At the bottom of the food chain!
The food chain was something I learnt several years ago in primary school and I had no fears about suddenly finding myself at the bottom of the chain, after all I am a human being and not some miserable plankton.
I just realized that the food chain can be extrapolated to life situations and in that case I may as well find out that i am some miserable plankton after altheir experiencesl. What do I mean? Well join me to draw parallel lines from a food chain to hierarchy in the medical world.
Man................ Consultant
Lion .................Senior Registrar
Goats................Junior Registrar
leaves................Medical Officer/ House Officer
There is a pecking order and our teachers never let us forget it, why should we? Experience of over thirty years as a medical doctor is no mean feat and a junior doctor with less than a few years practice had better remember that! My classmates will not quickly forget our whispered comments whenever a snr. Doctor made it known either by his words or actions that he was superior “There is hierarchy in medicine” Sure there is.
But for the insect\medical student, house officer or medical officer being at the end of the pecking order is not an easy thing, who really wants to be at the end of the food chain? No one. There are some advantages to being the most junior doc on the line but ill mention that last. First the disadvantages include:
1. When there is work to be done you can guess who can’t get away? Hard work never kills anyone but there are just sometimes, yeah sometimes when you just feel like sleeping/resting/or just taking a break and yet another patient comes in at the end of a very busy clinic you jolly well don’t expect your ‘oga’ (it means boss) to remain in the clinic while you pick up your bags and disappear home.
* Work remaining on the ward to be done after a long day’s work is completed by? You got it the most junior doc.
2. The next disadvantage is not the norm or the rule but it certainly happens I tell you because I was once a victim: You get the blame for what goes wrong. The example I will give is not mine sorry but I still have some way to go up the ladder and I don’t want any rungs pulled out from beneath me! It was the morbidity and mortality meeting of a department in surgery and the most junior doctor was presenting a case, when it came to the details of what had happened during a surgery the poor junior doc was almost taken apart when he described a procedure that was done. ‘In this day and age’, such cries of indignation were heard from the learned bench of consultants, “who told you to do that?” another asked. The junior doc unwittingly pointed out the next doc of a higher rank in the food chain as the culprit who had given him the go ahead. This higher ranking doc without batting an eyelid exonerated himself from the preposterous suggestion of his junior colleague. Haba! I remembered that day in theatre very well and I remembered distinctly the snr doc giving the very instructions that he had denied ever uttering, but what could I do I was merely a plankton by the food chain standard!.
Now you know where the idea of writing this article came from!
Any others at the bottom of the link can forward their experiences to me; I’d love to hear from you.
I just realized that the food chain can be extrapolated to life situations and in that case I may as well find out that i am some miserable plankton after altheir experiencesl. What do I mean? Well join me to draw parallel lines from a food chain to hierarchy in the medical world.
Man................ Consultant
Lion .................Senior Registrar
Goats................Junior Registrar
leaves................Medical Officer/ House Officer
There is a pecking order and our teachers never let us forget it, why should we? Experience of over thirty years as a medical doctor is no mean feat and a junior doctor with less than a few years practice had better remember that! My classmates will not quickly forget our whispered comments whenever a snr. Doctor made it known either by his words or actions that he was superior “There is hierarchy in medicine” Sure there is.
But for the insect\medical student, house officer or medical officer being at the end of the pecking order is not an easy thing, who really wants to be at the end of the food chain? No one. There are some advantages to being the most junior doc on the line but ill mention that last. First the disadvantages include:
1. When there is work to be done you can guess who can’t get away? Hard work never kills anyone but there are just sometimes, yeah sometimes when you just feel like sleeping/resting/or just taking a break and yet another patient comes in at the end of a very busy clinic you jolly well don’t expect your ‘oga’ (it means boss) to remain in the clinic while you pick up your bags and disappear home.
* Work remaining on the ward to be done after a long day’s work is completed by? You got it the most junior doc.
2. The next disadvantage is not the norm or the rule but it certainly happens I tell you because I was once a victim: You get the blame for what goes wrong. The example I will give is not mine sorry but I still have some way to go up the ladder and I don’t want any rungs pulled out from beneath me! It was the morbidity and mortality meeting of a department in surgery and the most junior doctor was presenting a case, when it came to the details of what had happened during a surgery the poor junior doc was almost taken apart when he described a procedure that was done. ‘In this day and age’, such cries of indignation were heard from the learned bench of consultants, “who told you to do that?” another asked. The junior doc unwittingly pointed out the next doc of a higher rank in the food chain as the culprit who had given him the go ahead. This higher ranking doc without batting an eyelid exonerated himself from the preposterous suggestion of his junior colleague. Haba! I remembered that day in theatre very well and I remembered distinctly the snr doc giving the very instructions that he had denied ever uttering, but what could I do I was merely a plankton by the food chain standard!.
Now you know where the idea of writing this article came from!
Any others at the bottom of the link can forward their experiences to me; I’d love to hear from you.
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