My Say: Sungkyunkwan Scandal

" Is a man's love for another an ignominy? Of course, for scholars who practice Confucianism, the most important virtue in Confucianism, "in", refers to love for your friend ("ren"). In, Eui, Ye, Ji, Shin (ren, yi, li, zhi, xin in Chinese), they're virtues that should be upheld, as scholars following Mencius's teachings. But, instead of seeing the truth as it is, the foolish mind that only sees what it wants to see and believes what it wants to believe cannot be considered wise ("zhi"). To put others in harm's way because of irresponsible curiosity,laughing and enjoying it without knowing that it is a sin, cannot be considered as just ("yi") or proper ("li"). And a heart that cannot trust ("xin") a friend cannot be called a Confucian scholar. No one has the right to judge and point fingers at a person for his love for another with precepts and skewed standards of what constitutes a scandal. If that is the way of a neo-Confucian scholar, I would rather choose to be...homosexual." - Lee Sun Joon

Sungkyunkwan Scandal, a cross-dressing in an era-themed Korean drama, is the new series I'm able to finish last night. Unlike its previous predecessors, this series is not just your ordinary romantic-comedy series but rather it's more on a serious side with sprinkled comedy. Although the series employs the cross dressing theme, putting it in a Joseon era setting gave the drama a different feel and more seriousness unlike other cross dressing series.

With the political struggles of the different faction of that time, how can friendship blossom in four people with different backgrounds and belongs to different factions? With the strict compliance of the ideals of Confucianism in their time, how can they question the tradition and change the place where they lived?

Introduction:

Sungkyunkwan Scandal is set in Sungkyunkwan University in the late Joseon era during the reign of King Jeongjo, revolving around the exploits and love stories of four youths. When her younger brother's illness worsens and their family is in danger of being evicted from their house for lack of money, Kim Yoon Hee enters the school under his name, disguised as a boy in her desperation to support him. There, she becomes friends with the intelligent and upright Lee Sun Joon, the playboy Goo Yong Ha and rebellious Moon Jae Shin.- DramaWiki

My Say:

When a cross dressing series comes to mind, people always associated it with romantic-comedy kind of drama and true enough, series like Coffee Prince and You're Beautiful is a rom-com series and it is always a big hit. But unlike them, Sungkyunkwan Scandal or SKKS for short is not your ordinary romantic comedy, it is romantic, it has comedy but with the addition of the historical element in the drama, it helps to spice up the series, adding more mystery and seriousness to it.

This series is also notable for having a good ensemble of cast portraying lovable characters who wears astounding costumes in a wonderful cinematography giving remarkable dialogues. These are just few of the reasons why SKKS is a hit to the people. But for me, the intriguing plot is the reason why I am hooked in this series. One must say that this is just like other Kdramas but for me, I see some uniqueness to it although I cannot point out what it really is, maybe the perfect harmony of the cast or the intricate connection of the characters to each other or because each characters have their own story, I really don't know.

My Rating: I'm giving this series 7 out of 10 stars for giving a popular themed drama (cross dressing) a different take, for the actors who played their characters well and for the great cinematography and story.

Pediatric Surgery Part 1

I always wondered why we don't have a lot of pediatric surgeries in our department or in our hospital for that matter. We do have occasional pediatric surgeries like circumcision, hypospadia and chordee repair, but that's it, no general surgeries, all genito-urinary surgeries.

Last week, I learned that the reason why we don't have general surgeries for babies that is because almost all of the consultants were either already based in US or training in other countries. But this week is different. A pediatric surgeon who is already based in US, comes back and ta-da suddenly we have a pediatric surgery everyday and luckily, I'm always scrubbing in their surgeries.

Yup! I considered it as a good opportunity especially if you are getting bored to the things that's happening in your life. I mean yes I'm not that yet good in scrubbing or circulating in every surgeries that there is in operating room, but scrubbing and assisting in pediatric surgeries is like a breath of fresh air. Although senior staffs are always telling me that they prefer assisting in geriatrics rather than in pediatrics because if there's an emergency the life of pediatrics is in a more immediate danger than in adults.

