stress management

last saturday i was fortunate to have been able to got to a stress management workshop conducted by makcik Fuziah Salleh.

what i got from it:

• i have a type A personality (memang tau pun tp saje je nak matchkan dgn the criterias given)
• i dont have as many stressors as others (setakat study je) but my personality type contributes a lot to my stress
• we have to pause and think before reacting to any event
• i am able to control what i feel and think. i dont have to let other ppls' inappropriate comments affect me.

cukup la for now. gottogo back to the hospital.

more on ortho

i am in week 6 of ortho and currently posted to the emergency department (we call it A&E, short for accident and emergency).

its the one week where we have to be at the a&e from 8am to 12pm. (lari kejap ni sbb ada teaching tadi, gi sane balik kol 6 nanti). we can cabut at our own risk. if we are caught not being at the a&e when we're supposed to, all hell will break loose. so, one can skip away but must tread lightly and always have an alibi or a good reason for one's absence.

there's so much to read and procedures to do. kadang2 best gak suture laceration wounds or doing dressings. but the logbook requirement banyak sgt.

most of the ortho cases here are trauma cases (read: accidents) or diabetic foot. elderly people come with OA or RA but tak byk sgt.

please 3x take care of ur diet. u really don't wanna get diabetes. it's such a vicious cycle. unless u were born with it, then u must proactively avoid it. once u have it, u'r doomed forever. penat dah tgk and smell diabetic foot. kesian tgk ppl drowning in the vicious symptoms and complications of diabetes mellitus. it all comes down to lifestyle. lead a healthy one. its much more islamic.

this weekend, i'm going to sue's wedding in kelantan, yay. mr shuk said it was ok if i went back early instead of 12pm. can't wait. penat dah tak balik umah. am hoemsick. jalan2 anywhere would do.

2 new postcards

i got 2 new postcards last week.
one from kak masyitah (thank u very2 much) and one from ayah.
it really brightened up my day.

a funny thing happened.
my postcard was sent to the brothers' mahallat coz there was no binti. i guess my name doesn't really indicate any gender for those who have no idea of me whatsoever.
fortunately for me, that my colleague noticed it and passed it on to me. my friend tu plak probably forgot what a postcard was and said it was an 'autograph', hehe.

a birthday gift for my friend, given 4 months late.

the postcard from germany

the postcard from dubai

the MCQ postmortem

my group just had a postmortem of the MCQ questions from our previous posting, which if u've missed the previous entries and pics, is public health & community medicine.

it was the 1st ever postexam postmortem conducted. tak penah dalam sejarah berlaku di IIUM. but my group did quite badly that our deputy dean asked the department to do it. only 5 of us managed to pass,the lowest mark being 28/100 and the average mark was 30+. alhamdulillah most of us actually passed.

so we had to scrutinize each of the 30 MCQ's one by one.

at the end of the day, the conclusion was that most of us had limited knowledge as we did not read beyond the lecture notes and any additional info question was either not answered or attempts at answering failed miserably. there were some confusing questions that we pointed out and they accepted it.

we were encouraged to give our opinion on the posting and one of the pertinent problem that we faced last block regarding the communication breakdown with our supervisor surfaced. alhamdulillah that was out in the air and off our shoulders.

anyways, for the accreditation, the department made a poster of the students activities and there were loads of pics of me and my friends coz we simply took lots of pictures all the time. so the only activities of certain activities being carried out were the ones that we took hehe. bangga plak.

The accreditation

this is the last entry for now.

Next week, IIUM Kuantan Campus will go through the accreditation process and included in it are interviews with 40 randomly selected students from all 5 batches.

Our dean, Prof Tahir conducted a session with the medical students to forewarn us of this interview and the impact that it would have on the university. We were given a sheet stating the vision, mission and learning outcome of the university just in case we were asked about it, hehe (cam tau2 je sume org tak tau). He reminded us to answer appropriately and to not take the oppurtunity to kutuk the university as the quality of our certificates was on the line. Hehe, it’s like saying, go ahead, say what you want but AOR (at own risk).

it's the art of persuasion, i say. clearly it was a threat coated with sugar and wonderful spices :)

My raya

a picture showing that height has nothing to do with age :)

half of the cousins on my mom's side

a display of nice teeth, growing teeth and braces

with ayah's kak yang (the elderly lady in the middle)

with ayah's kak yung (the elderly lady in the middle too)

This is a brief retrospective entry of my raya this year.

