Overworked is Bored

And so am I. After one week of covering the night shift in my CCU I am transitioning to days. It’s been three weeks of night work now (two night float and one CCU) and I am excited to get back to daytime. I feel like that guy in the sprint commercial with Catherine Zeta Beta (or whatever her name is).

Let’s face it, the day is soooo much better. Things happen during the daytime. People get placed on drips, on pressors. Patients leave during the day, both through the front doors and by way of the *BUS. There are codes and more staff and people to joke and gossip with, I love it.

The night is depressing. It’s just the nurses and me and they have me intimidated. They clearly outnumbered me and I was shaking in my white coat. Now I’m on with my gang too, they have my back. Try to pull one over on me now nurse! Do you feel lucky? punk? Do you?

Of course as soon as I come on there are only two patients to follow. TWO patients. How exciting is that? Overworked is watching them and so am I and together that makes for overkill. We get excited about every fluctuation in heart rate. “You mean he was going at 65 before and now he’s 68? We better investigate”. We’re even concerned about bowel movements. “Repeat after me- you will poop and you will do it now!”

No Crazy Crashing Patients to discuss, no fun anxiety to deal with. Just two, really boring, really stable, pathetic excuses for critically ill patients. Just Stable enough to be in my CCU.