Surgery!

Man, I love surgery! Got to do some surgeries today and had a blast! The surgeon was constantly asking me questions (called "pimping" for some reason) during the procedures, only about 10% of which I knew, but when we were done he told me "Good job!" That's like being told you had done well to not get trampled to death at the Running of the Bulls in Spain! Had a four hour hernia repair that was pretty tricky! I got to be first assist and run the cameras and some clamps since we do it laproscopically. What that means is you punch a few holes in the abdomen about half an inch across and then use ports to insert your camera, retractors, clamps, stapler, mesh, etc. This makes it so you don't have as much scar tissue left over and lessens infection rates. This poor guy had five holes in her before we were done! Probably doubled our time in surgery, so I hope he appreciates our effort. And I've got to tell you, one of the most painful things is when you're an hour into things and you've got to use the bathroom! Pain, pain, pain! I've got to stop drinking Pepsi products!

So we get done with the first case and the doc has me cut the sutures for him. I kept waiting for him to yell "ouch!" My doc is a mountain climber, and he says for every time I got climbing with him he'll let me run a chest tube or a subclavian catheter (which are both really cool procedures that are nice to know, especially for ER). So he says he's doing a 230 foot vertical climb somewhere down by Zion's on Saturday and said I could come...he's going to kill me. He's 64 and did a 1500 foot climb up the south face of Angel's Landing last Mother's Day! Even rappelled down in the dark! I'm a dead man.

He showed me a really cool suture technique for closing lacerations without leaving anything but the original scar. Very nice, especially if you're working on the face! So hey, if you think you can Rambo it and need a cut sewn shut, come on by! No lidocaine for pain, but you'll get a free suture job, besides I need the practice. *

*this is in no way an offer to practice medicine, and is provided for entertainment purposes only. Besides, it would be pretty entertaining to see someone try and sit through some sutures. I think I'd rather be rocked to sleep by a rock about a foot across!

Take care all of you and be good!

Love, Bartman