Gosh, I only have one day left to my Hospital Attachment. I have to say, the time spent in the hospital was well worth it. Anyway, TODAY! TODAY! THE HIGHLIGHT OF THE DAY, and I can literally say, highlight of my life.

I mean, I know it sounds ridiculous, and you have to be a little crazy to say it, but I like being in a hospital. Not as a patient though, I would think(I've never been admitted in a hospital, not counting my premature birth). Anyway, I've always liked going to hospitals. Following my sister to Polyclinic sessions can get boring, but you know, waiting is boring. Although I am easily amused (something that has come in handy at times this week).

This morning, went to The Prof's office before we started our day in the BMT Ward (Her world, I'd say), and she started her rounds. When we got to the ward at 8am, the Operation Theater (OT) people were already there to pick the girl up. And, as usual, The Prof did her rounds (This time with a different MO. Dr Hannah had car problems yesterday and had to take today of to sort everything out); The Brat is still a whiny brat, I don't know how a sick kid can have the energy to be so bratty - but then again, he's okay, platelet's just weird; The Addict's mum went back home (They're outstation), and his dad was there with him. And he had his specs on (Hahaha, I was wrong, he already wore specs. That kid's going to be like a BAT when he turns 20) and GVHD Boy seems better after yesterday's meds, and they're just trying to keep his platelets up over 30.

The Medical Lab Technician (Med Lab Tech, MLT, not Mad Lab Tech, hee) came up with a water bath (The kind you find in the Chem Lab that heats water to a certain temperature and keeps it that way) and a coldbox. One of The Prof's patient's having her cord blood transplant today.

The process is pretty insignificant; The Prof injects the donor cord blood into the girl. I was chatting with the MLT and the MO while the MLT was waiting for the cord blood to thaw (It's this packet stored in a small metal container thing transported around in a cold box which has liquid nitrogen in it. The MLT had to use cryo-gloves. Awesome stuff :D). The MLT's a pretty cool lady. And the nurses, too. Anyway, The Prof actually didn't want to do the CBT until after she did the bone marrow harvesting, but the MLT came at about 8.45am, and when The Prof asked one of her staffers to call the OT, it seems that they were not ready yet.

CBT went well; girl was puking, though. I guess it was the drugs. Also, people, if they sell you ketamine on the streets, don't freaking take it. Ketamine = not fun. I never took it before, and don't plan to unless I am administered ketamine by a medical professional, but I know someone who personally hated the experience of being drugged with ketamine. ANYWAY, after the CBT, The Prof was LOLing with her staff about how on days when they're really busy/running late/rushing for something, the OT people are early, but when they do things in good time, the OT people are slow.

Therefore, in good time, we made our way to the Operating Theater. It's like a totally different world from the wards - medical staff in there wore scrubs, and I think I would've lost my way in the operation section if I hadn't been following The Prof with the MO.

We made our way through a labyrinthe of corridors (OKAYLAH. NOT SO DRAMATIC. WE MADE OUR WAY THROUGH SOME CORRIDORS) to the changing room. Okay, I thought that, you know, UH has an operating suite with the observation room, a la House, but duh, House is a TV show. I got to put on a pair of scrubs (Comfy. Hahaha. The 'SMALL' sized scrubs were exactly as it said, "small". Meaning that they were pretty loose. Hahaha), put on a surgical cap (NOT cool like the ones on House. The ones they have look like showercaps) and a mask, a pair of boots and into the OT we go!

Girl Whose Bone Marrow The Prof Was Going To Harvest and her mum were in the OT; The girl was already in bed (obviously), and the anaesthesiologists were prepping her. Took a while to get her out of it, and she was scared and started crying and all, but she soon was out cold. Mum went out of the OT.

First thing to be done was get a liver biopsy. The Prof was letting Dr Myrna (The MO) do it. But, you know, I doubt Dr M had much practice - but these sort of things come with experience. First, she had to slice the skin a little; an incision of 1-2mm only. Then, she tried getting a bit of the girl's liver, but she failed the first time. The Prof stepped in to explain what the MO was doing wrong, snapped on a pair of gloves, and got a liver sample.

