Internal Medicine was my last rotation of intern year a couple months ago. If you don't know what internal medicine is, it's a general doctor that handles patients in the hospital. People there for pneumonias, fluid in their lungs, intoxications, etc just imagine things you or your grandparent may need to be in the hospital for (but not the ICU or postop from a surgery as those are different rotations/doctors).
I arrived to the hospital at 7:00 a.m. and then would see my patients until 9:00 a.m. and research their labs and discuss what happened overnight. I would write a note in the computer and order anything they may need. Some people would need discharge orders done etc.
At 9:00 a.m. we went to a lecture
From 9:30 to Noon we rounded with our attending. This consisted of discussing everything about our patients that happened in the last 24 hours and then how we were going to approach our plan today and what orders needed entered etc. We also visited our patients again.
At noon we had another lecture.
In the afternoons we would finish up with orders and paperwork from the patients on our list that we rounded on in the morning. We would write discharge orders and papers for people leaving. We would call family members or swing back by someone's room to discuss results of a test or imaging or meet with family. We would call nursing homes, social work, pharmacy, nutrition, speech, PT, OT, etc. and answer pages from nurses. Call family members or other doctors for collaborations on plans and recommendations.
Every other day we accepted new patients which means throughout the day we would see anyone who came into the emergency room and needed to spend the night in the hospital because they were too sick to go home. We also took patients from other hospitals who didn't have all the resources we have that was needed to take care of someone . We also saw patients who were transferring out of the ICU but still needed to stay in the hospital. We reviewed all of the history in the medical records on each patient and then visited with them and made sure everything was in the computer they needed and ordered studies if they need them. Plus we documented all of it. Then we would round on these patients and care for them the following days until they discharged.
When we were on call overnight we would manage all of the patients that were in the hospital in the internal medicine service in addition to responding to codes anywhere in the many buildings and seeing new patients in the emergency room.
Typically 2 days of the week we left at 5:30pm, 1 day per week we stayed for 24 hours, 2-3 days a week we left at 6:00 p.m., 1 day per week usually we left at 7:00 p.m. We had four days off per month.
I learned a lot, and had some great experiences meeting new patients and residents. I was not a fan of the constant phone calls and pages or the constant computer work which seemed to rule my life that month, but this is how the work gets done!
For more day in the life posts ---- HERE
.