Going to the O.R.

Fabulous day last Monday, donning the blue scrubs, hat, booties and donning gloves for my trip into OR 6 and OR 2 for several procedures, including a thorocotomy, total neck dissection and finally, a ventricularostomy. The circulating nurse manages the team and the charting while the patient is in the O.R. We would go and make sure that all the consents and forms were executed in the file, fetch the patient, reassure their family, take the patient to the operating room, transfer them to the OR table, insert their catheters, hook up their monitors, round up any last minute supplies, coordinate any final preferences from the surgeon, the anesthesiologist, tie up the gowns of the sterile crew (tech/doc/etc) and call for the final time out before the operation begins. As the procedure opens and closes, every little thing gets counted, down to the sponges, laps and needles...because the last thing you want to do when you staple someone shut, is leave something inside.

The patients were all women...ages 78 to 34. The last patient had Hep C and a ruptured brain aneurysm. As I peered into her skull, the surgeon said "OK Sam Adams (my nickname) how come I didn't use the bipolar on her?"....thinking of my best Trivial Pursuit answer (which would be France..by the way)...I tried to equate it's equivalent answer in medical terminology and answered, "ugh...doc, that would be due to increased risk of infection?" Ding Ding Ding...what did she win Bob? Nothing.

I was amazed and humbled at how fast, clean, and closed everyone looked after they had been sauteed, fileted and drilled.

Going to the O.R. was a blast. It would be fun to work as a circulating nurse or nurse anesthetist.