I went in yesterday for a day shift. What a difference a day makes. Day shift-Wednesday is only a third the intensity of night shift-Monday-post holiday. I saw 11 patients. In 10 hours. That's just silly. Got out of work early--first time in 5 months! I had a terrible medical student. Just a mouth breathing idiot. She tried to make up for an absence of medical knowledge by being chatty. I tolerated her, and gave her my friendly act because I know how much it sucks to be a medical student, but she was just a zero. Mercifully she is going into a field where her potential to destroy lives will be minimal. I asked her to do one thing--one F'ing thing in a 10 hour shift--"Get your lunch and come back here to eat it in the radio room. That way you can keep an eye on your patients and if somethign interesting comes in you won't miss it." I promise my med students two things: a)they'll be worked hard, but b) they won't be abused. They will have time to get food and eat, I'll get them out on time, and I'll send them out early if their work is done. That's a square deal. All she had to do was get some food and come back, and she couldn't even manage that. Fifty minutes later she came back--she had met a friend she hadn't seen for six months. WTF? Where did she learn this crap? You're going to be a DOCTOR, you little twit! Have a little pride and work ethic. I wouldn't have failed her for that, but if it was me filling out her evaluation I'd be damn sure she didn't get any better than a C for the rotation. It's not complicated: show up on time, work as hard as you can, and leave when you're done. U-561