And, damn, was The Prof fast! It was literally a push in, pull the syringe pump and pull the syringe out at the same time, and bam, you have a bit of liver. She let Dr Myrna have a second go. Dr Myrna got a slightly bigger chunk of liver (By big I'll say a really thin string about 1.5cm long, and by 'thin string' I mean as thin as a needle) and The Prof was like, "Still too slow, and this time, you took TOO MUCH liver". Heeee.

Anyway, once the biopsy was over, they lay the girl flat on her front, since bone marrow is harvested from both sides of your pelvis (I'll draw a diagram and put it up once I'm done with the attachment program). And they got the needles out. No, they're not long like the ones you see on House (The one from the ep where Foreman had to forcefully get marrow from the boy is actually the length of a biopsy needle), but still pretty freaking thick.

There's little blood involved in bone marrow harvesting. Apart from the roughly 300mL of bone marrow we were harvesting, of course. The doctors just use the same puncture to move the needle around and really push to get the needle to penetrate through the bone of the pelvis. It. looked. painful. I mean, it is painful - who am I kidding? It's painful enough to warrant general anaesthetic, anyway.

The harvesting took about... an hour? If my timing is right (I wanted to use my stopwatch; I forgot until a good half hour before the procedure was done), we started at about 9.50 and ended about 10.50. We were in the OT at around 9, anyways. The Prof explained to me the 'Rules' of washing/scrubbing your hands (They call it the 'No touch rule'. Hee, doctors) and that there was a certain way that they needed to wear their gowns, and they have to wear their gloves over the sleeves of the gown.

Since I couldn't/didn't take any pictures, and the pictures of bone marrow biopsy needles I find on the Net doesn't look like the ones they were using, I'll draw pictures! Because I need something to draw, anyway, HAHAHA.

During the harvesting, The Prof was like, "And this is pretty much what your Mum had to go through," and I was mumbling, "Gnaaaaaaarly," which was presumably unheard behind my mask. Hahahaa. After the harvesting of bone marrow was done, The Prof injected some local anaesthetic, and they were done.

Bone marrow harvesting isn't openly gruesome, like an actual surgery, but if you're already grossed out by injections, and can't stand the sight of NEEDLES BEING MOVED AND FORCEFULLY HAND-DRILLED IN, seeing this kind of stuff isn't for you. I don't know whether it was because of my over-exposure to gnarly things on TV or I'm just sadistic, I wasn't too creeped out by it. HEHEHE. I don't think I'd still ever want to poke anyone with a needle, though.

Got out, got changed, and we decided that it'd be a good time to... have lunch! Since it was around 1120. Kinda early, but my lunchtime at college is at 11am anyways.

After lunch, we decided to go and see if there was anything going on at the ER, so we walked over to the new A&E block. Into the ER, and, more specifically, to the Paeds ER. Which was, anticlimactically, empty. Which is actually typical, because parents are at work and whatever.

Went back to The Prof's office and tried to build a database for her with Microsoft Access, but, meh, I'm not an IT student, hahaha. Got most of the stuff figured out, anyway, but I had to bring work home, LOL. CLERICAL WORK. AHAHAHAHA. If I were an IT student, I wouldn't be on this hospital attachment, anyway. Although, I'd think that there should be a Bio, Chem, IT Studies combo in college. Bioinformatics is today's form of science.

And now that I'm done with another novel (To the extent that I'm not even blogging about anything else), I seriously need to get started on my 'homework'. Hee.

[Edited to add]
I bumped into Pn Mok today. I had gotten into the lifts to go up from the Ground Floor to the 3rd floor to make my way up to The Prof's office, and Pn Mok got into the lift on the 1st floor. When everything started to get squishy with too many people. AND GUESS WHO WAS RIGHT IN FRONT OF MY FACE?

Thank goodness she doesn't know me/didn't recognize me.

[EDIT 2]
I TOTALLY FORGOT TO ADD - During the entire bone marrow harvesting procedure, the anaesthesiologist was on the AirAsia website, looking at some promotional deal on a holiday to Gold Coast. HAHAHAHA WIN. I'M SERIOUS. He was searching on Yahoo for some phone, looking through his Yahoo e-mails, looking at the Air Asia website choosing his holiday destination... Seriously funny stuff (Oxymoron!).