Anyways, the first ever surgery that I was able to assist with Dr. L is the endorectal pullthrough.

ENDORECTAL PULLTHROUGH

 Endorectal pullthrough is the treatment of choice for patients who were diagnosed to have Hirschsprung's Disease.

The procedure consists of removing the mucosa and submucosa of the rectum and pulling the ganglionic bowel through the aganglionic muscular cuff of the rectum.

 OPERATIVE PROCEDURE:

The patient was anesthetized and placed in the lithotomy position. A urinary catheter was optional. Given anorectal dilatations half a minute, the right index finger was inserted into the rectum and pressing the anterior rectum-wall onto the above pubic symphysis. The left index finger pressed the abdominal-wall onto the corresponding site above the pubic symphysis, joining the two fingers together. This was the usual peritoneal reflection on children. Then with the right hand holding oval forceps through the anus, inserted forceps into the rectum and touched the left index finger then clipped the rectal wall. Slowly pulled the anterior-rectal wall down to the anus (Figure A) to produce an artificial intussusception between the rectum and the distal sigmoid colon. Fine silk suturing was performed circumferentially at the level of that point which would be used for traction for the distal end. Another circumferential suture was performed parallel 0.5 cm distances above the original one and used for traction for the proximal intestines. The full-thickness rectal wall was truncated between the above two circumferential sutures with cautery, avoiding damaging adjacent tissues when the abdominal cavity was open (Figure B). The full thickness of rectum and sigmoid colon was mobilized out though the anus and the mesenteric vessels were carefully dissected and ligatured (Figure C). The colon was divided until at 15 cm above the most proximal normal site. A definite resection line where ganglion cells were present was determined by intraoperative rapid frozen section. The distal rectum was pulled eversion and was dissected anteriorly 2.5–3.5 cm above the dentate line. The posterior rectal wall was split longitudinally and dissected until 0.5–1.0 cm above the dentate line. The residual segment was resected. After an oblique routine anastomosis was performed (Figure D), the large intestine was pulled back and an anal tube was placed. (Source: CMJ)

THINGS TO PREPARE:

 Pediatric OR set-up

Instruments:
mosquito curve and straight
kelly

Supplies:
silk 2-0
silk 4-0T5
chromic 4-0T5
chromic 5-0
vicryl 4-0T5

Anyways, the operation per se is quite easy with unremarkable event, the difficult part is during the induction of anesthesia to the patient. The anesthesiologist is having difficulty finding a good vein to insert an IV, so instead of starting early, we were delayed for two hours.

All in all, it was fun in a sense that you'll be glad that the baby was able to survive the operation and that he/she will be having a better future. :)

Sunday Market and Emergency Cases

Emjay, Bogs and I have been planning to visit the Sunday markets near our area (that includes the Sidcor Sunday Market, The Lung Center Sunday Market and the Weekend Market in QC Circle) almost a month ago but it was only yesterday that we were able to do that.

Actually, our main goal is to ask for the price of the stall in their market. I'm planning to sell cupcakes and other pastries kasi and we've decided that the best way is to sell it in a Sunday Market.

Anyways, our first stop is the Sidcor Sunday Market which is located in the Eton Centris. I didn't know that they have a Sunday Market until Emjay mentioned it to me. While roaming and looking to the products being sold, an old lady told us that this market was once in the Lung Center parking area and that all of them have already transferred here, so wala na daw kwenta kung pupunta kami sa Lung Center dahil pangit na yung nandun (I think she overheard us talking that we wanted to visit the Lung Center Sunday market).

Anyways, we learned that the stall's rent is just for Php490.00 but we need to enlist first with the products we wanted to sold. If we don't have any competition, they will contact us.

After buying some Vigan Empanada, we went to the Lung Center but unfortunately, the guard mentioned that the Sunday market event was cancelled. And so we went straight ahead to the QC Circle Weekend Market which is not even comparable to the Sidcor Sunday Market, so we didn't bother asking the price of the stalls there.

