Last week at cardio placement

Hi,

I just wanted to write about what I felt last Thursday at my placement. As it was the last week of this placement, my supervisor wanted to check on my caseload and gave me 10 patients to see. So I started to see the first three patients who were in high priority.

The first patient was 64yo male patient who has oesophagocarcinoma which my grandma died of two years ago and the survival rate after op is only 15-20%. I met this patient in my first week and has seen him twice a day to improve his lung function and walking tolerance. Although he seemed doing well with physio, he has had two re-operation due to gastric fistula. After repeated operations, he seemed losing confidence and anxious about his future. He reminds me of my grandma and it's hard for me to see him going through all that. Anyways he was very anxious and his voice was shaking during physio session with me.

Then I saw this BKA patient to ambulate him on zimmer frame and do some bed exercises. He didn't look well and finally threw up in front of me as soon as I applied compression bandage on his stump.

Hoo..Next patient is a very fragile 91yo lady, who admitted with abdominal distention and docs suspect that she has a cancer, and I met her for the first time. By accident, while I was sitting in physio gym behind the board, I heard when the doc and her family were having a meeting about sending her to the palliative care department.

All of these accumulated and I got very emotional and was in tears. I think I was never exposed to the environment where there are so many sick patients, and I couldn't stay in hospital any longer on that day and my supervisor sent me home early. Sometimes it's hard to control my emotions and don't know how to deal with it even though I know it's not professional to show tears in front of patients.

In Sun