Seniors Graduation

Yesterday our senior class graduated. Congratulations to Johnson, Whitt, Hunter, Jessica and Clint. They were great mentors from the start and helped us from the moment we got here. This next year is going to be weird without them, but I know that each and every one of them is ready for the future. 4 out of the 5 have a job already and one is waiting to hear back from their interview this week. It will be great to hear from them in the coming weeks on how it is to be pumping on their own at their jobs. It’s weird to think that that is going to be me in just a year!

I’m working on my resume right now, getting it ready to take with me on conferences and have handy in case I run arose a great job opportunity. The best time to start looking for jobs for us would be around January. Six months and under is about the length that a job will wait. I’ll talk more about the job searching when it gets closer.

In August our junior class will be starting. I’m excited to see how they are when they get here. It will probably be a flashback to what we were like when we first started. Hopefully we will be just as great of mentors to them as our seniors were to us.

Let me know if there is anything that you want me to post about.

Thanks,

Molly

Out on Rotations

I’m sorry that I haven’t posted anything in a while. Things have been super busy. We had finals at the end of April, followed by a long weekend break between semesters. We have also divided up among our different clinical locations. We have four rotation sites here at Vanderbilt. One of our students has started at Vanderbilt’s Children’s Hospital to do a rotation there for 9 weeks. Two of our students started early at Centennial Medical Center to be trained in by our seniors before they depart on their big adventures. Three of us are at the main Vanderbilt hospital and the Veteran’s hospital. The main hospital and the VA are a shared rotation, for a few reasons. The entire perfusionists who pump at the main hospital also pump at the VA when they have a case. The VA does 1-3 cases a week, which aren’t enough cases a week for a student. They also very rarely do on-pump cases there, so it’s not a sufficient pumping rotation on its own.  

The main hospital does quite a few cases a week. This week I did 6 pump cases myself, and was there most days for 12 hours. As long as the days are, it’s been nice being at the hospital more and gaining a lot of experience. I feel like I have grown a lot just this week in experience. It especially helps to do two cases back to back in a day. Setting up and getting ready for the next case is at a lot faster pace then you’re morning (first) case. You’re tearing everything down once it’s safe and the first patient is stable or out of the room. Then you have only like 30-40 minutes to get ready for the next patient while the room is being cleaned and set-up for the next one. It’s a lot faster of a pace then having a less stressful hour in the morning. It kind of prepares you for emergent situations, which is nice.

Does anyone have any questions? Want me to talk about any specific topics?

Feel free to comment or email me.

Thanks, Molly

Wisconsin Perfusion Society Meeting

This past weekend I attended the Wisconsin Perfusion Society Meeting. At the Friday night dinner I presented a poster on my case report. I attached a picture of my poster.
The meeting was a great experience and opportunity. I really enjoyed meeting students from other programs and discussing the differences and similarities in our programs. Even though we go to different schools, we all seem to go through the same feelings and experiences!

The speech that stood out the most to me was Dr. Knickerbockers reminisce of 1958 when him and his colleagues invented closed chest compressions. Dr. Knickerbocker and his two team members worked with canines. They had no intention initially of applying its use with humans. With limited resources they developed informational videos within the lab. They were even able to superimpose the EKG and blood pressure tracings over the image of fibrillating and defibrillating the canines to create fibrillation and reverse it respectively. The video footage was impressive and remarkable. All of the steps for chest compressions are still utilized today in CPR practices. It’s incredible to think about all of the lives that have been saved and recovered because of these three gentlemen and their passion in the lab to create closed chest compressions with canines. These gentlemen stumbled upon a true medical break-through and deserve many thanks and appreciation.

Busy Busy Busy!

I feel as if I am on auto-pilot currently. Most days over the last few weeks I have spent about 12 hours a day at the hospital. We have had quite the influx of cases lately, along with class and conferences. Last week I was apart of placing a 30 year old on ECMO after two cardiac arrests within a half hour. When she initially arrived at the hospital we had little information about her, we didn't even have a name. It was interesting to observe the processes that part take in order to retrieve information about patients and how this girl's story unfolded. She was successfully decannulated from ECMO two days later and doing great! It's amazing what we can do for people.

As Whitt has mentioned before, this program is intensive with multiple assignments and heavy case loads. There is little time to breath at points, but you just have to keep moving. Slowing down to think about everything there is to complete within the next few days, week, or month would probably give me a stomach ulcer! This last week I have been working on finalizing my poster on my case report to present at the Wisconsin Perfusion Society meeting next week.On top of that, I have had cases all week, we have an exam on Tuesday, and I found out I have two papers due by Monday. If you just keep moving and working, everything will get done or get worked out in the end.

Is there anything that you want me to talk about? Cases? Different Perfusion topics?

Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

Thanks!