Whirlwind

Well, I know I promised over a month ago to keep this thing updated. Obviously I am a failure. I was heckled by my good friend KF to update so here I go. First things first congratulations are due to KF and her husband AF on the birth of their first child SF yesterday, as well as congratulations to my cousin SW and his wife MW on their first child CW yesterday.

I finally arrived in Livingston, New Jersey last Monday. I made the drive in two days driving 15 hours the first day to Roanoke and then finishing up the drive in about 6 hours to Livingston. I traveled through Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and finally New Jersey. I was able to stop in Harrisburg PA to eat lunch with a friend from college who is living in the area which was a pleasant surprise.

The first week of neurosurgery at St. Barnabas Medical Center has gone really well. I have a great time with the residents each day and get along really well with them. I have learned a whole lot about the field in a relatively short time just because of the amount of patients I am rounding on each day. They do a great job of including us in all aspects of medical management which really helps to pick up on things. I had one hick-up when I was driving to work my check engine light came on. Luckily for my my hotel is across the street from the Lexus dealership so I was able to take it over there and get a loaner car in no time and it turned out to be nothing and I was in and out for $100. I took call this past weekend with one of the residents which was really fun but got me really behind on sleep. On Sunday we were able to get most of the work done pretty early and he let the other student and I leave around noon for the day. I took this opportunity to drive to Newark and then take the PATH over to NYC and walk around.

The PATH dropped me off at WTC or now ground zero and I walked from there up broadway to Union Square. I mainly just peopled watched. I noticed that in order to be a true New Yorker you needed a combination of some kind of hat, a fancy coat, skinny jeans, boots, and at least some time of accessory usually a scarf. If you really didn't fit this description I chalk you up to being a tourist. The biggest reason I went to the city was to go to Apostles Church led by JR Vassar. When sitting in a pew by myself a friend from college snuck up and sat next to me I was so surprised she then went on to tell me that another friend from college would be there because she was in town and then I saw another guy who was in BYX with me. Never in a million years would I think I would run in to one person I knew, yet I saw three.

Hopkins and BostonMed

I finished up my second round of boards this week and have been relaxing all week. I heard about a show called BostonMed, that filmed the lives of attendings, residents, and nurses at Mass General, Brigham and Women's, and Boston Children's. I have always had a love-hate relationship with medical shows on tv. They can be very entertaining but also are frustrating because they freak out about stuff that is very common and don't represent what the hospital is actually like. For instance every time they show an operating room the lights are off. Yes many operations that are done laprascopically do have the lights off but I would say the majority of surgeries I have been in on the lights were on. That being said I have always like the show House M.D. and Scrubs but never really gotten in to shows like Grey's Anatomy.

I watched the entire mini-series of BostonMed in two days. It was really good. Granted I have only been working in the hospital as a medical student for one year and have not gone through residency I think the show depicts life at the hospital very well. The interactions between the staff is spot on, after all the show is real and not scripted. So if you really want to see what life is like and not just get caught up in the DRAMA of Grey's then I highly recommend watching these mini-series'.

As soon as I finished BostonMed I started watching episodes of Hopkins which is really good as well. Hopkins actually came out before BostonMed so you can see how they improved the show. Hopkins basically does the same thing as BostonMed except it follows around attendings, residents and nurses at Johns Hopkins. Watching all these episodes has me extremely pumped about being a resident even though they are extremely tired and worn out. The show also has me pumped about being on the East coast for the next few months. There are beautiful shots of Boston and Baltimore throughout the series. The cities are so beautiful and vibrant, I just can't wait to be in that setting doing what I love.

I start my first official neurosurgery rotation on Monday, I'll let you know how it goes.

Code Blue

I have decided that I want to revive my blog after nine months or so of absence. Reviving might not be the correct term since I am not sure how alive the blog was in the first place. Anyways, I decided to do this because I have been trying to read more at night (I canceled my cable and have little else to do). I have read several of the "must read" medical books this past year such as, House of god. I found reading books like these are quite fun for me and encouraging. I just finished the book Better: A surgeon's notes on performance by Atul Gawande. At the end of the book he shares five tips that he previously gave to a group of medical students and one of them was to write, so here we go.

