Not So Cool Anymore

So I’m starting to understand why surgeons have such a bad name amongst hospital types. When I was rotating on Surgery I thought it very cool to be the macho, gun-slinging, cowboy who marches into “their” OR, orders what needs to be done for the patient, and takes control. After all, this is their patient and clearly no one has learned as much as the surgeon. Everyone else is inferior.

However…

Being on Anesthesia and hearing some of the condescension when being asked (or commanded) to do something irritates me a bit. Like, for instance, a puggy 3rd year gen surg resident who looks like she came straight from that Gardasil commercial (you know, that feminist, women’s power bitch at the end telling us about how you could be One Less? Evil men, spreading their icky, icky germs!).

She waltzes in, talking down to everyone in the room, because, gasp, we don’t react instantly to her commands, and wonders why the room isn’t prepared a completely different way than asked for by the attending’s card. An hour later (while the patient is under general anesthesia, mind you - bad, bad, bad), the surgery can finally begin. Had she been in the holding room prior to the procedure we might have dealt with this before hand. But what dumb fucks we were for not being all omnipotent! I cower at your Dansko's and beg for forgiveness.

I imagine that if I were on this rotation I’d think she was all cool and shit. Because I’d be internalizing like the mad-crazy medical student gunner I am. But I’m not. I’m on the other side of the curtain, dealing with blood pressures, respirations, keeping the patient from moving, trying to understand why the hospital scrubs have writing all over them (who do I call for a good time?), and other important, life maintaining items that anesthesia people do. Because people like to breath. It’s a good thing. Putting the patient in Trendelenberg at the instant a “request” is barked out does not imply that I need to be yelled at. I heard you the first time; pipe down their girly.

Since some of the surgeons have worked with me they have been quite nice about letting me wallow in my own brand of OAFAT (wah-fat: obligatory anesthesia fuck around time) before they get pushy. It’s been, for the most part, good. But girl-power chick needs to back the fuck off a bit and take a chill pill. You’re not god – yet. Though I imagine you think you are.