Being practical

Hello! As I write I am sat in the Super8 in Calgary (which I don't recommend one little bit incidentally) revising for my OSCEs - Objective Simulated Clinical Examinations - tomorrow. This is basically a whole day of being shoved into a room with a clinical scenario and having to deal with it, just to prove that you can. Some of them are emergency situations - I'm anticipating shoulder dystocia, post-partum haemorrhage, undiagnosed breech and neonatal resuscitation - and the others are likely to be normal clinical skills, such as an abdominal palpation, suturing or a neonatal examination, and yet others will be discussions on subjects such as vitamin K administration, metabolic screening and circumcision. They use real women where possible/appropriate (I assume shoulder dystocia would be on a model!) so that does help a bit I suppose, but I HATE doing these kind of exams. It's funny, the actual clinic skills I have no problem with and feel confident when I'm in a real situation, but having someone in a room watching, and critiquing, your every move is horrible. My tendency is to try to rush through things and in the process to forget something important, so I'm going to focus on breathing deeply and relaxing wherever possible. I did a practice session yesterday and was relieved to find that I did generally remember things - I was also relieved that everyone else was as nervous, and some were less experienced, than me. Anyway, we get 10 scenarios and have to pass at least 8 of them, 6 of which are mandatory. I can retake individual scenarios if I do fall to pieces ;-)

Wish me luck!