First, a little up date on what I have been doing. I started my fourth year of medical school about two months ago. My first month was spent doing research, the second month has been an academic medicine month. Academic medicine is the month we get to study for our licensing exams. I took one of them (COMLEX) this past Tuesday and take the second one (USMLE) on Monday. If you actually kept up with my blog you would remember a post about how I had a Meltdown last year.

The next few months should be interesting. I have decided that I want to be a neurosurgeon when I grow up. I have told this to several doctors I work with it is usually followed up with questions such as "Are you crazy?", "Are you married?" Neurosurgery is one of the most demanding specialties in the medical field. There really aren't many neurosurgeons, last I checked there were 3,500 in the US. This shortage along with with fact that many of the surgeries take 6+ creates a lot of strain. If you decide to cover trauma for you respective city you might be taking call several times a week for multiple hospitals when you are in your 40-50's. I have been told by some neurosurgeons I shouldn't do it and they wouldn't do it again. I have not been shaken by this so maybe the answer to the first question is yes, I am crazy.

With deciding to do this I have applied to several residencies and part of getting in to them is doing audition rotations (AKA away rotations or Sub-I's) at the places you apply. Unfortunately for me there are no programs in Texas that I am going to apply to so I will be doing this rotations in other states. Next month I will still be in Fort Worth doing a neurosurgery rotation with a local doctor so he can get me prepared to go "show off" to these other places. I am really excited about starting to do rotations in what I actually want to do. I have spent the first part of the year in thing like OBGYN, Pediatrics, and Psychiatry, all which I had fun because I love medicine but I really like operating and operating on the brain is just so exhilarating. After my last day of my rotation here I will make the trek up to New Jersey for a month, followed by a month in Long Island, then a final month in Philadelphia. Once I finish in Philly it will be Christmas and I will be on my way back home.

Given that I will be in the North East all by my lonesome I hope I can read even more books at night and hopefully blog about the experience.

SHARE Kenya

I know it has been a really long time since my last post but I have no finished up half of my third year of medical school wow time flies. I was lucky enough to participate in a trip to Kisumu Kenya during my family medicine rotation this past month below is an email i sent home while i was there. Here is a link to my photos, and a link to a website of our group's updates.

Hey guys,

I am writing this email as we journey on our hour and fifteen min bus ride from kisumu to masara. We take a two lane highway that is pretty scary; bicyclists ride on the edge of the road without a bike lane and tour buses pass us nearly having a head on collision each time while running cyclist off the road. Children play in the trash and bathe in the streams naked as we pass. Most ecstatically jump up and wave with both hands as they see us shouting mzungu (white person). Their smiles are absolutely gorgeous as you can see they joy within them. Once we get to ahero we take a left off the pavement on to a dirt road. We stop and pick up some of the translators who crawl on top of the bus and hold on for dear life as we travel the bumpy road for about five miles. The road is very much domed so we spend a good deal of the trek driving at what feels like 30 degrees. The scenery is gorgeous women walking from market with baskets on their heads. Other women out in the rice fields working with their children in the far distance you can see the mountain ranges. The best part is when gazing upon the horizon there are no power lines to interrupt the beauty. I usually take this time each morning to listen to my iPod and treat it as a one of worship and can't help but look out and think how great god is and bow He created this for our pleasure so that we may subdue it.

We finally pull up to the clinic each day with several hundred people waiting for our arrival. There are probably 20 children running from their perspective huts to follow the bus. We usually have morning clinic for about 3 hours until we take a lunch break. The women of the village cook. Chapiti for us which is a piece of flat bread that is fried Almost like a pita. To drink we get a cup of hot tea with sugar in the raw. Yes it is 90 degrees outside and we drink hot tea. We will then finish clinic leave some pharmacy students behind to finish up filling some scripts as we make the journey home.

We are averaging about 300 pts a day at clinic, yesterday was our biggest day at 400. The cases consist of malaria with fevers of 105, diarrhea from parasites, asthma, allergies, arthritis, trauma, abscess etc. We have a wound clinic that we rotate through. My first day in wound clinic I injected countless knees for arthritis drained many abscess and even pulled some teeth.

