Why did I actually give Berlin a chance?

Or better, german medicine. Some examples:

On my first day I was told to be the one to mix and set the iv-infusions. Since I had never done it before (nurses do that in Scandinavia and Switzerland, and also in Germany, when the med students aren´t there= in the evenings, at night), I naturally asked a nurse for help. But since I´m a med student, she directly said and very unfriendly: " It´s not my job to show you, you have to ask the doctors for advices!". So, I said I can´t, can you show me and I assume the nurse understood that I´m a total beginner. Well, when something goes wrong (no matter what), of course we med students are the ones to be blaimed, and not friendly, very impolitely! Yep, no wonder things go wrong, if they don´t advice the new people.

I was asked to take blood samples, hemoglobin and crp, for which I needed two (!!!) tubes. I took these two and of course it went all wrong. "Usually we also take coagulation, because blaah blaah blaah" I explained that I had been asked to take those two. And the midwife explained me at least three more times that I should have taken three tubes. As if I was stupid?

After a cesarian section I was asked to go out of the operation room and tell the midwifes to prepare some pills for the patient when she´s out of the operation. Just when I was telling the message, the other doctor came running out of the operation and screamed at me, that the thing has to be done immediately! Again, am I stupid or what? I do actually understand the difference between prepare and prepare immediately, it just has to be said!

Something more advanced and for the colleagues. To the policlinic came an elder patient who was planned to get operated next day. She had some basic illnesses, high blood pressure, copd and propably something with the heart too, medications for these diseases. First of all the doctor wasn´t sure, if she should order chest x-ray or ecg, which in this patients case were definetly needed to be done before any operation. But the best thing was, that she did not order something as essential as creatinin (kidney test, which is at least at internal medicine a so standard blood test for almost anyone, young and elder), to save money!!! Instead of that she ordered a few (at least for me) totally unnecessary samples to be taken! I tried to explain it to the doctor, but again, who listenes to the students?

Six days to go...

Munich

I spent the last weekend in Munich, we had a SLSLO meeting (finnish medical students in Germany) in the south. It was a short visit including 12hours of sitting on the train, but it was worth it! It´s always good to get out for a few days, kind of vacation feeling... Munich seems to be nice, it has a snobbish reputation, but I did not get the impression, compared with Zurich, it´s nothing. It´s not too big (which Berlin is) and it also has loads of activities to offer. In the center is a large park "Englischer Garten", we went there of course for a beer (did some walking too)! The Biergarten season had already begun a week earlier in Berlin, only that the weather the second time was more of an enjoyment. And what I appreciate the most... the closeness to the alps!!! Oh man, I was again so enjoying the views, maybe I should go to Switzerland for work for a few years?!?

Well, for now I´m coming to Finland, in 2-3 weeks depending on if I get the last week off or not. I got a tiny appartment in Ruoholahti and am so looking forward to my own home in the central Helsinki, finally!

Sushi a'la Turkey

Berlin is very multicultural. It´s very common for f ex turkish people to run an italian restaurant. What I did not have experienced before was Sushi by turks. This small restaurant is just around the corner of my home. I was a bit hesitating at the entrance as I saw this turkish sushi cook, since I was looking for a great sushi meal. Prejudices were wrong and the snack was delicious! And the cook entertained me the whole time... If I had wanted or not.

Hier wird nicht gegessen sondern gearbeitet

A thing called lunch is unknown at the operative section of this hospital. They don´t take a break at all, there are always some ten minutes between the operations and time for a bread and a glass of water, but that´s about it. I am warmly remembering the operations at Lohja, where the operator asked his/her team (!) around lunch time at the end of an operation, if it now was a good time for a lunch break? The operations don´t end around 2-3pm like in Finland, they continue until 4pm (or later if emergencies) and the day for these doctors has definetly started at 7am or earlier! At this point many of you my friends would (again) say: " I don´t think I would want to be operated by someone, who has eaten almost nothing the whole day!".