Ophthosurgery: a resident's perspective as it unfolds - Latest Comments

Re: Molcajete and Tejolote

Concrete Sealer — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 08:28:32 -0000

It’s really a nice and helpful piece of information.

Re: After Christmas frenzy at the Banana Republic

Aziz Kam — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 10:27:25 -0000

Hey Patrick, just wonder how did you make that montage? with a software? what software was this?

Re: GoDaddy’s shared servers lag

Aziz Kam — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 06:49:45 -0000

hey Patrick, it's Kam.

It's almost a year now and I'm almost done with my internship. Just wanna tell you the great news that I was given the most sought-after Ophthalmology residency offer in Hong Kong. Well..to get that offer, I had passed altogether three rounds and I felt very blessed to have come so far as the one who gets the only one spot in that hospital.

well, however if you might have noticed, recently some doctors from the medical departments of all hospitals are ranting about the lack of manpower joining their service, as a result of that, the Headquarters have allocated more doctors to them this year, and subsequently my original offer to work at the Hong Kong Eye Hospital is gone.

nonetheless, I'll be working in the same department though in a different hospital. It's the Prince Of Wales Hospital, one of the two teaching hospitals in Hong Kong and this one is affiliated with the Chinese University of Hong Kong (I graduate from the other med school, the University of Hong Kong). well i suppose most stuffs will be the same, like the basics and patient spectrum. I hope I'll have a great time learning how to be an ophthalmologist.

meanwhile, please keep on sharing your little fun stories here on your blog. I love to read all of them and especially some of your random rants.

hope you're having a great time too in your PGY2. you can visit my blog at kedicine.wordpress.com (it's sometimes written in eng and chinese). hope you like it and I'm thinking of transferring it to a WORDPRESS.ORG soon. let's keep in touch!

Kam, all the way from Hong Kong

Re: Consult headaches

RC — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 20:59:27 -0000

EVERY SINGLE DAY!
What's the vision?
I don't have one of those cards, I think he can see fine.
Then what's the consult for?
I'm not sure, I'm just covering...!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Or...he's legally blind in the left eye.
Oh, why?
I don't know?

Re: Molcajete and Tejolote

Ophthosurgery — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 17:44:01 -0000

Thanks for the clarification. Yes, I did notice that the C&B one sort of feels like the pumice stones for exfoliation. I will take a look at the W-S one next time I get a chance!

Re: Molcajete and Tejolote

sir — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 10:02:23 -0000

I am not sure that the crate and barrel molcajete is authentic basalt. I think it actually is pumice. The Williams-Sonoma Molcajete I saw, which retails for $49 is much nicer, and is unmistakably basalt. I think I am going to return my C&B and cough up the extra $17 for the one at Williams-Sonoma!

Re: Pulling Teeth

Ophthosurgery — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 21:38:25 -0000

Good to hear from you Kam. Let me know how things go. Hope that internship treats you well.

Re: Pulling Teeth

KamChai — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 04:23:08 -0000

Haha, best quote : "What doctor ? That doctor."
I must say America has some world's 'best' patients! I can almost imagine her finger pointing at the ED physician lol

How's life, Dr. Chan? I've just started my pre-internship shadowing the house officer who's working at the unit where I'll spend the next 3 months. We've been told that our calls will be q4-5days and there are 3 on call interns per night. One of them will cover the admission ward, one will cover all the emergency OTs and the third one, aka poor guy, will have cover ALL surgical wards in the hospital (a big teaching hospital)!

Anyway, I hope everything goes well for you and I'll keep you updated. Likewise, I have set up a new blog too, do come visit it when you have time!

Take care,

Kam

Re: Shafer’s sign

Ophthosurgery — Thu, 13 May 2010 19:37:35 -0000

You're absolutely right. I should change that caption. Thanks.

Re: Shafer’s sign

Soheil — Thu, 13 May 2010 18:40:44 -0000

A shaffer's sign should be including pigment granules & red blood cells, not white cells, isn't it??

Re: When brand-x simply is inadequate

Ophthosurgery — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 20:42:27 -0000

Perhaps you could search the manufacturer's website online. I don't use any of their products, and have no idea how to reach them.

Re: When brand-x simply is inadequate

patfarrer — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 16:37:14 -0000

Could you give me an e-mail where I can contact this company...since there was no phone numbers on the box or e-mail address.. If I must say.. that is bad business on their part...I'm sure the store can't help me either...

Re: When brand-x simply is inadequate

Ophthosurgery — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 22:40:56 -0000

I'd recommend that you ask the store where you bought the product regarding this matter. I have no ties to any clear plastic wrap company. As you have read in my blog entry, I am merely expressing my opinion on certain types of food wraps. Thanks.

