PAC

Every Wednesday morning I have preadmission clinic (PAC). These are patients who are going to have an operation electively so their pre-operative stuff is organised at this clinic. It is really a mindless job because all I do is copy information from other pieces of paper, letters etc onto another form called the pre-admission form.

Every surgeon has different requests for blood tests so I just order the blood test according to their preferences instead of thinking about which blood tests would be appropriate. I just copy the patients medications onto their drug chart. And that's it. Doesn't require a medical degree to do. Anyone can do it.It's the most boring part of my intern job.

So I try to make these clinics as time to get to know different people, practice how to make a conversation. Nothing medical. Sometimes patients remember me when they're finally admitted in hospital for their operation. It's a nice feeling.

Today I had a few interesting patients. One really pissed-off patient. She was angry because she had to wait for so long. It wasn't that long. Maybe an hour. What's an hour in a public hospital. I once waited for my antenatal appointment (back in 2006) for 4 hours. Anyway. She started off really angry, mulut muncung, asyik tsk tsk aje (I dah seram dah) but once I got her talking and appeared to sound attentive and interested, a sudden and amazing transformation occurred. She became so amicable! Wahhhh

I had another patient with an inguinal hernia which had extended into his scrotum. Tu biasalah...but this guy.. one side of his scrotum was the size of 2 rugby balls put together. He had been walking around with this huge thing dangling for many months. He smelt distinctively of urine and was very dishevelled and smelly. But, he was awfully nice. Gimme a nice person any day. I don't care if they stink or look a mess, if they're nice; you see past all that.

Another patient I got was a patient whose life had been full of dramas. She was abused as a child which caused her to develop a brain injury, epilepsy and bipolar disorder. Then when she got married, her husband turned out to be a religious maniac who punishes her everytime she "sins". Her daughter has autism. She was at the clinic because she has left breast cancer and will have a mastectomy. Amazingly she was a pretty cheerful person. She said if she wrote a book about her life, it might become a best-seller!

So yeah, the only consolation of being made to do this brainless, unappreciated job of preadmission clinic is I meet all these weird and wonderful people. Hehehe