A Simple Week in the Rhineland

Unlike anything I have seen before, week 4 started off with my face in a heart. My first time in the operating room, not as a patient, was one I will never forget. At first I was a little weary and unsure of what to expect. The anesthesiologist I was assigned to did not speak english, neither did the surgeons or nurses. I was quietly standing in the corner of the OR without any one to guide me as to what was going on. I freaked out. Once the prep on the first patient was completed, they wheeled him in to the room. Watching them intubate him and just everything they were doing caused me to feel queasy. Yes, I almost passed out before the surgery even started. An hour in the helped calm me down, and I was able to get back in to the operating room. During my time at the hospital, I witnessed a bone biopsy, a foot infection, some type of gastrointestinal endoscopic surgery, and two open heart surgeries. It was absolutely amazing to have been able to see real, live hearts and not preserved ones. One heart was going through coronary bypass surgery, and the other was going through an aortic valve replacement. I may never see surgeries like that again, so I will probably talk about this day and what I was lucky to see, forever.

Wednesday was full of German and History of Medicine lectures. Professor Wasser presented on "The Best Healthcare Money Can Buy" and it was probably my favorite lecture so far. I am not one for politics and anything that surrounds the subject, but recently I have been trying to get more and more educated on current issues. Healthcare is a topic I have been wanting to dive into but have been reluctant to because I don't know who or what sources to trust. This lecture compared American healthcare to German healthcare to Canadian healthcare to others. Basically what I gathered from this is that American healthcare is in a rough and troubled state and can only be fixed with major changes that no one is willing to adopt. American healthcare will implode in a few years if changes are not made. Some promising stuff. After this lecture, the class went and toured a factory that builds organs. This was super cool to see the behind the scenes and incredible detail that goes in to creating some of the most beautiful instruments.

Thursday was another day full of lectures. It was a rough day for neurophysiology. We began learning about auditory receptor cells, neural signaling, auditory pathways, and just a ton of brain stuff. It was a lot for me to take in because I have absolutely zero knowledge on this subject as I have never taken a class surrounding it before. Wish me luck on the next test. During History of Medicine, we learned about the history of anesthesiology. Immediately after this lecture, we were able to go and tour a local anesthesiology museum. I enjoyed this because it was interesting to see the tools that have been used throughout history to simply put people to sleep for surgery. One extremely cool thing we saw was this coffin-like machine that helped people with polio breathe. A lady lived in one of these for 35ish years. Yikes! (I forgot to take a pic. Oops. But just believe me, it was cool.)

Friday was an excursion to Bingen where we toured a museum dedicated to Hildegard von Bingen. After the tour, we ate a group lunch at this random restaurant which was awful. They gave me a salad that consisted of only lettuce and olive oil. Thank goodness I had snacks with me or I would have been starving. A river tour was then taken after the failed lunch. It took us north on the Rhine and every single town we passed had a castle which is insane. We got off in Braubach and toured a castle that had been set up to look like it did when it was occupied. It was a good day.

My travel plans for the weekend ended up falling through. I was supposed to leave for Munich at 12:15 AM. I got to the train station and found out that the train was delayed an hour, so I waited until 1:10 when I got the news that it was delayed until 2:30. At this point, I decided to go home and go to sleep. I was tired and sick and just wanted a good nights sleep. Soooo instead I took a day trip to Cologne on Saturday. Here, I went into a few clothing stores, went and toured the chocolate museum, ate the most delicious chocolate fondue, and just had a nice day. On Sunday, I took a train down to Heidelberg and took a look at its castle. It was the cutest little town and the castle was massive with the most amazing views. It also has the planet's largest wooden barrel of wine. It holds 58 gallons. I also went in to a small pharmacy museum where I saw old lab equipment that we still use in lab today. Even though my initial plans got cancelled, it was still a wonderful weekend.

Blonde move of the week: I dropped my retainer in the sink at my hostel in Dublin. Absolutely disgusting. I wasn't sure how to clean it, so I decided that boiling water would be the best option. Not the best option. It ended up morphing my brand new retainer (had to get a new one right before I left) and now it does not fit. Go me :)