Shock Treatment

Monday March 27, 2006

Shock treatment looms

By K. PARKARAN and M. KRISHNAMOORTHY

KUALA LUMPUR: A total of 1,808 from the 15,500 SPM top scorers, who had applied for Public Services Department (PSD) medical scholarships, have been shortlisted to go through a “shock treatment” at government hospitals. 

The students will undergo a mandatory three-day stint from Wednesday at the hospitals, including going to the mortuary and operation theatre. 

The scholarship hopefuls will also be taken to other critical units in hospitals like the accident & emergency unit, outpatient clinic, and maternity and orthopaedic wards. 

The students will be sent to 46 hospitals and will be required to do a written self-evaluation on their experience. 

PSD director-general Datuk Seri Ismail Adam said they wanted the students to see doctors, among others, dealing with dead bodies, badly injured patients and also delivering babies to show them that one needed passion to become a good doctor. 

“The stint will enable the students to know at the outset what being a doctor is all about and we will be able to choose those, who can really make it in the profession. 

“Those who are still confident after familiarising themselves with the mortuary, operatingtheatre and other sections of the hospital will be called for the final interview,” said Ismail, who thanked the Health Ministry for its cooperation in facilitating the visits. 

He told The Star that some of the scholarship applicants might not want to take up medicine after seeing what the profession entailed. 

“Those who decide not to pursue medicine after the hospital stint would be allowed to apply for PSD scholarships in other fields,” he added. 

Meanwhile, shortlisted candidates had started receiving letters from the PSD from Saturday – a day after the official closing date for scholarship applications. 

PSD said those who had applied for scholarships to do medicine and had not received any letters, could check to see if they had been shortlisted for the hospital stint by calling the PSD Hotline at 03-8885 3397. 

Those unable to attend the programme for any reasons should call the PSD hotline immediately to make alternative arrangements. 

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Y’know I’m really glad that they did this.. I remember once upon a long time ago, I really thought studying medicine and becoming a doctor was the most heroic thing to do in one’s life. Really. Looking back, I’d hit me so hard for being so naiive. Studying in Seremban Hospital was definitely an eye opener and I know that more experiences are to come, to open my eyes even bigger.

Yes, I’m gonna admit it, there are days I just WISHED I wasn’t so gutty to take up medicine. It’s expensive, it’s difficult, it’s tough, lol… all for the sake of wearing that glorious white coat. Hah. Even pharmacists and physiotherapists wear white coats. And let me tell you, white coats ain’t the best thing to wear in a local government hospital, trust me. It’s not as gaya as you think. I mean, think about it! I’ll never enter the working world of cool corporate meetings in fancy office rooms, with super cool corporate clothes, entering super high tech office buildings. Instead, I’ll be entering a hospital, probably stinking of urine, or strong detergent, high chance it’ll be a run down building, with poor lighting system and probably no airconditioning as well.. seeing ill and maybe even dying patients. Sigh. Exciting huh?

HOWEVER,.. the more I think about it. My life isn’t about me. It’s about giving. It’s about serving. There was a real reason behind me choosing medicine without me realizing it. It’s about being an instrument of helping the poor, helping the sick, being a listening ear, a pillar of strength for those who seek treatment for the illness which has been bothering them more than ever. Sometimes, we enter a phase of life, not knowing why we’re here, what in the world we’re doing in the present, but I know… I’ll look back 10, 20, 50 years from now, and see my life fulfilled.

Did you know?

Did you know…

The length from your wrist to your elbow is the same as the length of your foot.

Your heart beats 101,000 times a day. During your lifetime it will beat about 3 billion times and pump about 400 million litres (800 million pints) of blood.

Your mouth produces 1 litre (1.8 pints) of saliva a day.

On average, people can hold their breath for one minute. The world record is seven-and-a-half minutes.

On average, you breathe 23,000 times a day.

On average, you speak almost 5,000 words a day – although almost 80% of speaking is self-talk (talking to yourself).

If the amount of water in your body is reduced by just 1%, you’ll feel thirsty.