After my forensics posting, I went back to johor with ayah. I had only 3 days at home then off to Kuala Kangsar stopping for a while in KL to pick up hafizah. The next day, we went to SG Petani. Munibah went staright to Sg Petani with the IIUM anak2 Kedah bus. Hehe, habis2an kitorang gelakkan dia.

Last year, it was just my family and pak su’s. This year, 5 families crammed into a 3-bedroom house. The bathroom queue was long I tell ya. But, there were more hands to do the raya preparations.

On the night of raya, I started having abdominal cramps and had full blown diarrhoea in the morning so I couldn’t go for the prayer. Orang lain sume sihat walafiat je except for one cousin of mine who might have eaten the same contaminated food. Alhamdulillah I was okay for the traditional phography session. But after the annual laksa preparation, I was feverish and had to rest. In the evening my intestines still didn’t settle down but I didn’t want to be left behind when my family visited my relatives. I spent practically more time in the toilet at mak cak’s then outside. I could only look at all the glorious food. Everyone gave me all sorts of remedies which didn’t really work. As we were all leaving the house, I suddenly felt nauseated and went to the sink to vomit. The wretching hurt a lot but I was relieved afterwards. I think it was the biji selasih rebus that mak made me eat. We went to pak long’s after that.

The next day we went to a few more houses and went to kuala kangsar. Everyone had heard from pak andak that I stayed at his place for my forensics and asked me about it. Angah said I dah kurus and she guessed that the only reason could be due to ‘bercinta’. Hehe, ape la angah ni. Orang tak boleh makan sebab diarrhoea je la. Sekarang dah regain whatever little I did lose during the fasting month hehe.

The day after that, Kak ngah and abang ngah came to the house. Then, we visited perak relatives because ayah wanted to introduce abang ngah to them. I couldn’t really eat much for fear of more diarrhoea but the jalan2 was interesting. All my smaller cousins attended to Aisyah so my sisters and I just played with Ayyasy. We took the oppurtunity to take photographs at the houses we visited since we rarely see them.

One more day in Kuala Kangsar then one in Ipoh and then a few days in KL. And then back to Kuantan for the new posting.

My holiday was full of travelling. It was tiring but satisfying at the same time.

a few more pics

with Dr Aznan, his wife and kids

at Dr Samsul's house.
the house has such a nice view overlooking the sea that we just had to take a picture of it.
in the picture; one is married, one is engaged to be married this december and its complicated for the the other 3.
try guessing which one is which??

at cuah's house.
sibah, me and yaz with Hannah, the adorable 4-month-old 1st baby of the batch.

right now i'm having a small-scale blogathon since i'm really stressed out. so these entries will last u a week or two to read and comment.
[i am such an extremist. susah sgt nak practice wasatiyah]

again and again i suffer from the consequences of my disastrous procrastination.

i have to submit my 1st case write up tomorrow and i'm only half way through. last weekend, it seemed like i had all the time in the world so i watched 23 episodes of Heroes to find out why nibah and kak yung and everyone else were so excited about it. yeah, it was fascinating and i was hooked.

so now, i have to struggle with my assignment. i just never learn, hehe.

this morning we had a islamic input delivered by Prof Dr Sidek Baba. it was very interesting.

after the class, i was supposed to go with sibah to the hospital and then do my write up on my lap top so i had to go back to the room and get it. the door was locked and i evidently forgot to bring my keys today of all the times in the world to forget i just had to choose today. plus azza was out shopping and does not know when to she'll be back. when i went to the security gueard for the spare key, he said that the person in charge was at the other campus. just my luck.

if i do follow sibah to the hospital without my white coat and my laptop, how could i finish my work.

so here i am, at the library, trying not to hyperventilate and getting muscle spasms.

jamuan raya ortho

the jamuan raya was held on monday last week. since all our lecturers were involved, we were released early from the ward to do the preparations. it was held at Mr Zam's house. there were loads of delicious and wonderful raya food. my taste buds had a whale of a time.

preparing the food for the raya feast.

the current ortho group (my group) had to do the prior preparations since the other group (now in specialized posting) had classes till 5pm.

me and yana tekun potong bawang free style. mr hafiz komen macam2.
i hope my tears were not wasted and some ppl actually ate the bawang with the satay.

faiezah K, one of my verbal sparring partners

dari tengah hari sampai ke malam my group had to to stay there.
we were told that there would be shifts and the former ortho group continue with the night shift. tetibe, they passed out an order that we were to stay until the end. melepek kitorang kat situ kepenatan.

the good thing about having to stay back is that we could get pictures with the ortho surgeons. but our bodies were way tired, plus i was supposed to prepare for a seminar for the next day. tension gak bile kene tahan tak boleh balik and loitering around.