Re: When brand-x simply is inadequate

patfarrer — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 18:57:08 -0000

I purchase one of your clear plastic wrap from one of our local stores here in Windsor where I live.. it was sealed tight and when I opened it the wrap was empty ... the roll was there but no saran on the roll...first time that has ever happened...hmmm I threw out the box so I can't tell you what the siral # was I have another box teh number is as follows
7118733182 Manufactured by Trinidad Benham Corp.. Denver Colorado USA 80237
What do I do now..am I out of a box of saran wrap.. I think I got it at our local Canadian Tire Store.. Can you e-mail back on this matter?
Thanks
Pat Farrer

Re: Eye surgery difficulties

Ophthosurgery — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 11:29:40 -0000

Nice. That's better than cutting off the nose. Maybe you could give them an option of (1) surgeon sitting on their chest, or (2) surgeon sits on elevated tray table over their chest. Either way, it's the winning solution.

Re: Eye surgery difficulties

Rchen — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 09:36:21 -0000

Here's another solution - perhaps I'll try this on my next case:

1. Operate while sitting on top of the patient - that gets rid of the nose problems, AND you can continue to use your right hand. No need for triple-digit QUAKE hours.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Ophthosurgery — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 23:40:14 -0000

The netbook audience is self-selecting. Someone discovers that they are remarkably configurable at a reasonable price, and suddenly a bunch of geeks start opening them up. This gives technology a good advancement...and something for me to read while my patients are dilating.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Jon — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 23:21:35 -0000

Yeah - do you think it's because the netbooks are so inexpensive they're easy to hack? Also they're so portable so people probably want to customize stuff more frequently.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Ophthosurgery — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 21:36:27 -0000

It's impressive how many websites are dedicated to tweaking the netbooks. I've been mostly referring to the forums on http://myhpmini.com, which has its own forum. You can literally spend days modding these things.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Jon — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 21:25:43 -0000

From what I've gathered, it depends on the netbook what kind of support there is for alternative OS's. There seems to be pretty good support for the Dell Mini 10v for Chromium and OS X in general. Chromium does not have a lot of apps, unfortunately. You may want to look online and see what resources there are for the compaq before trying OS X. This link seems to have pretty good sense of which netbooks work with OS X.

http://gadgets.boingboing.net/...

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Ophthosurgery — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 00:04:49 -0000

Yeah as you pointed out, there are basically 3 options aside from Windows:

1. Google Chromium OS - It looks just like the Chrome browser, and boots up insanely fast--5 seconds? In fact, it is just a web browser that boots up. WiFi detection is very slow on my Compaq Mini 110C (takes minutes to find a network). Not a great alternative yet.

2. Ubuntu Remix - Fast and full OS (boots in 30 seconds). It actually serves the basic needs (web surfing, audio [a little flaky for some reason on my netbook], pdf reading). I still get hiccups on occasion, which is likely due to the inferior solid-state HD.

3. OSX - Looks nice. But it's a beast to install. According to some of the forums I've read, the wireless card may or may not work, depending on the chipset. No wifi would be a dealbreaker on a netbook. I may attempt an install if I'm able to "obtain" some install disks, a usb dvd drive, and a free weekend. My netbook only has a 16gb drive, which may not be enough to fit OSX comfortably with media.

I don't think there's too much of a role for the netbook in the hospital, at least for me. I suspect that there may be a clinical application for the iPad in the near future, however.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Jon — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 22:59:32 -0000

Ubuntu is a reasonable option if you don't like Windows issues - they have a lite version for netbooks.

For the Mac OSX, I think the only updates that have problems are the big OSX updates. That's probably every 6 mos or so. The sleep problem on the Dell Mini has been solved. As for hospital networking, well at that point, I guess you're using the netbook for more complicated tasks than I would (general web browsing and email).

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Ophthosurgery — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 22:38:30 -0000

The way Apple software updates work, there is always a moderately high chance that your installation will break on every software refresh. It is a pain to be reconfiguring every 3 months or so. iTunes is typically the nasty culprit. The other tricky issue is enabling the Hackintosh to sleep properly with the lid closed. That said, if one is able to procure Hackintosh on a netbook, I'd recommend adding applications like Parallels and VMWare to make it compatible with most cruddy hospital networks. I am inching toward a Mac every day...

Btw, ChromeOS is nicely built, but there isn't enough support for it by 3rd party applications.

Re: Optimizing your netbook (Or simply making it usable)

Jon — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 21:55:56 -0000

The best bet might be to turn a Dell Mini 10v into a Hackintosh. It sounds pretty straightforward and using a refurbished model from the outlet store, I think it can be done for about $250. So goodbye crapplets and hello Mac Netbook! Of course, doing that would violate a number of user agreements and licensing codes, but this is something I've read about.

Re: Temporary Hiatus, Take 3

Ophthosurgery — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 20:01:06 -0000

Indeed. Part of the consult process is convincing the consultee that their request should not be stat.

Enjoy escape from the frigid NYC winds.