u/Prudent-Orange-9737

Novice anaesthetist here, finding the sheer volume of things to remember overwhelming. Anyone got any useful mmemonics they used/still use to make even small things more memorable? Looking for anything to help remember drugs, things to check before tubing, monitoring etc etc anything whatsoever but I really work off of memory cues and finding it all a bit challenging without any! (I know A-E is king in almost all scenarios obviously do utilise this but just seeing if anything else exists to make life easier!)

Looking for a good pub garden for a Saturday - preferably good ales on draught, not too busy and not very ‘sports bar’ vibes

Looking for a place in the Clapham area to buy food international food items - particularly from Turkey, Iran, Syria etc etc

Been a doctor for a short while now and starting to formulate my own ideas about which parts of generically taught examination techniques are pretty redundant and don’t change management - one example is that I have rarely been able to get patients to differentiate between pain on palpation vs rebound tenderness but have found that jolting the edge of the bed pretty reliably weeds out the peritonitic from the non-peritonitic abdo pains (DISCLAMER: I know this will be controversial to some). Wondering if other people have similar parts of other exams that they now never do due to low pick up rate, difficulty to perform in practice or due to them not ever impacting management and what alternatives have people been practicing otherwise?

Been on my ED rotation for a month now (last rotation of foundation training). During an 8 hour shift in ED I will see 5 patients. I will be honest they aren’t particularly complex. I understand a lot of the advice is ‘well if you have 2-3 complex neuro patients then that takes up a lot of time chasing scans, speaking with specialties etc’ but that isn’t the case. I spend an awful lot of time double checking results to make sure I haven’t missed anything before discharge, documenting thoroughly (clerking fully essentially) to cover myself medicolegally, and waiting to discuss patients with seniors just to sense check things even if it is relatively straight forward. I have been really enjoying the placement but have had consultants start to tell me I’m slow and not at the standard they expect in terms of efficiency and knowledge (have never been told either these things in other placements, on the contrary have always received really good feedback and asked to pick up Locums in departments as they want me to work there). Finding this disparity in previous feedback vs feedback now incredibly challenging to come to terms with. It’s making me really reconsider if I am any good or just a bit shit at the job. At a bit of a cross roads as to whether I cut down documentation or don’t run things by seniors as frequently or just crack on as I have been and hope seniors just accept I’m like this for the next 3 months and then move on.

Any advice what to do in this position?

Been on A&E for a month now, was hoping all my major gaps in experience and knowledge would be touched upon while working in EM. Have SO MANY bog standard conditions that I haven’t treated yet - DKA, true ACS, Strokes, PE, meningitis - never treated a single one! Lots of sepsis of various source, AKIs, exacerbations of HF, COPD and Asthma but little to no experience of the previously mentioned. Feel that the serious stuff is almost always taken care of by seniors or that I will be working them up for these conditions and e.g trop static, CT Head NAD, D dimer negligible…

Am I missing something? Very concerned I will open my eyes one day to being a reg and someone will ask me how to manage a stroke and I will look at them extremely confused. I understand the text book answers to how to treat these things but the actual nitty gritty of managing them with all the superimposed patient and environmental/system factors. Have others felt like this at F2?

Note; even the stuff I’m seeing and I feel ‘confident’ with in comparison I seem to run literally every part of my assessment and management plan by the reg before actioning - is this normal?

Have been looking into the ST4 self assessment - just wondering if people know of any slightly easier ways to tick off some of the higher marks in the portfolio - any leadership roles that are accessible? Prizes that are lesser known? Extra qualifications that can be done in your own time that count?

Thanks!

Caveat: I appreciate none of this stuff is ‘easy’ and also appreciate that it’s in place to develop you as a clinician as opposed to a tick box exercise but I just want some insight into options! Thanks :)