Orthopaedics 101

Look how young he looks? I guess 4 years of nasty hours will age you a bit.
I love that I took a picture next to the clock, kind of funny.

This is Doug's very first day as an intern in 2002. Little did we know what we were getting into. Looking back what we thought was hard in medical school was a breeze to us now. We often chuckle how good we had it back then. Residency has definitely been a big challenge for our family. Juggling such harsh hours and a family of 6. But, hey were almost done and the light is coming soon! (at least I hope)

I have been wanting to write this down for a while and am finally getting around to doing it. I thought I would describe what exactly my husband does. We have had several friends in the past who aren't familar with the medical school/residency thing and are a lot of times confused as to why we are still in school. The funny thing is I often talk to one of my good friends from highschool and she always replies "remind me again when you guys are going to be done with this." I always laugh and tell her we are in the lifetime student category. I am just glad he didn't choose something like a heart surgeon or general surgery (sorry lara). That's just a few added more years that we would have had to tack on. The ironic thing is before medical school he was going to become a physical therapist. One of his mentors strongly suggested if he was interested in that he might as well go to medical school since he had the grades to apply. So that is exactly what he did.

Anyways, his career of choice began back during his third year of medical school at Tulane. They really don't get to rotate that much on different fields of medicine you kind of just pick what you think you would like. After doing some rotations he knew of certainty that he wasn't doing Peds, Psych, OB, or ER. He narrowed it down to a surgical specialty and has always loved working with athletes and physical rehab stuff. So it wasn't long after that he choose to study orthopedics. I was glad when he came to this conclusion of what he wanted to be when he grew up. It was an even bigger relief when we "matched" in the field of his choice. There are so many people who graduate from medical school each year (at least 150 per school) which means there isn't always a spot in a residency program. So you can imagine how thrilled we were to match in San Antonio. The weird thing is we both had forgotten that he applied there and were focusing more on our top three choices. Looking back I am so glad we didn't match in those schools. I guess we were blessed with this place for a reason!

These are just one of the 3 stacks of books that Doug has to read. It amazes me how much this guy can read and retain. I have to reread something in a book about 3 times before I can even comprehend it. Each year he has to take an annual exam OITE. It is coming up in November so he usually starts studying for it in August. Every night he will come home on top of his hard, hectic day and study for about 2 hours. (mind you this is after he helps me with dinner, bath and bedtime with the kids). What a guy!

This is Doug's "case log" book. Or the little black book is what I call it. As a resident you have to log in every surgical case that you assist another physician with or do yourself. This book contains EVERY case he has ever done since his 1st year of residency. As you can see from the little white pieces of paper he is a bit behind in logging them in. (that is where I am trying to come in a help him out a little). We had a scare one time and misplaced this book. That was a terrible thing because its almost as golden as your wallet is, luckily we found it.

I had to picture this and I know Doug will think I am weird. But on top of the books that take up our whole bookshelf....this is the corner of my room. He currently has three bags! Yes, and he is not a woman or carries a baby around. Well, maybe to him he does. He has a bag of books, one with his computer and the last one is his over night call bag with all of his tolietries and extra clothes. You would think they would give the residents a place to put this stuff, but they don't! I really should have taken a picture of his trunk because that is his other closet of junk.

Okay, this may gross so many of you out. So don't look if you have an uneasy stomach. I had to post this picture because it has a funny story behind it. Don't worry I am not violating any HEPPA rules because I don't even know the patients name or anything about them. This case came into the ER when Doug was working one time. As you can see this person had a dead foot. He said the smell was horrific and stuff was ooozing everywhere. You would think if this was starting to occur the patient would have gone in. Most of the time these patients he works on wait until something like this occurs. The grossest part was they saw a fly come out from the deadened area. Yes, I said a fly!! Isn't that soooo sick?

The last picture I had to post because Doug actually was so excited about this case. He was on trauma when this took place. A little boy about 21 months old got his finger stuck on the escalator at the bottom. Somehow it sucked his finger underneath at the bottom. Can you imagine the screams and pain this poor child went through?? It gives me chills thinking about it. They couldn't get his finger out from the escalator so they had to take the metal plate off and air vac him to the hospital with it. (this is where Doug comes in) As you can see the metal went through is finger. (gross i know) They were actually able to sew the child's finger back on. He was so excited about this because he was able to help! A pretty gross story, but they little kid at least will have a finger.

This is why my husband went into Orthopedics. He loves this stuff. I can't even believe that I wanted to be a nurse. I had all of my prereq's done when I met Doug. I was acutally ready to apply. Ironically, I can't even stand the thought of blood or anything anymore. Not only that but I hated school. I just was never good at it.



Overall, I am so dang proud of him. He amazes me each day with all the stuff that he does and accomplishes on top of dealing with my complaining and being a great dad! I love you honey!