fantastic

9/19/06

"day 16"

Hey!  Today was fun, I just hope I can remember everything I did today, that seems to be my biggest problem.

 

I saw 'my' patient today and that was fun, I got to progress her exercises as I saw fit.  She asked me about the Mall of America and I told her all about it.  It was a good time.  I also got to do that with some other patients today too (the progressing, not the talking about MOA)

 

During inpatient gait training I followed this one lady with a wheelchair who had at least 20 colored wires coming from her head.  I've never seen anything like it.

 

There is this one guy, and I wont get into everything because this could get pretty detailed, but basically he has this HUGE gash in his shin.  He's not our patient usually.  He came in and Sharon (the PT Aide that I eat lunch with everyday) was putting his leg in the whirlpool.  He's in a motorized wheelchair and he was pushing it forward and Sharon was yelling "Stop going forward!" because he was pushing her and the whirlpool across the floor.  It was funny.  Then when she got the leg in, Liz and I saw that the wound is not in the water AT ALL.  Which is a problem we had been hearing about, that we really dont have a way to fix, but we thought at least 75% of the wound was in the water.  But no.  So Liz told Sharon to get a rag wet and ring it over the wound.  And Sharon was not thrilled about this job and I dont blame her, and she said "for how long??" And Liz said 20 minutes.  And Liz and I laughed and Sharon I think was about to cry.  But she did it, what a trooper.

 

At the end of the day we went up to do 2 bedsides.  One of them was the first time I got to do something directly with a patient at bedside.  And it was a quadraplegic guy who was really sweet.  He couldnt talk but he could nod and grimace, so we could communicate somewhat.  Well, then we went to the other one, which was that guy from yesterday who was wanting to go home.  A side note: this guy keeps pulling the fire alarm.  So for the past week and a half we keep having a code red, which is "Dr. Red, calling Dr. Red."  Anyways, we went to see this guy and he was sleeping and we went to ask his nurse if it was alright to work with him and this is what she said "I just chemically restrained him. You don't want to work with him anyways because he was just <I've censored this part for my blog :) but you can probably guess>.  So unless you want to smoke a cigarrette with him."  And Liz got so red and embarrassed and said "You guys!  I have a student with me!  From the midwest!  And she thinks we are all crazy out here!"  Haha.  It was kinda funny, but more disgusting.

 

I think that's all.  Oh, and after work I went to the I Love Lucy gift shop and bought a mug so that I will always remember my connection with Lucille Ball, that we both once lived in Jamestown, NY. 

 

Love ya!

Lyndsey