17.96 hours

that was my overtime from the last pay period. Crap - I thought I was doing better, but in retrospect... I'm just going to work earlier to leave earlier but it's getting better, my 98 hr pay period is not the norm - I'm actually back down around 90 hrs, that's tolerable.

Today I found my mind wandering while seeing patients - it's not the first time this has happened. I'm usually thinking about what else to look up or read about or mulling over treatment decisions I've made recently. However today was the first time I actually took a patients temp twice because I was so wrapped up in my thoughts. (I've done this before just to keep a patient's mouth shut, or set the thermometer to setting that counts by one tenth increments - oops, again internal filter, I meant I was double checking that my thermometer was accurate).

Medicine is such an evolution. There are really no right answers, but there is an answer that has more backing from research or more promotion and that's what used. And I'm not sure where all my patients went to "med school" or nursing school or where they managed to work as an EMT between their time away from the rock yet they all seem to think that their two week CNA course or the fact that they watch Dr. Oz on Oprah is better than any degree or knowledge I have and somedays it's frustrating, not to mention the threat to sue or contact the ACLU.

Some patients are breakthroughs, "why should I take all these meds?" (for DM, HTN, high cholesterol) "well, do you like your eyes, kidneys, brain, heart to function?" "Well, yeah. You mean I could die?" (Not to get all philosophical - but yeah we're all going to die) "No one has told me that before, guess I'll take the meds."