I have yet to have any patients that aren't happy and content. Everyone seems so happy about everything. The children run around and play with anything they can find. One of my favorite toys is a metal ring they spin and run alongside with a stick that pushes it. Might not be the best description but that is essentially what they do. We pass out stickers to them every day and they absolutely love them. I get asked daily for my water bottle and my pens something they get to experience and play with once a year.

Sunday Bonyo's dad had a party for us at the village. We had live entertainment that consisted of a keyboard 5 cow skin drums a shaker and a man singing. Each song lasted about 20 mins it seemed. I made a complete fool of myself but the children loved it. We had the kids in a Congo line at one point. After watching the villagers dance they sat down and said it was the white peoples turn to dance so we stood up and tried to dance some more. I have never been laughed at that much but I believe they enjoyed it. We finished the party with a meal provided by the women. I went into their huts and watched them prepare the meal and will show you pics later. The huts made of mud with a tin roof had two rooms one for sleeping and the other for cooking. The cooking room had a wood fire in the corner with a pot of water on it. The women sat around a table and prepared the meal. Chickens roamed throughout the hut along with cats and dogs. So who knows what the meat was. It is custom that guest eat first and then they eat the leftovers. Makes you think twice before getting seconds or a lot off food and never will you not finish a meal.

I have many more stories that I hope to get into an email but I am now tired of typing on my phone. I hope you all are doing well and can't wait to get back and share stories and pics.

-Parker

Mr. and Mrs. W. Peppard

This weekend I had the pleasure of using my skills I learned when I was eight for a wedding. What would these skills be? Well of course they would be acolyting (not sure if that is a word). My roommate CB and I were both asked to be acolytes in a wedding for two of our friends. He is an Aggie thus we were on the C team since we are we t-sips. However, I would like to make a notion that this is actually the best position you can have. 1) you have your moment 2) less responsibility 3) you get all the same perks.

Talking about perks the rehearsal dinner was very elegant with a great steak. The brides started of the T(r)oast perfectly with a talk about how "no man was good enough for his daughter" with cigar in mouth and all. He happens to be a lawyer thus he knows how to execute a speech to the crowd better than any. We learned all about how WP was a man by his sports knowledge of Michael Phelps pot and Lance Armstrong's breakfast. We also learned he is an engineer and can fix things.

The wedding went off with out a hitch and might be the shortest ceremony of all time. AP was very excited the entire time as you could see from her almost jumping up and down during both ets of vows and constant giggling. WP on the other hand lost it when she was about halfway down the isle. It seems like the times are starting to change most every wedding I have been to recently the guy has cried more so than the girl. We then booked it to the reception which was very much a party. After a few moments of chaos at the reception due to the overwhelming amount of people and rush for the food the dancing began. The couple decided to do all the pictures up front thus we were able to eat and then dance with the couple through most of the night. They buzzed a way in a limo at 10:30 but this seemed more like midnight because of how tired I was from wearing out the dance floor.

We finished up the trip to Waco with a stop at the Dr. Pepper Museum. If you have never been consider yourself lucky. First of all there isn't much to see there and most of it isn't entertaining. Second of all the Dr. Pepper I had at the soda shop was watered down and terrible. The only redeeming part of this experience is the picture below.

Always state your intentions

This is a valuable lesson I learned recently. After spending some time getting to know a girl at school I decided she was worthy of a date. However when asking her I simply said I would like to take her out to dinner and then to our Boot Party for school. She was unable to go to the Boot Party because of her back but said that going to dinner sounded fun. YES! I was in like Flynn. I told her I would make reservations at a restaurant in Arlington and pick her up around 8. I went to Student Clinician Ceremony before hand where there was dinner served (didn't know that was going to happen), and then booked it from downtown to pick her up.

