Ms Rachelle Tan, Senior Assistant Manager of Nursing Ed in NUH helped me to arrange my job shadowing. She is quite a cool and young lady! As nursing is quite a repetitive job, she arranged about 2hours job shadowing in each of the different wards over 4 days.. So actually my attachment is quite short, 4 days, from 9am-3pm (9.30am - 2.30pm to be exact, with lunch from 11.30-1230).. I only hope something interesting happen during my attachment so i can learn more stuffs... haha..

Supposed to meet Rachelle at 9am today, but I reached at 8.20am.. Was thinking that maybe i can get my breakfast at NUH.. but *facepalms* the kopitiam is under renovation.. I thought it would be quite rude to call her so early, so i lagged until 8.55am before calling Rachelle that I have reached. (for some reasons she was still quite stunned when i said i have reached :/) She brought me around the main building and told me that im quite suay that the kopitiam is under renovation just as i come for my attachment (lol) and shown me that i can go to the kent ridge building or nus med there to have my lunch.. but it is quite hard to walk to nus... hmm.... (in the end i just bought random sandwich from random vending machine for lunch)

We talked about why I want to pursue nursing. she says whoever laughs at me when i say i want to give free medical services in third world countries are immature.. HAHAHAHAHA.. then she told me after i get my results i can apply for sponsorship from NUH, and NUH is the only hospital that have a special group of senior nurses in charge of grooming the 'scholars' under the sponsorship to push them to higher level.. HMMM...

(im getting bored to type detailed-ly).

before lunch:

i went to surgical ward 41 (mostly neuro patients). NC Nur Hidayah introduced the wards to me and I shadowed SN1 Zhang Yue Ying (going to 4 years exp, graduated from NYP).

after lunch:

i went to surgical ward 44 (contains both surgical and medical wards. medical wards contain more of patients w respiratory problems). NM Kalarani left me to shadow nurse Cherry (going to 3.5 years exp, pursued nursing in philippines).

1. Nursing is shift work, each shift is about 9hours, 3 shifts.. (7am-4pm, 12pm-9pm, 8pm-7am) morn/aftn shift is more busy but in charge of 6beds, night shift is more relaxed but need to in charge up to 16beds.. (YY told me most of the time they are so busy due to short of nurses such that they have to skip their meals. she said she usually only eat after the end of her shift, and told me to eat more before i start pursuing nursing LOL)

Usually doctors make their morning rounds from 8am-10am.. Patients have their medicines about 8am, 12pm, 4pm, 8pm, etc. +- 1hour..

2. Some patients with renal failure, their hands are so used such that their hands cannot be used to inject for dialysis, so they have something called "Femoral Catheter", tube thingy inserted into their thigh for dialysis.

3. MRSA is a type of disease where the bacteria is immune to most antibiotics = difficult to cure. Remember to sanitise! Patients w MRSA are in cubicles with "Contact Precautions". Everything they use, the equipments etc, are yellow/labelled with yellow which is an universal indicator for MRSA.

4. Oh, some patients have difficulty breathing have some sort of tube inserted through their neck, trachea? most patients are heavily reliant on the tube, which has become their lifeline. IN ANY CASE the tube dropped (which is very very rare), there is a box with tweezers or sth and the nurses would need to use it to keep the hole on the neck open while waiting for doctors to come and insert a new tube. Today saw YY using some machine to monitor oxygen level of a patient when she was inserted the tube today or something.

Today saw how the nurses prepare medicine, insert insulin, insert some antibiotics through "burette", something which IV drip passes through.. Some patients they cannot eat so they have some tube inserted to their noses directly connected to the stomach.. Have to ground the medicine into liquid and pour inside the tube too. Oh today I saw a diabetic patient whose feet is rotting too. ouch. what else did i see? Those saikang I didn't see since they do it behind the curtain.. Mostly are done by the ITE nurses wearing purple pants tho..

Actually hospitals in singapore are quite high tech (PDAs, HSMs etc), can contact people from different areas.. good teamwork between doctors, nurses, dieticans, pharmacists, psychiotherapists etc.. cool man..

I think nurses are really patient and noble people.. Even if they feel sad for the patients, they always remain so cheerful in front of the patients! (as in encouragement smile, not laughing at their fate or sth).. Today a 70+ year old auntie went for cardio surgery. Heart bypass. Hope everything went well! She was crying although her family was by her side.. She was really scared since risks are high for old people.. She hugged and kissed the nurses as she was on the ops bed waiting to be transferred.. wah. although singaporeans can be demanding, i think i will still persevere and work, take it for the sake of people who can appreciate..

on the other hand, i find doctors very charming :D (not all though)

tmr going to paeds ward and ortho ward. kids and bones related.

on the other hand,

i just finished watching flower boy ramen shop.

jung il woo!!!