The Intensive Care Unit

I'm currently rotating as a junior intern at the ICU. Being a junior intern is no joke. As they say, this year would be the worst year of my medical-student-life and this is just the second week of my rotations. It is difficult, i tell you. Not only does lack of sleep  pushes you to your limits; the agonizing emotional and psychological aspects does, too, contribute to the difficulty of being a junior intern.

Let me tell you what the routine is in the ICU. Everyday (morning and afternoon), we do rounds on all our patients. We have at least 15-20 patients a day. The team of doctors includes two consultants, three fellows, 5-6 residents (neuro, cardio, infectious, et. al.), 1 senior and 4 junior interns. The team discusses the cases one by one- from one room to another. It is like doing window shopping; however, a lot more intimate and requires more of intelligence. We discuss the cases in front of the patient; however, they can'thear us because the person of interest  is separated by the glass panel from us (and yes, i think they are sound protected). Here, we try to predict the future of the patient- will he live or die. Questions are always raised by the consultant. Usually, all these questions are addressed to the junior interns. Which makes the lives of junior interns toxic.

The junior interns are what they call the lowest breed of doctors and as of now, i am part of this. We are the ones who usually get challenged and ridiculed. We are the ones who, literally, do not have anything to offer. We are the "slaves" of the team. This may sound devastating and saddening; however, this has been how the system has been going since time immemorial. I myself, have already been humiliated in front of the team. But oh well. Our curriculum tries to defy this; however, it can only do as much, as of now.

I call their ICU team as the Team of Extraordinary Brain Cells. For heaven's sake, the team consists of intelligent, highly reasonable, objective, and very competent doctors. They can throw multitudes of differential diagnoses and can defend such in just few seconds. I am amazed how these doctors were trained. I was owe-struck on my first day of rotation on how they are able to memorize all lab values of their patients down to the last decimal. Believe me, they are really that good. Here i saw the pseudogods they are telling. Downside, what I personally think is, they purposely detached themselves from the souls of their patients.

Tomorrow would be the last day of my rotation there. I'm not sure if i'm gonna miss the team, the pride, the angst, or not. I'm not sure if i'd like to go back there. I really don't. I'm happy about the rotation; however, i think, i was caught in between intimidation and self-preservation.