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Published: November 8th 2015
Flat white
Yummy and pretty!Our first day of work was a very long one. We started early in clinic at one of the big Brisbane hospitals. Their medical training path is a little different from ours. From medical school, they do 2+ years as a "resident", which is basically like an extended transitional internship- 3 months in this, 3 months in that, etc. Then they might work as a GP (general practitioner) in whatever field they are interested in for a couple years while they apply for further training. For example, in the dermatology dept, there was 1 girl who had just finished "residency" and was working in the clinic seeing patients, but still presenting them to the attending (or senior trainees). Their advanced training is called being a registrar, which in dermatology is 3-4 years. After that they can sit exams to become a full-fledged dermatologist. For anyone wondering, in the states we do college then 4 years med school, then 4 years residency (for dermatology). Though in the Navy it was more like their system: med school, 1 year as a resident, then practice medicine as a general practitioner (I was a flight surgeon) while applying to go back to residency.
The
More coffee :)
From our favorite local breakfast spot clinic that we attended that day was a multidisciplinary clinic with plastic surgery, radiation oncology, and dermatology. It's actually a great idea and is something like tumor board but in person. They see more complicated cases that need other specialties to weigh in and hold it every other week. We saw some interesting patients with less common conditions. It was somewhat similar to working in a city hospital in the US. But it was neat to be in their training environment and see the interaction between residents, registrars, and the attending dermatologist who was Jim. It's all so weird how they call everyone by their first names no matter how senior they are.
After clinic we had a short break to grab food (and explore the New Farm neighborhood which is like Georgetown) then back for academics. The whole area of Brisbane is broken down into neighborhoods. We live in Spring Hill which is a business area, kind of like the financial district in New York City. Nearby is New Farm which is like Georgetown in DC (but apparently gay, which is probably why it was awesome haha). Jim works in Carina Heights which is more of a suburb.
Omg yum.
My favorite meal in this country. I don't know what the greens on top are (we were trying to figure it out). They do some great poached eggs here! Not sure if it's Australia or that restaurant that's really big on them (I ordered the extra egg and that's how they brought it without even asking!) Snaking through the center of Brisbane is a very serpentine river on which they have water taxis for public transportation. It's very pretty actually! The city of Brisbane itself is more known for business- we've had a few people asking why we would be in Brisbane for a month if visiting Australia haha.
Their academics seem to be centred around one night a week where they spend 4 hours from 5 to 9 pm on whatever their topic is that week. They do bring in dinner from a local restaurant, so that was a plus. The session we sat in on was run by a Mohs surgeon who had a very pedantic teaching style. It was somewhat painful to watch, though we learned a lot about how to design closures and now want to buy their textbook because it is very succinct and well written. This is probably because general dermatologists typically do much more complex closures then we do in the states. While we refer most of our skin cancers in sensitive areas to Mohs surgeons, who are dermatologists with an extra year of training specifically for that kind of surgery, here there so many skin cancers that
Omg yum again.
Rachel and I halfsied on breakfast. Such a good idea! they would not keep up if they did that. Here, they only refer the very large and complex cases to Mohs, and all the rest are cut out by general dermatologists or, more commonly, plastic surgeons. There does seem to be a lot of animosity between Mohs surgeons and plastic surgeons here. Much more than in the US (where there really isn't any).
So that was a very long day (13+ hours). The next day we started with breakfast again at the nearby awesome cafe. Omg. Again. Amazing breakfast, complete with a "flat white". They don't seem to have drip coffee here- it's either instant or espresso. No in between. The flat white is espresso with milk. So good, and I love the designs on the top! Although I must say the instant coffee we bought for the apt is actually pretty good and growing on me! I might drink it when I get home too 😊
After that, we went to Jim's practice in Carina Heights called Southeast Dermatology. It's a very nice clinic! They have a few specialties there, but the whole back area is derm (the whole building is the Belmont Specialty Center or something
Nice plate
Haha seen while eating breakfast like that). His practice is almost exclusively skin cancer because he's been there so long. If you have enough of these types of patients, it would be easy for your whole practice to be repeat skin exams. I have seriously never seen so much sun damage. It's like working in Florida if all of your patients are Irish and grew up before sunscreen and spent all their time outdoors sailing. No joke, that's like all of his patients. I'm really impressed watching his skin checks though- very thorough and pretty quick. He uses a lot of dermoscopy, which is one of the reasons we're here. It's a relatively new tool in dermatology but the US has been extremely slow to embrace it. For some unknown reason (pride?) people are actually resisting using it at home. Here their family practitioners are using it. Makes us look shameful. Rachel and I are some of the only ones at home using it, making it somewhat self taught.
