Case log during holidays?

[turkeyjerky]

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Hey all,

I'm an EM intern and had a quick question for you all. We have a 2 week stint through anesthesiology to get some dedicated airway experience; mine is during the last two weeks of december (12/23 to 1/3). I'm worried that the schedule might be too light during this period and whether I should try to switch it. Any thoughts? If it makes any difference, this is a large, tertiary community hospital; I don't believe there is an anethesia residency. Thanks

 

[RxBoy]

Hey all,

I'm an EM intern and had a quick question for you all. We have a 2 week stint through anesthesiology to get some dedicated airway experience; mine is during the last two weeks of december (12/23 to 1/3). I'm worried that the schedule might be too light during this period and whether I should try to switch it. Any thoughts? If it makes any difference, this is a large, tertiary community hospital; I don't believe there is an anethesia residency. Thanks

Yes it will be light. Surgeons don't like booking elective surgeries near the holidays, especially those weeks. The majority of surgeries that come in will be urgent or emergent, and I can assure you the anesthesiologists will not make your airway experience a priority for those cases.

 

[rsgillmd]

Hey all,

I'm an EM intern and had a quick question for you all. We have a 2 week stint through anesthesiology to get some dedicated airway experience; mine is during the last two weeks of december (12/23 to 1/3). I'm worried that the schedule might be too light during this period and whether I should try to switch it. Any thoughts? If it makes any difference, this is a large, tertiary community hospital; I don't believe there is an anethesia residency. Thanks

I would take the direct approach and ask one of the anesthesiologists that works in your institution. "Too light" is a vague term. If they've been there a while they can probably tell you whether you'll have a decent experience or not.

Although I'm with RxBoy. Most probably the answer you'll get is that you're better off rescheduling. Even a busy hospital is not going to schedule elective cases on holidays, and you'll probably want to be home with your family on the holidays also.

 

[jwk]

The holiday itself will be light (urgent/emergent cases only), and Christmas Eve and New Years Eve will probably be much lighter than a normal day. However, we find that our OR schedule can be quite busy for the weeks heading up to Christmas and New Year's days, either with people taking advantage of the school holidays or vacation time to squeeze in elective surgery, or those trying to avoid getting dinged with another year's deductible once they get to January 1st.

 

[bullard]

Agree with jwk

 

[RxBoy]

either with people taking advantage of the school holidays or vacation time to squeeze in elective surgery, or those trying to avoid getting dinged with another year's deductible once they get to January 1st.

Forgot to mention that there is probably a lot of hospital variance so check with the hospital. For example, our pts don't attend school and have been awarded a permanent all inclusive government funded vacation.

 

[IlDestriero]

We close 1/2 the rooms during the holiday stretch, but there are plenty of elective cases scheduled during that time because of the school holiday. There is tremendous variation between hospitals. My old military hospital switched to emergent cases only from the 24th to the 2nd.
You don't need to learn how to manage the difficult emergent airways with rapid sequence intubations (they're not going to let you manage them anyway). You need to learn how to do a proper jaw lift, bag mask ventilate, use an oral and nasal airway, place an LMA, and of course drop a couple tubes in the goose. 😉
You need plain old boring elective cases for that. Those are the skills you really need to develop to be effective in stabilizing a patient while calling for assistance.
Try to switch weeks if it's going to be a ghost town.