Week 3 of Orthopaedics

waiting for class

Adlina, Mr Shuk and me. Faizah A, Azamani and Acap balik awaal nak buat seminar.

the orthopaedic surgeons

It’s the 3rd week already. There are lots to do and a lot is expected of us but it’s not too stressful. We have ward work in the mornings and seminars in the evening with oncalls starting from 6pm until 12am once a week plus we have to follow the supervisor’s oncalls plus go to the ward at night just to cover OT patients for the next day or for the student grand rounds. And we have 4 case write ups to submit (the most amount of all the postings).


Until now, I have always gotten supervisors who weren’t really into the supervising thing. We were told that in ortho, the supervisors had to really take care of their students and everyone calls them ‘bapak’ among the students. They remember each of our names so anyone who gets into trouble is known to all the lecturers.


I guess having Mr Shukrimi for my ortho supervisor is a godsend. He’s absolutely cool and funny. I keep laughing during our bedside teachings. Everyone else wants to join us too. He likes to sing classic songs and asks us whether we can identify the lyrics he sang. Me, Ad and Faizah dah tentu tak tau hehe. He keeps nagging us about reading the newspaper and watching the news which I don’t really make the time to do. The only downside to it is that my feet cannot bear the prolonged standing sessions because his classes are really, really long. We have to stand about 2 hours straight. Doktor tak pe lah sebab dia duduk on a chair.


Last week, during our physical examination class with Mr K, he asked every one of us to passively try to bring our thumb to the volar aspect of our forearm. Only 2 persons in my class could do it. Yours truly included. So he asked me to flex and extend my knee whilst everyone observed my patella (knee bone). Normally, the patellar movement is supposed to be in the same alignment as the knee is extended, but mine moved slightly lateral. He explained that I had laxity of the ligaments so my knee joint is not as stable as everyone else. Then he told me to stand. I had no medial arch on standing so it means that I have pes planus (flat feet). [You’re supposed to have 3 foot arches to ensure appropriate weight bearing because of the tremendous pressure on the feet].


Only now do I understand why I could not stand standing very long all this while. I tought it was normal. And mak said it was because I was obese and that I had to reduce my weight. Ces! [baru faham pasal badan sendiri]


I so want to buy comfortable like-walking-on-air shoes to survive through Mr Shuks’ teachings. My current ones hurt my feet on prolonged standing and walking.


Last week I was assigned to the male ward. There is certainly a definite pattern. The younger ones usually came in with fractured limbs due to involvment in motor vehicle accidents while the older ones come with foul-smelling, diabetic foot. One time I clerked a young guy who fractured his leg, he was rather too cooperative until I asked about the social history when he got rather defensive. He was kinda gatal so after that I avoided him. If only I could practice inserting a branula on him… hmm.


Now, I’m in the ortho paediatric ward. There aren’t many cases which is a good thing on one hand but on the other, we don’t really get to learn much. Most of the kids are those who were hit by a motorcycle while crossing the road. Sian derang.


The IIUM orthopaedic department has so mmuch money from a research grant so they organise many courses. Interesting! But some workshops are too advanced for us. In one such case, the whole lot of my batch slept soundly throughout the presentation and then devoured the food provided hungrily hehe.

the collector in me

i'm a collector. i like to collect things. some of them junk. some are quite nice.

it used to be stamps and then coins. now i think i rather like postcards. i just received one from a friend in England. thanx, mate. i already have 2 from Australia and one from new zealand. my friends bought them fro me when they went there. since i have't gotten the chance to travel YET, i guess i'll just have to settle for postcards for the timebeing.

so, if it isn't too troublesome for you, could you please send an interesting postcard my way when you have the time :)