PL-3!

pediatrics level 3!
interestingly, just hours after writing about last year’s schedule, i got my block plan for next year! i can hardly believe it, but the end is now in sight (though still more than a year away).

first six months: july ’09 – december ’09

decoded, this means:
– ward senior
– 2 week each of clinic chief / community hospital NICU senior
– endocrine elective (ie, fellowship dress rehearsal!)
– genetics/metabolism elective (an endo fellowship requirement)
– emergency department
– research! (ie, time to write up fellowship grant applications)

second six months: january ’10 – june 10

– adolescent medicine
– 2 weeks night float / 2 weeks days as senior on heme/onc
– outpatient special needs care
– emergency department again
– ward senior again
– GI elective

thought it’s possible things may shift around, this is how things stand now. overall, i like it! just 2 months of true call, plus 3 months where there are some nights (but no 30 hour ridiculousness). and then it’s on to endocrine fellowship! wow. they always say that residency goes fast, but i never believed it. until now.

healthy lifestyles
today on the docket for my community rotation is a morning in healthy lifestyles clinic. i’ve been interested in working for this program for a while, so it should be fun. healthy lifestyles is a program which targets overweight and obese kids and teens who are motivated to change their habits. it focuses on both the physical (working on insulin resistance, hypertension, PCOS, and other obesity complications) and the mental (psychological issues, general well-being) in caring for these patients and is designed to help them live (duh) a more healthy lifestyle.

considering the fact that i saw many a 200+ lb teen in the ER last month (the most impressive was a 15 year old weighting 198 kg — people, that’s 435 pounds!), our community is obviously in need of programs like these. the only problem is that not every family (or child) really wants help, and there are a lot of barriers (not having safe areas to play outside, parents working multiple jobs and not having time to cook, etc) to improvement. but hopefully i’ll get to see today that the program we have is making a difference at least to some patients.

all right, time to get my healthy lifestyle on and high-tail it to the gym. i can’t believe it’s already wednesday — almost miami-time!

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3.24.09

workout: a 4-mile run outside that i managed to run at a decent clip for the first time in a while (8:39/mi average on hills). my hip actually feels decent today, probably because i had an ART session as well. plus, i shredded. i’m still on level 1, because i’m scared of what’s to come. next week, though, i am going to take the plunge into level 2 territory and see what all the hype is about. i’ve heard it’s plank city.

doin’ time: no cooking — i went to a pizza/beer celebration for the incoming interns at satisfactions instead. it was fun and delicious, although i am such a beer snob at this point that i could barely drink the yuengling provided. it was free, though, so i managed.

reading: for my quality improvement project (residency requirement), i am going to look into improving a program we have on resident self-care (more about that in a future post). i read 2 articles on resident burnout, how it affects patients, and some interventions.
from fam med 2008:49(6)

i actually think that blogging is a pretty therapeutic intervention against burnout. maybe i’ll have to study that sometime! also, free pizza and beer seems to be effective as well.