I can hardly believe it when I look to my calendar and see it is 10th November 2014. What happened to Spring, Summer and Autumn?!
We are three weeks away from the end of our first posts as junior doctors and I find myself in a position where oddly, I can say I think I'll miss it! Going to work now feels much more manageable and definitely enjoyable. And the best bit is working with my colleagues :) from my fellow juniors, fantastic nurses and sometimes even a senior who joins in a joke! I am pleased to say I have also finally come to a point to where when I get home I am sometimes able to muster up the energy to sort out academic work, life admin, and even make lunch for the next day. (In reverse order of importance, of course).
Looking ahead however, I'm excited that I'll soon being doing a medical job - what I think and hope will be much more my element than surgery ever could be! I'll be based in a hospital in Melrose - a large and very busy district general serving a countryside population who live in the Scottish Borders - just across from England. (Humans are so original sometimes!) I expect I will gain very different clinical experiences, perhaps be given a bit more responsibility, and have the chance to engage with lots of new people once again but whom I would expect to see both in and out of work quite a lot since most of the juniors live next door to the hospital.
Looking further ahead still, today I had to discuss my job choices for next year. Essentially there is a ranking process and you must hope that few others wish to do the jobs you would like. Of course there will be some give and take, and so I hope that I will be happy with my allocations as they will likely impact my thoughts on my future path both clinically and location-wise. A supervisor also asked me recently if I planned to stay in Edinburgh until consultant level... I realised this question had not even remotely crossed my mind before. And who knows the answer?! I only just got here!