She lives in the back house of some friends so this made things tricky, I went to the front door of the main house which she was unable to leave from, so I had to make my way back to the car pull up to the back house that she lives in and then get out of the car and preceded to open the door for her. We made our way to Olenjacks Grille in Arlington to what I thought was a great dinner with good conversation. She ordered a grilled chicken salad with Russian dressing. I thought this was a great sign since girls always order salads on dates. After about an hour of conversation the waiter brought us the check. I immediately grabbed the check to pay; she reached for her purse and offered to pay for her portion of the bill. I thought this was odd but assured myself she was just trying to be polite. After a few more mins of conversation we left which I opened her door again and went to drop her off. We of course jammed to my favorite two Michael Jackson songs on the way home: Will you be there? (Free Willy) and Black or White. When I say jam I mean I was singing at the top of my lungs and borderline dancing as best as one can while driving a car. In my mind this date is going great. Now here comes the moment of doom. We sat in the circle drive in front of her house having some casual conversation to end the date, when she drops the dreaded F-Bomb. "Thanks for a dinner it was fun. But if you keep paying for your FRIENDS meals you are going to wind up broke and you won’t be able to pay for Africa." A million thoughts rushed through my head and I am sure my face lost all color, but somehow I quickly changed the conversation and left shortly there after.

I didn't state my intentions upfront and this lead to a huge amount of confusion. I came up with four things this could have meant. 1) She word vomited and didn’t meant to say it and was just awkward because she didn’t know how to end the date that I never called a date 2) This is the biggest hint of all time 3) She was fishing for my intentions and just gave me the big cheese down the middle (that I just looked at and didn’t swing 4) She said it and didn’t even realize it.

After a few minutes of freak out time I made my way back to the Boot Party and had to let all my friends know "how it went" since they knew where I was because I didn’t eat during the Student Clinician Ceremony. I then had to contemplate these thoughts and try to rationalize it all through the weekend. I finally had the talk of intentions (not to be confused with a DTR) a few days later in which, she informed me she didn't think it was a date, she noticed I got really quiet after that moment but didn’t think anything of it. So from now on always state your intentions and avoid all the confusion.

Dr. and Dr. Johnny V

This weekend I had the privileged of being a groomsman in two of my best friends wedding. The wedding took place at Nolte Farms in Seguin, Texas. I had to take my second board exam on Friday and was going to try and book it down there to at least make the rehearsal dinner. To my surprise I finished the exam really early and was able to make it down for both the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner. The Dinner took place at the gristmill which is always a favorite. The night really got going once the t(r)oast began. Many of them were towards JV with an occasional shot at KV all in all a fun night with great memories. The next morning AG and I drove back down to Seguin from Austin to have lunch with JV and some others. Craig’s Sauté and Grill was a hit especially since we all know how much JV loves to sauté most of his meals. Then the delimina hit what am I going to do from 2pm until 5pm when pictures start? AG and I ended up driving down about every road in the town passing the car show at the square checking out the movie theater, the amusement park with the worlds largest silo climb.

It was now time for the big show. After a few pictures we headed over to the Biblical Garden and watch the crowds file in. The sun was beginning to set and the bell started to ring it was show time. The KV's and JV' mothers were escorted in followed by a small sermonette that JV and KV wrote. We finally made our way up to the front and then it was time for KV's grand entrance. This was by far the most moving experience I have ever had at a wedding. She was gorgeous, I looked over at the bridesmaids I didn’t see a dry eye and Johnny V was barely holding it in, and chills were running through my spine. The ceremony was so beautiful because even though they were the center of attention you could tell they were reflecting all of the glory to God, and his presence was definitely felt. The wedding proceeded with some laughs along the way and it was time for the party.

In honor of them I have decided to make a list of some of my favorite memories with them.

KV
-Diet Vanilla Dr. Pepper
-Rosa's
-Mus musculus
-Driving through Westlake looking for Andy Roddick's House
-Dominican Joe's and Mozart’s
-Singing and acting out songs in the Car
-Bringing you flowers at the airport

JV
-FEAST
-BYX Summit
-Long talks after cell group about Krista
-Steaks for O-Chem
-The talk about fathers

JV and KV
-Krista's Surprise Party
-Ya'll giving up Valentines night to be with me as I checked my Match
-Copeland when JV wanted to take KV dancing

I am sure more will come to mind and I will edit this as they do. I love both of y’all very much and couldn't be happier.