Orientation

Orientation week went by in a blur. There are about forty of us so I had lots of new faces and names to remember. The class as a whole seems awesome and passionate; I really like the diversity though we noticed a predominance of Stanford graduates, people from Chicago, and guys names Jason. Social events like an evening at Gordon Biersch nibbling at appetizers and a welcome dinner at the chair's house allowed us to mingle.

I really like the program directors, chief residents, and staff. They're really personable and approachable, and as my world whittles down from a high school of 2000, an undergraduate class of 1600, a medical school class of 140, I find it surprising and refreshing when the program administrators know who I am (though now I can't hide behind the guise of anonymity). During our welcome, we got our much anticipated schedules - the contents of which will unfurl in this blog as I go from rotation to rotation. It'll be a solid year, fairly intense, but I'm excited about it.

We also had an orientation by the department of graduate medical education, getting our badges, going through employee health, learning about infection control practices, getting computer codes. Much of the week consisted of computer training, and that was somewhat frustrating. There are so many systems to learn, so many nuances and details, and each hospital has its own particulars. But we did have some fun sessions such as one on putting in central lines. They got chickens and we were able to practice using ultrasound and going through the entire procedure. This came in handy as I put in a central line on my very first day.