Obstetrics and Gynecology: Part 2 of 2, The Philippine Centennial Celebration
June 13, 1998
Saturday
Belated Happy Centennial* to All! The country is now 100 years and a day old. I’m post-duty right now, which is why I’m free and at home doing my mail.
I went on duty yesterday at the Obstetrics Admitting Section (OBAS), June 12, beginning at 7 am. One of my duty-mates, Tina, had a bunch of plastic flags which we put around the OBAS – on the poles for IV [intravenous] fluids, on the walls, etc. Even the resident on duty got into the spirit by putting the Filipino flag on patient tags (which we call “flags” and taped to IV line tubing, to identify the patient attached to that particular IV line). Duty wasn’t too bad, and I even got a little sleep (2 hours or so). I wonder if the kids born on this day were named Filipina or Centenario. Yuck.
There were fireworks over Manila Bay at 7:30 pm that night, as part of the grand centennial program. These were launched from 4 barges in the bay and their launch timing was computer-controlled. Cost was about 4 to 5 million pesos (I’ll leave the currency conversion to you)^. It was an elaborate display, with not only the normal spherical/circular fireworks shape, but also stripes, firefly-like arrangements, golden showers, etc. The 30-minute show kept me and my classmates oohing and aahing. You may ask how I got to watch this spectacle while on duty on the ground-floor OBAS. Well, my “post” or assignment from 5 pm to 10 pm was “circulating intern”, which means I go take lab specimens, x-ray plates, referral letters and the like from the OBAS and bring them to the appropriate places in the hospital (e.g., the laboratory section or the radiology department).
Technically, I’m not really supposed to be at the OBAS all the time since I’m privileged (?) to be running around the PGH from 5 pm to 10 pm. So just before the fireworks started, I (fortunately) had an x-ray plate which had to be dropped off at the radiology department. On the way back to the OBAS, I met some classmates who were going up to the 7th floor of the hospital to see the show. And so I went too. My duty-mates at OBAS had given me the blessing to leave them and watch the show, so I could tell them all about it – all they could see [from the ground level] were few of the fireworks which were exceptionally high in the sky. The Robinson’s Place mall’s multi-level parking structure blocked their line of sight. Once on the 7th floor, where lots of other people were gathered, we waited for some time before the show started. Wow! That was a good show, but I was expecting the fireworks to form something like “100“in the sky. Maybe I expected too much?
THOSE WITH QUEASY STOMACHS ABOUT THE BIRTHING PROCESS STOP READING HERE. HAPPY CENTENNIAL!
Anyway, the rest of the night wasn’t too bad. In the morning, though, there was this lady who came in on the verge of giving birth. She was already pushing (straining) and we had to tell her to stop doing so, otherwise her baby would be born outside the relatively infection-free delivery room (meaning she and her baby would have to take antibiotics after birth, which drains the pocket terribly – extra expense for her). So there she was on the examining table at the OBAS, when I looked between her legs and saw something bulging in the area. I thought it was a baby’s head, so I quickly donned gloves and tried to push the thing back in (in a sense). I felt it wasn’t a baby’s head (thank God), but the bag of waters ready to burst! By this time, a stretcher came to pick up the mother to bring her to the delivery room. I still had to push the bag of waters back and keep it from bursting, though. So the OB resident told me to get onto the stretcher with the woman (she was lying down on it, and I was seated on the stretcher at her feet, with my hand still holding the bag of waters). Thus I (and the mother of course) was wheeled into the delivery room, where she got onto the delivery table. The delivery room obstetrician burst the bag of waters and told the mother that finally, she can now push with all her might. She gave birth to a healthy baby girl. Whew. Talk about adrenalin rush!
Thinking about it makes me tired, but happy. I think that’s how obstetricians feel about their profession – it’s physically taxing but it’s a rather happy specialty since you get to see the miracle of life unfold before your eyes. However, I am not going to be an obstetrician. No way.
Notes:
* The Philippines celebrated its 100th year of independence on June 12, 1998. On that day in 1898, General Emilio Aguinaldo declared independence from Spain. Read more about it here.
^In 1998, the exchange rate was approximately 42 Philippine Pesos to 1 US Dollar, so 4 to 5 million pesos was USD 95,000 to 120,000.
JOINT is the Journal of INTernship, a series of email messages to family and friends (“journal subscribers”) written during my yearlong medical internship from May 1, 1998 to April 30, 1999. Internship is one of the requirements before taking the Philippine Physician Licensure Examination (also known as the Medical Boards). Journal entries were edited for clarity in January, 2020. Read more about it in the first blog post, Introducing JOINT.
