Cafeteria medicine

A little taste of what care can look like in a small hospital:

5:30pm. I am done my work for the day and just need to check in on the patient with ruptured membranes (TPROM) we are trying to induce into labour. I decide to go to the cafeteria first to get dinner. As I wait for my food, behind me in line arrives my pregnant patient. The cafeteria lady looks at her and says "are you allowed to be eating or are you on clear fluids?" The patient looks at me and says "I don't know, can I eat?" I ask her how she is doing, (no contractions yet), and tell the cafeteria lady she is fine to eat dinner.  I sit down and eat with another resident, with my patient sitting a few tables away. 5 minutes later, the nurse looking after the patient comes down to the caf, doptone and gel in hand, and scolds the patient for missing her hourly check in, telling her to come back to the room to have her vitals done and a listen to baby or she is going to check the heart rate right there in the cafeteria.  Nurse and patient leave to go back to the floor, I wave, tell them to call me if anything more happens. Rounding for the day = done. All without leaving the cafeteria.  (The patient had a nice delivery early this morning!)

A cafeteria dinner... sausage and perogies were delicious.
Stewed frozen spinach? not so much.

We are incredibly lucky to have our meals here in Inuvik mostly covered. We have a card to use for 3 meals a day at the cafeteria, all free. And the selection there is not bad. There's always a hot plate and soup to choose from as well as multiple cold sandwiches and salads in the fridge. It's definitely a time saver not to have to cook, (we will be spoiled for our next rotation!) but occasionally it's nice to have a homemade meal for a change. We are set up with a kitchen in our residence room as well and are finding groceries, while definitely more expensive, at least the basics are within a reasonable price range. And seriously, you have to remember we are 200km north of the arctic circle, it's amazing there are vegetables at all here!

This fairly fresh grocery basket came to $64.74.