Out Patient Chemotherapy

      For 4 days, I will be on hospital duty orientation. Together with other clinical instructors Don Bansuan, Lloyd Lepiten, Chona Barrun and PJ Arrangues, we will be acquainting ourselves with the  Out-Patient Chemotherapy Infusion Room of  Davao Doctors Hospital, the FIRST and the ONLY one in Mindanao.

     It has followed the regulations being set by PhilHealth, allowing more safety area for the nurses in preparation and administration of this drugs. Chemotherapeutic drugs are toxic in nature and  the preparation should not be anymore be done in clinics or bedside of the patient.

Chemotherapy cycles, depending on drugs and the case, or  hours of infusion varies and may range as little as 3 hours which means that there is no need for the patient to be admitted in the hospital.

Patients are also kept comfortable with Lazyboy couches which can be reclined when they want to lie while the treatment is going on. The room is also air-conditioned  with one TV to give the place a homey feel. For the meantime, both adult and pediatric cancer patients are treated in the same infusion room but a separation of the two will materialize soon.

I observed the facility more today and the process much more than the patients. We weren't allowed to deal with the patients much . I wanted to watch the insertion of a Porta-cath today, one of the central lines inserted in the upper chest and  just below the clavicle or the collar bone.

Earlier, we got more familiar with the common used chemotherapy drugs and those that values as high as P 300,000 per vial. Yes, there are people who can buy that given at the rate twice a week.

      The unit is one very hepflul area for many cancer patients. I believe, that this again will boost the level of medical competence of the hospital also. More than that, a place of hope for patients who is fighting for one disease feared by many because of its unpredictability.

   I have 2 cancer stories to share making me appreciate the treatment. It has taught me to appreciate science and its quest to augmenting one cancer patient's life to a lot more year. It has taught me of the value of the facility being able to understand the care of the cancer patients.

    I still have 3 days to more to this area which I learned does not allow students inside due to probably of the small space. However, they can be called to observe  minor procedures such as Bone Marrow Aspiration.

    Tomorrow is another day. Earlier, we dealt with Liver Ca, Breast Ca, Multiple Myeloma.  Tomorrow will be another round of nursing care for patients with cancer again..another round of learning..and another round of appreciating life.

One Goal.One Heart.One Nursing Team

            Yesterday, the college celebrated 'Nursing Day". It was one of those days you get to relax from a strenuous routine and just be happy. 

            I may not share the same sentiments with my colleagues, but it is in this time that I get to see the real personality of my students. I get to see the other gifts they possess. I get to again be in awe of the creativity they have. It is in these that i cannot help thinking again of my school days. We all had our chances, mine was the best for me..but for someone whose life majored in schooling, i get a pang of jealousy seeing a life infront of me whose only worries are the pressures of putting up a good entry in a competition.  

           I have had a lot of students..i have shared most of my professional life with them and gave a mountful of my heart as well. Seeing these students excel in another side of their lives is inspirational to me. Knowing some of students in the best ability they have ,sometimes more than their parents have seen, is an honor for me. It gives another meaning of living specially for me who still in my quest to make a family.These nursing students will always be unique in their own way.           
              The day was a celebration of life and blessings and the nursing course itself..it was a day to remember that we are ONE in heart...that we have ONE GOAL..and we are ONE TEAM out there to defend what we have. The presentations made gave me the idea that this batch will not be easy to beat. Even those classes i deemed underdogs in school presentations, had me speechless and jaw dropped proving me wrong. The essence of teamwork...the magnificence it brings and the impressions it breaks made a point very clear to me.

           I salute these students for having still the hearts of a warrior, an artist..and a nurse. It is when i see them that i forget the professional pressures and drama of my work...it is when i see them that I forget how struggling we are with what is laid for us ...it is when i see them that i smile and see what my worth is.

Thoracotomy and Enjoying Operating Rooms

         At last, i have been assigned to be in the Operating Room. It has been 5 months now, and for the many times i have been marveled and awed by what I witness, it is just now that i blogged. The many things one could just imagine, is right before my eyes. And it has been "usual" already but the existence of such faculties never cease to amaze me.


        Like last weeks surgery was Thoracotomy. But in the many instances that I have witnessed such, it has always left me dazzled how the human body can be opened, the patient's chest for that surgery, without damaging other vital organs. That , when the chest right cavity was opened (which made abdominal cavity visible as well), you could actually see  the liver, diaphragm rise and fall as  the patient breathes. 
         It was like choreography at it's finest but we're not talking of a dance...it's real teamwork. The anesthesiologist, surgeon, nurses and students were so fast and careful..a vital thing for survival of a patient who know and feel nothing of what is done to him.
        And that amidst the opening, incising, cutting, suturing..it returned to it normal form once again..and much important, to it's normal functioning. 
       O well, i maximize what i see everyday and learn from it. It will always interest me as long as i'm there.