Hippocrates, the Father of Medicine, suggested that a woman could enlarge her bust line by singing loudly and often.

You’ll drink about 75,000 litres (20,000 gallons) of water in your lifetime.

Men loose about 40 hairs a day. Women loose about 70 hairs a day.

A person remains conscious for eight seconds after being decapitated.

The muscle that lets your eye blink is the fastest muscle in your body. It allows you to blink 5 times a second. On average, you blink 15 000 times a day. Women blink twice as much as men.

On average a hiccup lasts 5 minutes.

The bones in your body are not white – they range in colour from beige to light brown. The bones you see in museums are white because they have been boiled and cleaned.

If all your DNA is stretched out, it would reach to the moon 6,000 times.

We actually do not see with our eyes – we see with our brains. The eyes basically are the cameras of the brain. One-quarter of the brain is used to control the eyes.

Near death experience

i just got home from a near-death experience… ok.. maybe it wasn’t as bad as that cuz I didn’t quite see my life pass me by as many say you would. But yeah, I’d label it as close-not-so-close-to-death experience.

In case you didn’t know, I’m a frequent train passenger.. and as usual, I’d take the train home from Seremban every Friday afternoon. Today was no different than any other day…. until we had to stop at a station because "the train had to be fixed". Fine. So we waited.. no biggie. 15 minutes…20 minutes… half an hour… then it got moving again. Then it stopped again… x minutes.. (can’t remember). On top of that, TODAY of all days, there were an extra amount of passengers onboard the train. Imagine.. the train was already packed as it is.. and when we reached UKM station, MORE students were waiting…and they pushed and poured in, regardless whether the people inside were squashed up like sardines (me being one of them. ugh.)

So yeah, imagine this. A train with a few carriages LOADED to the maximum.. full.. i mean it, literally FULL of people. It’s already stuffy as it is with the airconditioning. Ok. Still tolerable — UNTIL we left Kajang station .. we heard a loud bang. Then the airconditioning went off (bad).. then train started to stop (worse… more waiting). Ok. So we’re now in the train.. stuffy, sweaty, can’t breathe because of the amount of sardines in the tin.. and we’re waiting for the conductor to fix the stupid train. NOW.. here comes the worst part.. the train doors started closing and the airconditioning was still NOT on!!!!! Suddenly, everybody started feeling breathless.. (I did, to some degree).. and people started panicking and banging on the windows and doors for them to open up. Some girls were crying, some begging for the doors to open (you could hear the real desperation in her voice).. and children were crying.. we were all sweating and running out of breath.

I saw the emergency door open handle and wanted to break the glass to turn the handle.. until I saw the sign "Denda RM1000". ARGH.. what to do, what to do. Hearing the desperation of some of the passengers and the banging on the windows and doors, and the assurance from my friend that she will pay half the denda if we were denda-ed (lol, thanks girl!).. one kind guy helped to smash the glass, and we turned the handle.. Whoosh.. the door brakes were released. The guys rushed to push the doors apart. LITERALLY, you could feel some air.. some oxygen flowing in the train. At least we could breathe normally now. But we were still hot and sweaty. ARGH. We waited for the train to be fixed.. waited some more.. waited more… until I couldn’t take it anymore. I was going to walk.. on the train tracks to the next station. We hopped off the train (which was a really difficult thing to do – the train was high above the tracks).. and started walking.. on terrible rocks and stones (My shoes are now tearing apart), and we asked the KTM guy, how long a walk to the next station? "One hour" How about to the station which we came from? "40 mins"

AAARRRGGGHHH!!

Thankfully, we saw an old aunty right on the opposite side of the fence of the train tracks. She was a proud owner of a kampung house next to the tracks. Without much hesitancy, we crawled past the fence, braved the wooden fragile looking bridges.. and looked for civilisation. As always, my beloved dad was always a call away to the rescue. (Did I tell you how much of a hero my dad is?)

This is the story of my near-ok-maybe-not-so-near-death experience.