The Australian Orientation--week 1

You'd think that this orientation would begin upon my arrival to the Aussie land, but no--It begins in L.A. This is where I missed my international flight and was forced to spend a day at the beach. I did take my notes, but then I remembered that we were told to study in a quiet and test-like environment...clearly, this was no place to study.




The Flight

Once on the plane, I was delighted to watch take off and the landing on my own personal entertainment screen. Besides watching the plane, I was able to select whatever movie I wanted to watch out of a list of like 200, watch TV shows or live concerts, or play video games. It was very cool. Fly Qantas kids.






The Coffee

In Australia all coffee is espresso. Starbucks in Australia is not highly regarded as locals opt for diners and specialty shops to get the good stuff. I drink a flat white which is pretty similar to a latte. YUM! There are several other styles I need to try though (long black, etc).

The Physiotherapy in Acute Care

The private hospital where I am working is a surgical hospital where all surgeries are elective. Physiotherapists play a huge role in patient care. Each patient undergoes a pre-operative evaluation by the therapist that includes examination of lung function, loads of education about lines and tubes and interventions, subjective questionnaire administration, and even a tour of the ICU. The therapists at the hospital understand every component of care and are involved in it all. There are no occupation or speech or respiratory therapists at the hospital so the PTs do the spirometry testing, stimulate coughs and use suction, and even teach UPPER EXTREMITY EXERCISES! I auscultate every patient and teach deep breathing exercises. (Where is Dr. Darbee when you need her???!)

Hence, PT is never boring and the PT's are very well respected by the surgeons. All examination procedures are standardized and kept in a computerized database. However documentation is less detailed --they laughed at me when I would write why I performed sit to stand transfers or strengthening exercises with a pt. They said that readers "should be able to put 2 and 2 together."

All these new areas have been a little overwhelming to piece together. I am learning heaps thanks to my CI Andrew and another student there named Meredith.

Social life so far

Meredith and her husband, Trav, took me to dinner and taught me to do the "tim tam slam." A tim tam is a very common chocolate covered rectagular cookie. To complete the slam, you bite of both edges of the cookie, use the cookie as a straw to drink tea, and let the tea melt the cookie from the inside out. It is gooey and wonderful madness.




Meredith and I have bonded over our love for chocolate and plan to do many other chocolate related things while I am in Sydney.

I live with to other international students. Asli is from Turkey and makes wonderful Turkish food. Judith is from Austria and distracts me from studying when I don't want to study. They are great!




Fun words to use often in Australia:
Heaps=lots
food can be described as "beautiful" (to taste)
no worries=way over used expression to say "its all good" or "your welcome"
cheers=typical salutation
ring= phone call (give me a ring. i rang yesterday but there was no answer)
Aussie, aussie, aussie is followed by Oye, Oye, Oye! at sporting matches and is a lot of fun.