I was warned over and over and over that learning my way around the CathLab was going to be like relearning an entire new career.
It is.
I snapped this picture when I was helping on a particularly bad STEMI we had roll in from the ER.
[ZH] (guy on the left) was attempting to "scrub" but things really nose-dived and he tagged out with
[TM] (guy in the middle) since he's a more seasoned tech.
[TC] (guy on the right/green mask/purple cap) is our lead cardiologist. I took this picture because I wanted to show [A] what I meant by our "line-up" and how it looked when we are working a case. My position has recently switched to the middle. Normally there isn't 3 people at the OR table. Its usually just the Cardiologist and a scrub tech. In the room is also an RN, and someone "monitoring" which is like your court reporter scribing everything into a surgery timeline, they also log when medications are dosed, set timers for certain pressures, etc.
I've flown "solo" a few times. But just when you feel like you've got it, you'll take 2 steps back. Its frustrating. I did more solo cases today, and they went awesome. So I feel I have bounced back from my disappointment earlier this week.
I took the photo above probably 5 minutes before we all had to start doing CPR. I was the last one to do CPR before the DR called it. This ended up being my first "hands on" death. Meaning, the first person that I literally had a hand in -physically touching- and trying to intervene, that died on me. I had some weird emotions after. I didn't cry, but did get some air caught in my throat. Mostly when I realize that since I was the last one to do CPR, I was helping them with their last few heart beats. Its some heavy shit.