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Life is
tough and perhaps tougher when you are a post
graduate intern a.k.a. PGI. For a PGI, the day
begins as early as 7 a.m. when the intern does his
usual morning rounds from the hospital basement,
where the wards are usually located, up to the
highest floor (in our case, the 5th floor) where all
of the private rooms, ICUs and nursery are located.
He has to finish his rounds by 8 a.m. and turn in
all of his progress notes (daily updates of the
patient's condition in the hospital) inside the
charts just in time for endorsements. Endorsement is
that time when the intern who was previously on 24
hour duty informs the incoming intern on 24 hour
duty, the consultants and the rest of the PGIs about
the number and kinds of admissions during the past
24 hours. The intern is expected therefore to know
all of his admitted patients, their history,
physical examinations, even latest laboratory
results and the diagnosis and other differential
diagnoses. Endorsements however do not just end
there. Most of the times, consultants would
interrogate the intern regarding the management and
other basic questions regarding the case.
Endorsements can take the whole morning.
After endorsements, the morning is spent depending
on your status. A PGI is FD (from duty) if he was
previously from a 24 hour duty. A PGI is OD (on
duty) when he is on 24 hour duty on that day. A PGI
is OC (on call) or pre-duty if he is to have his 24
hour duty day the next day. Each type of PGI may
have different functions in the hospital. For
example, the PGI - OD mans the ER (emergency room)
or LR (labor room) whichever is applicable. The PGI
- OC mans the OR (operating room) while the PGI-FD
takes all the ward calls. Regardless of their status
however, there are really some PGIs who are "OD
looking FD".
In my hospital, there are 3 PGIs assigned for each
department. There are the PPGIs (pedia PGIs), SPGIs
(Surgical PGIs), the MPGIs (medical PGIs), the
OBGYNEPGIs (OB-GYNE PGIs :-)) and the CPGIs
(community PGIs). During the morning, all of us
would go to our respective posts, do rounds with our
respective consultants and answer calls from our
respective wards. It is only during lunch time when
all 14 of us would huddle inside our On-Call Room,
share lunch (the lunch alloted for the 4 PGIs on
duty) and chit-chat, study, watch a DVD, study, eat,
study, tell jokes, study and take a bath. Oh, did I
mention studying?
After lunch time, all of us attend the afternoon
conferences in the board room. During Mondays, it is
the surgical conference, Tuesdays are Pedia
Conferences, Wednesdays are OB-GYNE conferences,
Thursdays our Grand Conferences, Fridays our for
Medical Conferences. Saturdays, Sundays and Official
Holidays are half days so those who are not ODs go
home to rest and study and sleep and study. During
weekdays, all PGIs who are not ODs go home at 5 p.m.
For those who are ODs, the day has just begun.
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