His clinic is pretty efficient and it was neat to see his interaction with patients. We did a half day with him then headed over to his plastic surgeon friend's office to observe there (who
Aussie military!
Saw this guy walk in but didn't get a pic from the front. Holy hat. Haha also is the head of surgery at the big hospital here, no big deal). He was super calm, collected, and really a pleasure to work with! He was in the same class as Jim at med school way back when. Did I mention how Jim knows everyone? It was his skin cancer day at the day surgery center, so we watched him excise a lot of skin cancers! Mainly ellipses with primary closures, but we learned some things. Very cool to have such a broad range of experiences here!
After clinic, we headed back to the New Farm area only to find the little shops closed around 530. Boo. We sat with a glass of wine- at least the restaurants stay open 😊
The next day was the same- Jim's office in Carina Heights. We did a half day then went to the South Bank area and walked around a little. This neighborhood is on the water and supposed to be a good spot to watch the travelers walk around (according to someone else's blog). We had a great lunch/dinner (half day ended at 2) and watched an ibis, crow, and pigeon clean up the table behind us.
Cavalry
Their cavalry hat! Wow. Modern day cavalry- no horses. Light armored vehicles now. From there we went to a travel agent recommended by Jim's wife, who was right up the street! So glad we have a car. This would've been tough without one (not to get to the travel agent, but just getting around and doing everything. Uber would've been so much more expensive, I think...) Everywhere you go you have to pay to park. This city is known for it I guess haha. The upside is that they have a very easy electronic way- I just send a text with the amount of time, the zone (on the sign) and license plate. Done. If we leave early it credits us. Did I mention how nice it is to have a local phone number? Unlimited Australian texts! For $10! I still can't believe it. Another bonus for the parking situation is that I can use my Amex, which is not accepted in too many places (no foreign transaction fee! One of my cards is 3%! Glad I brought my USAA MasterCard as a backup- only 1% and I'm trying to see if they'll waive it for SCRA benefit since we're on orders 😊
Aphrodite, the travel agent (which is a weird
Ibis rocking lunch
This guy ate a full meal of French fries, shrimp (aka prawns here) and a burger (which he mostly knocked on the floor for the pigeon) name here too), had a nice suggestion of where to fly to see the reef. That was mainly what we took from our meeting. But that'll be in a future post 😊 After that it was still somewhat early so we went to the mall. Their big indoor malls here are Westfields! Same company as the ones in the DC area. We found a very cute shop called Typo, but then again found out that the shops, even the mall!!, closed early at 6. On a Friday. Really?! I don't understand...
The rest of our evening was spent at Woolworth's, the bottle shop (looking for this awesome Australian pinot noir sparkling chardonnay, that they didn't have), and the pharmacy. No dramamine here, but the generic is available. I usually have non-drowsy dramamine just in case, but the pharmacist here had never even heard of the active ingredient, meclizine! Instead I got dramamine that's made with caffeine. Haha, that's creative.
The next morning, Saturday, we were heading to the Gold Coast for the weekend. Jim's hospital was having a conference for GPs, where they basically teach them didactic and hands on skin cancer stuff, in addition to other specialties.
Aussie mailbox
So interesting the small differences. I have to remember to look down at the storm drain covers, as pointed out by a past travel husband :) Very cool that we could tag along! We are so lucky that Jim is the point of contact here. This month would've been so different... But hey, we're in Australia! For a month! Anything is good 😊
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Marie
non-member comment
Love it!
So glad you've taken us on your trip, I'm looking forward to your next entry. Have fun. Love you, Marie