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Today was my first day of tutes for urban week: breast examination in the morning and basic first aid part B in the afternoon.
I'm not sure what to say about my feelings about this morning's tute. At the time it was both exciting and nerve-racking. Questions kept going through my mind... "What sort of woman will I be examining?" "Will I forget bits of the exam?" "Will I make an absolute fool out of myself?" (This was indeed my foremost concern. Funny how I was more concerned about this than the fact that I would be touching a stranger's breast in less than an hour's time) "Will I somehow do something so badly that I get sued for battery?" (Er...yeh, wasn't thinking very rationally then).
But in the end, it all worked out fine. I was grouped with Chau Wang and Jia Mei examining a "near-menopausal" woman. To be honest, I would have guessed her age to be no more than late 30's but oh well...the two tutors were really patient and gentle with us and in general, I think the tute went quite well. We were taught the "lawn-mowing" technique which literally is sliding our hands up and down the precordium in parallel lines with regular spiral palpations. However, one of the problems I did experience (and Chau Wang did too) was that I was too gentle. The problem lies in the fact that MEN DON'T HAVE BREASTS! We were too scared of hurting the patient, so we didn't use enough pressure when palpating. A little about our patient though...not the standard "near-menopausal" patient you would expect. For one, she had a ring piercing on her left nipple O_O Then roughly 20% of her body was covered with tattoos. Just to top it all off, when I sneaked a peek at the screen-saver on her phone, it was a pair of breasts.
The tute wasn't all rays of sunshine...h3dl3y was in our tute and I am pleased to say that Chau Wang finally had the pleasure of experiencing the hate that one can feel when faced with a racist imbecile. Beautiful quote: "Yah, Daniel, I hate him too" =P I won't go into the details but he was every bit as annoying and arrogant as I remembered (makes you think what he's doing in medicine...)
The afternoon tute was quite uneventful, and boring. My tutor was supposedly the same as the one I had last year but I couldn't recognise her. That is due to two facts: 1) She had cut her hair. 2) She had lost about 30 pounds. The latter is because in the short year that I haven't seen her, she was diagnosed with MS and the weight loss is a side-effect of the medications she's taking for it (but increased appetite!)
Even though today was only two tutes, it was still exhausting. So tired now T_T...but I have the day off tomorrow!! Guess that's all for now...
I'm not sure what to say about my feelings about this morning's tute. At the time it was both exciting and nerve-racking. Questions kept going through my mind... "What sort of woman will I be examining?" "Will I forget bits of the exam?" "Will I make an absolute fool out of myself?" (This was indeed my foremost concern. Funny how I was more concerned about this than the fact that I would be touching a stranger's breast in less than an hour's time) "Will I somehow do something so badly that I get sued for battery?" (Er...yeh, wasn't thinking very rationally then).
But in the end, it all worked out fine. I was grouped with Chau Wang and Jia Mei examining a "near-menopausal" woman. To be honest, I would have guessed her age to be no more than late 30's but oh well...the two tutors were really patient and gentle with us and in general, I think the tute went quite well. We were taught the "lawn-mowing" technique which literally is sliding our hands up and down the precordium in parallel lines with regular spiral palpations. However, one of the problems I did experience (and Chau Wang did too) was that I was too gentle. The problem lies in the fact that MEN DON'T HAVE BREASTS! We were too scared of hurting the patient, so we didn't use enough pressure when palpating. A little about our patient though...not the standard "near-menopausal" patient you would expect. For one, she had a ring piercing on her left nipple O_O Then roughly 20% of her body was covered with tattoos. Just to top it all off, when I sneaked a peek at the screen-saver on her phone, it was a pair of breasts.
The tute wasn't all rays of sunshine...h3dl3y was in our tute and I am pleased to say that Chau Wang finally had the pleasure of experiencing the hate that one can feel when faced with a racist imbecile. Beautiful quote: "Yah, Daniel, I hate him too" =P I won't go into the details but he was every bit as annoying and arrogant as I remembered (makes you think what he's doing in medicine...)
The afternoon tute was quite uneventful, and boring. My tutor was supposedly the same as the one I had last year but I couldn't recognise her. That is due to two facts: 1) She had cut her hair. 2) She had lost about 30 pounds. The latter is because in the short year that I haven't seen her, she was diagnosed with MS and the weight loss is a side-effect of the medications she's taking for it (but increased appetite!)
Even though today was only two tutes, it was still exhausting. So tired now T_T...but I have the day off tomorrow!! Guess that's all for now...
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