Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal Program Hospital

Well I am now in week two of orientation. Yesterday we had our drug calculations test. The questions were structured in a much more practical way. Things like working out the fluid restriction differences after medications and what time an IV will finish so you know when the next bag is due. All the teaching here is centred on timing things and when something is due.

Documentation is going backwards. There is literally a form for everything and double documentation is the expectation. All the efforts in Australia to get people to stop writing "meds given", when there is a medication chart, and "bloods ran through with no complications", when there is a blood chart to say that. "Obs within normal limits", when there is an obs chart. The notes are expected to address EVERY activity done for your patient, even if there is another form that says the same thing.

In August the entire hospital is going on computer with the aim to be paper free within 1 year. At handover you will take a laptop each on a trolley that can be wheeled to the bed side. You input all the data, look up blood results, new orders and can even use MIMMS and Google from the bed side. It looks expensive (this is Saudi…no surprises there) but it really looks good. A doctor inputs an order on their computer for a new drug and it automatically emails your laptop. No more chasing files from the desk. Or loosing notes between Triage and the bedside. No more struggling to get to a computer to look up lab results and no more taking phone orders of path reports and trying to track down the appropriate staff. If there is a blood result requiring urgent attention the Path lab inputs the details and you get an alert icon on your computer.

Also we have to do our BLS. I had to ask how to do the Heimlich manoeuvre. It is still the recognized 1st aid for choking, according to the American Heart Foundation. I have never learnt it, except "chunka, chunka chunka…lobster" according to Gunter. (Eddie Izzard reference), I did get the strangest look when I said the Heimlich manoeuvre is out of date in Australia and I had no idea how to do it. I don't mind learning new things, in fact I am looking forward to it, but it is the idea that anything different to the American system is considered odd or strange, even wrong. Ironically 'Sicko" was on Fox last night and Michael Moore pointed out some of the American ways of doing things. America has a higher infant mortality rate than Cuba, and is the only Western country not to offer free nationwide health care. I don't suggest that info coming out of America is necessarily bad, but when a health system is entirely driven by money and profit, one has to consider the 'conflict of interest' in research funding.

I wanted to take more photos around the hospital for the blog. But public photography in Saudi Arabia was illegal up until a few years ago, so there are signs everywhere of things you cannot photograph. Hospitals are one. As are shopping centres, bus stops, mosques, airports, train stations, soldiers and women. I have taken a photo of the pool and the front door from behind a bush. I feel like the assassin of JFK. I saw the shooter on the grassy knoll.

Now for a fun point of view, the pool is good and so is the Gym. The games room is empty most of the time. But there is table tennis, snooker, table soccer and darts. There is also 5 tennis courts and 2 basketball courts. I think I shall wait for the cooler weather before joining the basketball club. The Employees Social Club (ESC) does organize shopping trips, picnics, tennis and martial arts lessons, chess nights and anything suggested. The difficulty is that Bahrain is only 20 mins drive away and if you can go there for the weekend where there is alcohol, night clubs, cinemas, public swimming etc, the ESC chess club pales a little. But nothing will pale the intensity of table soccer, eh Pippa?

Speaking of soccer, the Saudis are fanatical and ALL the European team jerseys are available and about AUS50 - AUS 60 depending on the shop and team, so orders taken. Also there are two satellite channels playing only soccer.

Anyway must away, new experiences wait