Mac Lesnick - 6

My New Favorite?

     I've been excited for this day for the past two weeks! The OR has always interested me so much. Maybe I watch too much Grey's Anatomy, or maybe I could actually be cut out for the department. After an hour orientation on the history and rules of the OR, I got to put on scrubs for the first time - wow they are comfortable! Once I got changed, I happened to run into one of my fellow classmates, Elise. She ended up spending half the day with me and the nurse! The one thing that disappointed me was that students aren't allowed in the operating rooms anymore because too many of the have passed out or gotten sick. This was really interesting to me because I learned in my orientation that operating rooms used to have stadium seating for all of the medical students to watch. Now only experienced students are allowed in. So all of the surgeries I saw, I watched from the outside through a window. The nurse and Elise would always laugh at me whenever we saw something part of an open body because my face would be about an inch away from the glass window. I was so intrigued by everything going on in the rooms. The nurse explained what each machine is used for and what each person was in the room for. Since she was a nurse, she of course explained, in greater detail, what the OR nurse in the room was responsible for. She not only was another set of helping hands for the surgeons by passing him the instruments (tools) or helping with parts of the surgery, but she also played a much greater role. The OR nurse is responsible for the patient. She is the one who sees the body on the table, not as muscles and bones, but as a human being who is in very critical care. They take into consideration the needs and care of the patient and what is best for them in the moment. Surgeons have enough to worry about, so the nurses take the stress of the patient off of their hands during surgery. The one downfall about this department is that there isn't much patient-worker interaction like there is on the long-term care floors. However, the excitement and variety of the OR was enough for me!