two weeks in ortho has more or less strengthened my opinion that ortho is a sad discipline. two cases in point - the 90/c/f diabetic stroke patient with gangrene on two toes who had to undergo an aka (above knee amputation) and the middle aged, diabetic security guard who's had three previous ray amputations (2001, 2002, 2005) who now has gangrenous toes bilaterally. he has extensive lower limb dermopathy creeping to mid-shin level (i have not seen something so bad before) and the pus was just oozing from his toes when the dressing was removed, not to mention the smell from the gangrenous parts. he was offered a bka but refused. not surprisingly he was very angry at the surgeons for offering an amputation and insisted that he could feel his own feet. he's most likely to get himself discharged, although i'm not sure what will happen when he goes home. it's hard to say you want to cut off a person's leg, but what else can we do in cases like this?

i'm getting to know the team better, and they're pretty nice doctors to hang around with. night call was excellent since houseman, medical officer and registrar were all trying to teach us something. even my consultant, who was quiet in the first week, sprang a brief but excellent tutorial on the management of osteoarthritis on us. fantastic. i always love night duties because i seem to learn twice as much in half the time spent in the wards, not to mention the little nuggets and stories the doctors like to tell at night. heh.

my computer has finally arrived, as has my printer. compy is a dell e520, running on windows vista home premium, and the printer is a basic epson print+scan+copier. can't seem to find the drivers for the printer online, so there's a bit of a dent in my celebrations. i've had my previous comp for seven years, and the printer for even longer (it's a canon bubblejet - don't laugh), so this brand new set of gadgets is pretty exciting, not to mention getting my first subwoofer and 19" lcd screen. woohoo. was so happy that i dug out my sims3000 and began to build. i enjoyed playing it so much that i scarcely noticed that it was way past midnight, and then only regretted it at service this morning. haha.