulmonale. Presented with swollen legs.
• A man with laryngeal TB.
• A boy who came in for post-chemotherapy care. He had a tumour of the brain. so pitiful..
• A man with end-stage-renal disease (ESRD).

See? Interesting cases, aren't they? I only managed to clerk the first one. The rest were clerked by my friends.

The cases that come here were quite serious to begin with. In my opinion, the orang asli are quite far behind, they are not enjoying the benefits of modernization. Many of them live in wooden or bamboo houses without water or eletrical supply! The government really should help them out more.. Education is the key here.

Okla, on the overall, I think I really learnt a lot from this hospital posting. History taking is a very essential part of diagnosing a patient! I also enjoyed myself tremendously too! Gombak posting is not boring at all! ^v^

PS: We went to many nice places to eat! hehe... I *hearts* Ampang Yong Tau Fu!! :>

PPS: Will be having some form of hols now. My GP posting is after CNY break. But will be staying in kl for 1 more week instead of rotting at home haha..