In the CUB Unit

Posted by Alex at Saturday, September 25, 2010

This past month I was at Allegiance Health for my inpatient cardiology rotation. I spent my time at the CUB (cardiovascular universal bed) unit monitoring patients from the time they have open heart surgery until discharge. To get a better understanding of what patients go through, I was given the opportunity to observe a CABG (coronary artery bypass graft) and aortic valve replacement surgeries! I thought I would pass out from seeing all the blood and organs, but was able to keep my cool.

As I reflect back, some thoughts that stick out in my mind:

(1) P-care discussion sessions linked with Institutional & Community IPPE: Extremely valuable! In these discussion classes we are assigned to work up patients and give patient presentations. All those long hours I spent last year working up patients has paid off. Working up patients on P4 rotations is nothing new since I got good practice during P3 year

(2) You still need to know everything! Although I was doing a cardio rotation, non-cardio issues arose such as delirium and aminoglycosides dosing

(3) Utilize your fellow health team members- Sometimes you cannot get the full picture by reading charts and looking at drug orders. My preceptor emphasized to me that talking to nurses and asking them about patients' status can make your job much easier

(4) Try extremely hard to have most of your PharmD investigations project complete prior to P4 rotations- Rotations are busy...on top of your tasks during the day on site, you also have to work on presentations for rotation pretty much each week. Such workload gets done when you get home from a 7-10 hour day at rotation. This past month I have been working on my P680 Seminar as well, which is a huge presentation you give 4th year on a topic you have to research extensively. At least have your data collection and analysis for PharmD investigations project complete since it's 1 less thing to worry about.

After completing this rotation, I feel like I have further developed my clinical skills. My mind automatically clicks what drugs and important lab values to look for in a patient undergoing cardiac surgery. I have also identified areas in which I need improvement. For future rotations I hope to work on these weaknesses and better fine tune my skills.