A quick Tour around the Alaska Native Medical Center

Although we don't actually get to do any OB/GYN work there, several people have strongly recommended that we take a tour around the Alaska Native Medical Center (where native Alaskans get their medical care). It was a really nice hospital with AMAZING artwork. If you are ever in Anchorage I strongly recommend visiting. Just a couple pictures here. It is an excellent reminder of the cultural heritage of the area/state. Lindsey took these pics because my memory card was full.

View from the top of the ANMC. The medical complex was pretty impressive and quite modern. I was very impressed.

Walrus Ivory carvings abounded. They were really good. There were several larger whale-bone carvings as well.
Lots of artwork adorned hallways and entryways into the hospital. The main entry is actually a sitting area in large circle to symbolize community and sharing between the different Native Alaskan people groups.
This was a basket display on the second floor. The plaque next to the basket says that sometimes seal gut is used assist with decorating the baskets.

The information sign beside this display said this traditional coat is made out of squirrel fur.

Hangin' with the other 3rd year med students in Anchorage

There are actually a bunch of 3rd year medical students here in Anchorage right now: 4 students on OB/GYN, 3 students on pediatrics, 2 students on psych, and 2 students on internal medicine.
Some of the students flew back to Seattle for Thanksgiving. Others had their husbands/significant others fly up here to meet them. Anyway, the medical students and partners that were here had a great time putting together a combined Thanksgiving meal.

Many concerned individuals have asked if I had to spend Thanksgiving by myself. Rest assured, that did not happen. Here we are with other med students having our Thanksgiving meal together. To my left is another third year named Erika and her husband, Mike, to their left is a 3rd year student named Chris, and to his left is third year student, Alison, with her boyfriend.

This is a picture Lindsey took of me. About 100feet behind me was a moose eating a bush. Lindsey joke that you couldn't see the moose at all, but you could see that was scared for my life (moose can trample people if they get too close).

Here is a family of moose that we ran into one night when Lindsey and I went to pick up the car. They look cute, but they are huge and dangerous.

For Erika's birthday we went out to Sushi. It was really good and a lot of fun. On the left we have Lida and Erika (on Pediatrics) and on the right it is Lindsey, me and Jonathan (all on OB/GYN).

Here is a picture of Lindsey hanging out at our kitchen table. We have a nice little apartment.

A drive around Anchorage

There have been a number of humerus things we have seen while driving around Anchorage. I thought I would share just a few of them with you here.

One of the dilemmas in the area seems to be: what to do with the snow? Seen here it was made a decorative part of a court. The bulldozed all the snow into a big pile in the center of the court and made a path to drive around the outside and built a snow man on the top. Thanksgiving cheer all around! Note that in this picture it looks pretty dark, but it was taken around 9:30-10am.

Typical driving on the main roads. You can see the mountains, etc in the background. Apparently, the mound of snow at the side of the road after snow ploughing has a name, but I can't remember it right now. I will have to get back to you on that.

I have never seen so many Hummers, Pickup trunks, and Subarus in my entire life. They are (very understandably) quite popular here.

The phone number for the local Anchorage cab company is 222-2222. I think they made it so that even if you are really drunk you can easily call a cab.

The "Community Minded" liquor store is one of our favorite signs. Our question is: how is a liquor store community minded? We decided a sub-slogan could be something like, "We keep our prices low to keep you drunk. Truly thinking of the community."
This is another one of the many liquor stores. It sort-of reminds me of how Seattle has lots of coffee stands, but here they sell alcohol. Alaska does have a very high rate of alcoholism compared to many other states, and it can be a pretty big problem, particularly out in the more rural areas.

Anchorage pictures (finally)!!!

My classmate, Lindsey, and I spent the morning taking in the beautiful scenery around Anchorage. Here are some pictures that we took.

View of Anchorage from Earthquake park. Thanks to Lindsey for taking this one!


Another view of the Anchorage shoreline.


A view of both water and mountains!


Lindsey and I had breakfast at the Snow City Cafe. It is the beast breakfast and brunch in Anchorage. Highly recommended if you ever visit. I had the Crabby omelet. It was delicious.

Here is Lindsey standing outside of the Snow City Cafe.
Cold. Walking on the trail in Earthquake Park.