Because I'm on a 2-10 shift yesterday, I didn't go home after our Sunday Market tour, instead I stayed in SM North and just went to the hospital around 1pm. Unfortunately, instead of having a peaceful Sunday afternoon duty (the usual routine of those who were on Sunday afternoon duty, is sleeping, watching TV and playing computer games), we have an emergency case, and it's not just one but three. They came one after the other.

Our first case is emergency ventriculostomy and our patient to make it worst is pregnant. She ended up in ICU afterwards, just for a close monitoring. Then we had an emergency appendectomy followed by an emergency ex-lap which also ended up in the ICU because of her unstable vital signs.

The weird thing is, all of us who were on duty that afternoon were also on duty the following morning, so we decided that instead of going home, we'll sleep in OR instead.

Good thing is, we were not that toxic today as expected and we were able to go home immediately. No overtime work for us :)

The Toxicity Continues...

Supposedly I'm only getting Sir G's 2-10 HNOD shift and another will take over for his 6-2 HNOD shift but unfortunately, no one was able to get that and they told me na ako na lang dahil ako naman ang nag2-10 HNOD, so all the problems that may occur alam ko dahil ako naman ang nakausap ng mga nagpaschedule.

Anyways, I accepted naman yung challenge even though alam kong mahihirapan ako. At first okay naman until nagkulang na ako sa mga staff ko. Some were still in a case tapos kelangan ng sunduin yung to follow case ko. So I opted to make some student nurses to scrub in one of my case. I even asked our supervisor if she could circulate in one case and fetch some patients.

Hay nakakaloko talaga ang araw na yun, buti na lang at helpful naman yung mga senior staff na nandun, especially Mam Mai.

I really don't like doing the HNOD duties but then some part of myself wanted the challenge. I want to prove to them I could also do well in that aspect. Sabi ko nga practice makes perfect, maybe after a month or so of doing it, gamay ko na sya. Hopefully!

A Different Kind of Toxicity

Toxicity have different meanings in a nurse point of view. It may mean toxic patient, toxic doctor or toxic relatives. But one thing for sure, toxicity means stressful.

In an operating room set-up, being toxic may mean having a lot of cases in a day that even though you're in a 6am-2pm shift, it is 100% sure that you will be asked to do an overtime work and you'll be getting home late. Being toxic may also mean having a toxic case, where the patient have a lot of contraptions when brought to OR or the patient may end up in ICU after the surgery. Or being toxic in an OR may mean having a toxic surgeon or anesthesiologist, that even though your case is simple and the patient is not in an immediate danger, you'll still be having a stressful day.

Anyways, today I experienced a different kind of toxicity and that is being a head nurse for the day or HNOD. I knew from the start that being a HNOD is difficult but it was only yesterday that I experienced how difficult it was. In our department it was not only in one shift that you'll become a HNOD. Aside from the 2-10 shift, you'll be automatically become the HNOD for the 6-2 shift the following day. Mahirap yun dahil every 8 ka na nga, toxic pa buhay mo.

The 6-2 HNOD is difficult because if there's a problem in the schedule, or in the supplies, equipments, rooms, you'll need to face the wrath of the consultants that were being affected. On the other hand, the 2-10 HNOD's toxicity comes from how you need to arrange and prepare the operating room the following day. Ang mahirap dito, every now and then may tatawag to schedule an operation the following day and you need to satisfy what the consultants wanted. But sometimes it was difficult because some of them wanted to do the surgery on a certain time but unfortunately, there are no more available rooms for that surgery.

Anyways, today I'm a 2-10 HNOD. Supposedly tomorrow I should be a 6-2 HNOD but Sir G asked me to have a change of shift with him, so instead of being a 6-2 HNOD, he'll take that and I'll be the 2-10 HNOD instead (yun kasi sched nya, palit na lang daw kami). So in the end, I'm having a 2-10 HNOD again. I'm just hoping that it would not be difficult like yesterday.

Kahapon kasi hirap na hirap na ako. Andaming nagpapasched at wala na akong mga kwarto to accommodate their surgeries ang masaklap pa ayaw nilang ipa ibang araw yung mga surgeries nila. Tsk tsk mga pasaway na serohano.

Goodluck na lang talaga sa akin tomorrow!