the PA students switched this weekend and the old PA who had been there for 2 weeks before me and 'trained' me left and a new one came. I have now graduated from camera holder to trochar placer/ grabber. i get to grab on to the gallbladder and move it around, etc. its a lot harder than it looks and for the past 2 weeks i have been pretty nervous to step up to this new role. moving up is down and vice-versa. you are staring at a screen across from you and doing the opposite with your hands. the only way to get good is practice...
this weekend we had several lap appys and a couple I&Ds. today we started out the day with a lap chole and then we took out a large portion of a women's stomach due to cancer [a partial gastrectomy]. this was the first open abdominal surgery i had seen with Dr.B. it was a large midline incision from the sternum to below the naval. another doctor, captain [he is a real captain in the navy...and the sweetest man who loves teaching and is good at it] was with us and i was next to him holding retractors and such getting to touch and feel whenever i wanted. it was amazing. they even let me anastomose a part of the stomach with a big 'gun like' tool. it was incredible. my hands where holding this women's stomach, grazing against her spleen and liver, and at one point had my hand entirely in her abdominal cavity. wowzers.
another great part of the day was when Dr.B said we could come with him to his medical mission down to Mexico in a couple weeks. its a Saturday day trip where we leave around 7am and come back late at night. i am super super pumped for that. :)
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