Rotation #1: Infectious Disease Consult Service at the NIH

Hey everybody! Well after quite the road trip, I'm finally at my first rotation of the year: Infectious Diseases (ID) at the NIH. I just finished my first week, and it was AWESOME. Put it this way....the first patient we rounded on had about as many problems as all the patients on my Michigan service combined!! The patients have things I've either a) never heard of or b) never, ever thought I'd see and c) things the attendings and fellows have never heard of prior to that particular patient presenting themselves either - it's amazing! On the down side of that, I now have a LOT more than I thought to read up on tonight!

One example of the cool things I'm getting to see is the cute little blue guy below: an amoeba. They seem kind of funny when they're in Far Side cartoons, but not so much when they show up in your liver after a trip to Mexico!

These are not your run-of-the-mill infectious diseases patients...they all have cancer...and not just that. They have the weirdest infections that you don't see in normal patients/hospitals. In fact, the ID fellows here have to go out to regular community hospitals for rotations so they can learn how to treat simple cellulitis, because they'd never learn about normal things here! Also, most of the patients on our service have had stem cell transplants (took me a minute to realize that it was "stem" they were saying, and not "bone"!)...something I didn't even realize was that common yet! Apparently there are only two centers in the country that do them on a somewhat regular basis - here, and somewhere in Washington state. So that is yet another thing that I need to learn about, ASAP!

So the building below is the clinical part of the NIH, where I work. Its actually just the front of a giant complex of buildings, most of which were part of the "old hospital." So where I work is called the "new hospital." It only opened 1 year ago, and it's the most beautiful hospital I've ever seen or will see. Not only is everything perfectly clean and new, the patients are very happy campers as they each have their own flatscreen TV that is also a computer. So I have to say that this is probably the only time I'll ever go see one of my patients in the ICU and find them surfing the web!

When you walk inside the doors, this is what you see...There's this incredible atrium that is probably 7-8 stories tall. There is a giant garden at the center of the building, and lots of light everywhere. It must be an incredible place to be a patient. I would've tried to take a picture of the atrium area, but it's just too big. You really have to see it for yourself.

This is what is on the wall to the left of the security desk in the above picture. I thought it was neat so I took a picture of it.

My roommate here is from the West Virginia Osteopathic school, so that's pretty neat! Our apartment building is right next to the NIH, so I won't have to drive in the traffic here!! Yay!! But the NIH is so big we have to walk to the edge of it, and then take a shuttle over to our building, which is on the opposite side of campus (reminds me a lot of A&M in that respect!)

We found out right away why the rent is so reasonable in our particular building (as opposed to the rest of Bethesda & DC where rent is outrageous)…it's right across from the Bethesda Fire Dept.! We were still moving our stuff in when the first call went out. Funny. But actually I think I've already learned to sleep through the alarms, because I don't remember being woken up by any this week! When I get time (after I go to the Spy Museum!) I'm going to walk around in Bethesda/Chevy Chase and take pictures of some of the houses here. I think it's about the prettiest area I've ever seen (not quite Charleston, but pretty close!).

This weekend I'm going to try to do some board studying, and we're also going to take a tour of Haunted Alexandria - I can't wait! I might try to make it to Monticello and Mt. Vernon this weekend too, but it depends on how much studying I get done between now and then!