boy did I get stomped on

Today was not my greatest performance yet I do not think that it warranted being told that Emergency Medicine is not the right fit for me.


What a hard ass of an attending. Interesting that the other attendings had constructive criticism and said I did well.

Sorry to hear that you had a rough shift, Gabe. Its always tough decide what to do in that situation. If the attending you worked with isn’t a person you want a letter from (i.e. clerkship director, program director, etc), then I tend to say shrug it off and move on. If, on the other hand, this attending’s opinion could be signifcant on your grades/comments/SLOR, then I would seek him/her out, ask for specific areas to improve on, and then try and seek out another shift with them.


FWIW, I had a horrible shift with an attending who I knew fairly well. I had enough decent shifts with other attendings, that I just decided not to use him for a letter.


Shake it off and knock 'em dead tomorrow. We all have those days, and you’ll be fine.

Thanks, He is not the program or clerkship director. He told me that I was not proactive enough in the 2 shifts he worked with me. Yet, the first shift I was competing with 2 EM residents, an EM intern, an IM resident, and an psych intern to see patients.


Now I would jump on a patient as soon as I saw them on the list, I would ask to do procedures, and I would always know what is going on with my patients, what labs needed to yet be done, what labs were done, did they go to radiology and if the films were up and what they were. I would write up the discharge paperwork and have it all ready for either the attending or the sr resident.


I do not know how he can say that I am not being proactive. Granted, yesterday I was more slow than normal. It may be because I did not like where I was (the facility has a satellite site in the more poor section of the city and the people that go there are very frustrating). He got frustrated with me when I was waiting for him to present and I he told me not to watch him type.


Now that I have licked the wounds from my pride I have the next couple of days off and 1 week to prove him wrong, which I intend to do. I guess one thing that I have to work on is my confidence. This is my first EM rotation and I am learning more about being confident that I can make my patient better. Next I need to redirect my patient to why they are here and are the problems life threatening. If they are not, then back to their own doctors.


The first one is always the roughest

no scaring the almost oms-1…lol


now go back and prove him wrong!!!

That’s rough, Gabe - I’m sure you did great this week.

basically, he was the only one that told me this and everyone else I spoke to told me different. There are going to be people that you do not mesh with. However, it did light a fire under my belly and everything has been great since then.

Yep - and that’s actually one of the great things about EM. If you don’t mesh with one attending, you can still do well on the rotation and get overall positive comments.

Being that I just woke up from a 11p-7a shift, I am about to have breakfast. But more importantly, last night my shift was with the program director.


I worked my butt to the core last night. And it paid off with her feedback. In addition to being on top of everything my patients were going through, I was able to staple a head laceration secondary to a scooter accident, suture another head laceration, put a NasalGastric tube in to assess for gastric bleeding, and splint a hand. Told a drunk patient nicely, but sternly to shut up and lay down for his CT, which he did and overall had a great night. Most important of all, the director was impressed.


One more shift and this rotation is in the books. Hopefully it will result in an interview.


Stay Thirsty my friends.

Wow … intense! Congrats on such a great shift. I hope you do get that interview!

Way to “get back on the horse” so to speak!


Good luck on getting that interview!


Kate