End of Ward 75, beginning of psych, and a new coin

I was on call in Ward 75 on Sunday, for the last time in block 2 (I'll be back there in block 6). It was a really, really quiet call (which is a very good thing), and I actually got sleep, but we did have a bit of excitement. Right after the med student returned with dinner (we one out to grab us food every time we're on call), we were all sitting around eating and checking things on the computer, and suddenly he jumped out of his chair and said, "Hello, sir!" Just my luck--I had just taken a rather large bite of food. I turned to see who he was talking to (thinking it was our attending), and saw Lieutenant General Schoomaker, the Surgeon General of the United States Army (ie, my boss, after the President and Chief of Staff), standing in our team room. He was walking around the hospital on a Sunday evening, just getting a feel for the place and a reminder of what really happens in Army medicine, at the very bottom of all the decisions he makes. So he stayed and talked for a bit, joked about college football (he went to Michigan; I was wearing an OSU tee-shirt), and traded internship stories. He was an intern before the 80 hour work week (obviously), but still recorded his hours, just out of curiosity. There was one week that he worked 158 hours. He still doesn't know how he did it. Then he gave us coins (above), and resumed his wandering of the hospital.

And just to put things into perspective about how nice we have it now, in Block 2, I worked a total of 260.17 hours, which is 65.04 hours per week.

Well, I was supposed to start on PCLS (Psychiatry Consult Liaison Service) at National Naval Medical Center (better known as Bethesda) on Monday, but as I was post-call in Ward 75, I didn't start until today. It's going to be a really laid-back rotation, especially after MICU and Ward 75. We currently have three patients and three interns. I showed up at 0730 and left at 1600, and maybe worked two hours. The rest of the time, I sat around and twiddled my thumbs. Tomorrow, I'm bringing some fun reading, and after work, I'm going to Barnes and Noble and seeing if they have a USMLE Step 3 study book so I can pretend to study while I'm at work. It's going to be a good month.