Full Circle: My Third-Year Rotation
Over the past four weeks I had the opportunity to come back to rotate in the emergency department (ED) where I'd worked as a scribe for quite some time. I was so incredibly excited to come back to work with the nurses, techs, PA's, and docs I'd gotten to know so well over the years, but I couldn't help that I was also incredibly nervous.
Nervous that I wasn't good enough to hang with the pace of a huge trauma and stroke center.
Nervous that I would let down the docs that had trusted me and given me the opportunity to come back.
Nervous that I wouldn't be in love with Emergency Medicine as much as I thought I would.
For years, this was the place I came to escape.
It was an escape from the stress of school; from worrying about my future; from being alone in my apartment at night after I lost my dad.
I never minded going to work and not sleeping most nights because I was apart of a team. Taking care of patients, I felt like I was helping in some way or another.
This ED was a family. Even then, I knew that it would always hold a special place in my heart. Years later, as a third-year medical student, I found myself back in that special place.
I stood in the room where I first witnessed a trauma. I stood in the place where I’d first experienced the passing of a patient. With every new experience, that room of memories evolved.
I was no longer just a witness.
It became the place where I intubated and put a central line into "my" patient. It became the room where I did my first (of many) chest tube; where I sutured innumerable lacerations. The nerves all dissipated within hours of my first shift because this environment felt natural.
It felt like home.
The trust my docs instilled and had in me from day one gave me validation that this was where I was meant to be. It ensured me that I'm capable of achieving more.
My love for Emergency Medicine became so much more tangible, and for that I'm forever grateful.
To Dr. McGee and the Eugene Emergency Physicians — past and present — thank you.
Thank you for always taking the time out to teach me. Thank you for pushing me to be the best physician I can be.
Darrel T. Phong
Osteopathic Medical Student - 3rd Year (OMS III)
Pacific Northwest University of Health Sciences