ROSTER WORRIES WITH GREEN RELIEF

Christchurch, NZ

Kia ora my friend, 

I meant to only write about medicine and working in a different country but it is impossible. The lush green and blue life surrounds me on my way to work and back home. On my day-off mornings I wake up with an almost intolerable eagerness to go out, see, smell, hear and feel my feet work me up the hills to see even more. So, I’ll have to try and describe some of that to draw a fuller picture of life here. Feeling in awe and priviledged in nature is big part of my life as are my family and medicine. First learning point, clearer here in New Zealand than ever before, is that medicine is just part of life, not life itself. Not in my personal life or the lives of my patients, hopefully. I am here to help them live their lives with as little discomfort and harm from their illnesses or trauma as possible. In emergency medicine that sometimes requires very quick life saving decisions and fluent team work and sometimes, more often than you think, just stopping for a moment by the human being and listen, see and feel to what they actually tell you. 

My start here as a resident doctor in emergency medicine has not been without struggle. I did not know what to expect, except a well functioning, big tertiary emergency department with good educational system according to ACEM (Australasian College for Emergency Medicine) standards. The first choking sensation came at the sight of the roster (työvuorot in Finnish). Although the weekly hours in general are 38, the shifts are clustered to i.e. four nights in or evenings until midnight in a row with a couple of days to recover to then continue working again. Each shift is nine hours. Everything else, even compulsory work matters have to be done on freetime and as a first year New Zealand doctor no outside-of-hospital schooling is financially or timewise supported. I have done nights and shift work but never like this. In addition, the last years in Finland I have been working mostly day-time after been given more responsibilities as a fellow/almost senior in tutoring and admistrative tasks (in pre-hospital setting). Here working most of the time or trying to desperately recover from it while attempting to play mother and spouse felt like a twisted human experiment. I wanted this, we were very committed to this as a family, so why the struggle? Maybe because I am just a human. Also the change in the working role to basically a junior doctor was mentally and physically a challenge. But don’t get me wrong, I truly appreciate the chance to discuss each patient with a senior and not having to bear the whole responsibility alone. Very good for the patient. Very educative for me.

I was was thrown to the deep clinical resident doctor end with little preparation. I had to learn the electric systems in night shifts with my then Purple team (the teams are named by colors, thus the name for the blog) and rest of house manners overly tired. The roster ate me up. It also took a toll on my family, who tried to start their new lives in preschool, school and stay-at-home-on-a-study-leave dad mode with either an absent or exhausted mother. And even though I felt Christchurch hospital could give me a lot, I felt more frustrated, disappointed and tired than ever for the first three months here. I definately felt like not being able to carry on like that for more than a year like planned. The feeling of not being able to contribute at any level is depressing.

Even in the middle of the eternal jetlag-like state, I felt my heart bubbling for the excitement of being here. Literally everything seemed so beautiful. Sure, some of the bubbling may have been benign ventricular extra beats from exhaustion, but how soothing can greenery, hills and flowers be! Or the ocean in never-before seen shades of blue and turquoise green. Even the most modest of gardens push out leaves in dozens of shapes and flowers we grow shortly in the summer or indoors. It was Spring here when we arrived. Just being able to walk on a beach while gazing at distant snow topped Alps was and remains unique.

Never underestimate the power of nature and outdoors for your wellbeing, but do what you can to support it as well. I was lucky to get a mentor from the senior doctors in the ED as an ACEM function. She, Suzi, is great. She heard and saw me. The changes to my roster that sounded impossible in the beginning were finally granted thanks to her input. The last three months I have mostly been awake.  I am excited and proud about my work, feelings I almost lost in Finland and nearly buried in fatique in NZ. 

I am quite eager to share my thoughts so wait for the next letter. I do not know what it is about, but it will include green and medicine, maybe a bit of bird life too. 

The picture in this letter shows one of the several local tree ferns. The silver fern is one of NZ’s national symbols. The ground level ferns we have in Finland have always been my favorites, but these calmy unfolding giants took the enchantment to another level.

Ngā mihi, Reetta