Lindsey on trail in Earthquake Park.

Darn Power lines. They always ruin my pictures. It looks like the sun is rising or setting, but this is at noon. The sun just doesn't rise very high in the sky here this time of year. Crazy!

Lots of moose crossing signs.

Lindsey and I worked very hard to get this picture. Our car almost got stuck in a little unploughed turnout. Then we had to wade through about 8 inches of snow in not-so-good shoes. I couldn't feel my toes after wards.



Lindsey used my camera to take this video. It is beautiful, isn't it?

Brrr. Cold weather

This last week we had some cold weather. It reached down to -10 to -15 degrees F. It was by far the coldest weather I have ever experienced in my whole life. It means a lot of dressing and undressing when you have to go outside throughout the day. We have a few inches of snow, but according to one of our classmates, it isn't enough to cross country ski in.


Here I am all bundled up. Good times. If you walk all the way to the hospital (about a 6 minute walk) when it is really cold outside, your nose hairs freeze and sometimes your eye lashes freeze.


This is the Alaska Magazine issue that was for sale when we first arrived in Anchorage. Apparently, what small birds and animals to shoot during the fall is a hot-selling topic.



I keep forgetting to go outside and take pictures during the daylight hours, but here is picture of the pathway between the University of Alaska Anchorage Housing (where we live) and the Student Commons area.

I will try to add more pictures later. So far I have been pretty bad about taking my camera with me when I go out.


So far, I am definitely having a positive experience. People have been really nice and I am learning a lot.

Don't bother voting in my lame poll

ORIGINAL POST:

To my blog readers, please vote in my poll about whether or not I should allow Google advertisements on this blog. I have been very resistant to it in the past - I didn't want to subject my blog readers to the unpleasant words of corrupt corporate America. However, I decided I should put out a poll to see how you all feel about it. What do you think? Are my witty words and stories strong enough to overcome the irritation of annoying advertisements (doubtful), or do you reject buckling under corporate powers for a couple of dollars every month? I would like to settle it all in a democratic vote (which is apparently going to be heavily favored towards those with more advanced computer literacy because you have to have a gmail account to vote in the poll). However, if you do not have a gmail account, feel free to leave an anonymous comment at the end of this entry and I will add it to the final tally.

Thanks!
Christy

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UPDATE:
Apparently my poll is completely defective and I am the only one who has been able to vote in it so far. This was my first attempt at setting up a poll so I probably did something wrong, but it doesn't stop be from sending some bad thoughts towards Blogspot and Google. Sorry about the technical difficulties. Feel free to post comments if you have strong feelings either way.

Baby Feet

The other night I had one of my first overnight labor and delivery shifts. It was a lot of fun and I had some very good and interesting learning opportunities. It turned out to be a fairly quiet night as far as labor and delivery usually goes. I took a woman down to get an ultrasound and then I ended up following a woman who was in labor. The woman delivered towards the end of the shift and the delivery needed a vacuum (attach suction device to baby's head so the OB can assist with the delivery). It was a good learning experience because I had not seen a vacuum delivery before. After the delivery the baby's family was very happy and crowding around the new infant and mom. After cleaning up a bit in the room, I was sitting at the nurse's station and a nurse was walking by and asked if I wanted to 'help make baby feet.' I knew that part of the post-birth paperwork was to create a paper image of the baby's feet using this weird powdered ink stuff, so I assumed that this is what we were going to end up doing on our newly delivered infant. Being my normal enthusiastic self, I said I would be delighted to help and jumped up to follow the nurse.

I made a visual illustration to emphasize what I thought we would be doing when 'making baby feet' before entering into the experience:

I followed the nurse into a room where we set up some tables and started getting out supplies. There were some bowls and materials to make a dough like substance and plaster. At first I was a little puzzled as we were getting the supplies out of a cupboard called "bereavement supplies," but in my sleep-deprived state, I didn't put any more energy towards thinking about the issue. The nurse explained that we were making two sets of baby feet by pressing the dough flat into the bowls, then we would press the baby's feet and hands into the dough to make and indentation, and then pour plaster over the dough to make an impression of the baby's feet. Then when the plaster was almost dry you could engrave the baby's birth date and name in the back. The nurse gave me a sad little smile and said it is a really nice thing to help the parents remember the baby by. It was then I realized through my sleepy haze, that no one had actually told me that we were 'making baby feet' on a living baby. I looked around the room a bit more and saw a carefully arranged pile of flannel Mickey Mouse baby blankets on the end of the bed. I quietly asked the nurse if she could tell me the story behind the baby. She explained that it was a baby that was born many weeks before the age of viability (age of viability is around 23-24 weeks gestational age) and there was no way they could save the baby. The nurse explained that many years ago, medical personnel thought that a woman should not see a child that was miscarried/stillborn, and that every one should just sort-of pretend that it never happened. However, now they have found that mothers/parents have better closure and actually heal better after the loss of a child if they have many different ways to remember the baby by - pictures, naming the child, a baby feet plaque, counseling, etc. So the hospital helps parents with the grieving process and remembering the baby in many ways including making baby feet impressions to give to the parents.

Even after having a couple minutes to prepare myself, I think my face still whitened a little when the nurse carefully brought over the pile of Mickey Mouse baby blankets and removed a very small dead baby. Using gloved hands she gently pressed the feet and hands into the dough, and then handed the baby to me. I was shaking a little as I held the cold body (it fit easily in one outstretched hand), but was able to repeat the process and create impressions in my bowl of dough as well. The nurse then carefully took the baby back and dressed him in some premature infant clothes and took him back to his parents for holding/pictures. Although it was a bit of an emotional experience, I felt very privileged to be part of it. I also think that it is an important point that when new parents experience a loss such as this, they want the existence and death of their child to be acknowledged. A very good lesson, but hopefully not one I will have to utilize frequently.

6minutes X10 = 1 hour

When we arrived, we were told that the sun sets 6 minutes earlier each day this time of year in Anchorage. At first we didn't think it sounded like much, then we realized: 6 minutes a day X 10 days = 1 hour! Every ten days we are here it gets dark 1 hour earlier! Yikes. So if it gets dark around 4:45pm when we first arrived, it is going to get dark around 3:45pm in just 10 days, etc. (Ok, sorry for saying the exact same thing 3 times). Apparently by the time we leave daylight will extend from around 10am to 2:30pm or something crazy like that. Fortunately the clinic I have been assigned to has lots of windows so I will get to see the sun for a little while each day.

I hope you all are well. If you live in an area with lots of sun now, soak up some rays for me!

Arriving in Alaska, quick update

I arrived in Anchorage on Saturday. The flight was fairly uneventful other than being an pretty sparsely populated plane and it seemed to have a slightly higher percentage of red-neck type personalities on board. I was slightly horrified to discover that the largest airport in the largest city in the entire state only had one baggage carousel. While waiting for my luggage, I discovered a well dressed and articulate man waiting for luggage. I took a chance and asked if he was a medical student. He was indeed a medical student who had taken time out to get his PhD, hence why I did not recognize him. We were taken to the University of Alaska Anchorage campus where were placed in the wrong apartment. After some more adventures and the arrival of our 3rd OB/GYN student (Lindsey), we found the correct room and moved all of our baggage. It snowed 3 inches on Sunday night and we were awoken frequently by the grinding of snow plows. Today they put the studded snow tires on our all-wheel-drive Subaru and we seem to be in pretty good shape as far as transport goes. Lindsey, one of the other girls on the OB rotation, used to be ambulance driver for 5 years and is really good in driving in all weather conditions. I have driven here once, but gladly defer to other more experienced snow drivers. Tonight it is 14 degrees F, but according to the weather report it feels like 5 degrees F. It stings a little when the air hits your face, but we have marveled at how little the natives seem to wear despite the chilly temperatures. We must seem like people visiting Seattle decked out in rain boots, rain coats, rain pants, and umbrellas when it is just slightly sprinkling.

Monday and today were both days of orientation to the OB/GYN rotation. Today we had a suture workshop where we practiced cutting and suturing up placentas and tying surgical knots. It was fun, but once again I was faced with the realization that I am coordination-challenged.

Everyone keeps asking, but, no, I have not seen Russia yet. :)

I will try to keep updating when I can. Lindsey and I saw a moose tonight, but I didn't have my camera with me, so I didn't get a picture! Better luck next time.