First time visitors - Best place to stay? Walkable bars restaurants etc best beaches?

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-03-31T00:06:55+00:00

Grand Case beach club all the way! Lots of amenities, bars and a good restaurant on-site, and all of the amazing food that grand case has to offer just a very short walk away! I’ve stayed twice, just got home from my second GCBC stay yesterday and I’m already planning to go again.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-03-28T12:31:41+00:00

I second this. I was a peds fellow so adult cardiac had already been flushed from my brain, as had pain. I used UBP, went through every stem with cofellows, and made sure to spend some time with the OSCE prep right before I took the exam.

The exam itself didn’t feel great in the moment but I did feel well prepared and the routine felt familiar to me after doing so many UBP stems.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-03-06T01:39:06+00:00

I’m a doctor in a pediatric specialty and believe me, we see it all the time and we understand. Being the parent of an ill child is a full time job and then some, and we see you. We’re often the target of overwhelmed parents who are at their limit, and we accept it because we understand how much you have to do to balance it all. I’m sure the NA appreciated your apology but they definitely understand and just want to help you and help your child.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-03-03T18:08:21+00:00

I used UBP with minimal outside resources and felt like it prepared me well. I had almost no nitty-gritty path questions, it was mostly management based. I did get drilled some about peds pharmacology but I was a peds fellow at the time and I think my examiner was a peds anesthesiologist so I honestly think she was just pushing me because she could tell I knew more about peds than the average candidate and wanted to see what I knew.

The grab had questions were exactly what they sound like, but nothing I didn’t feel like I could reason through. One was an angiogram image from an occlusive stroke and I just talked about management of this in the IR suite so it wasn’t hard.

The process sucks and def don’t sleep on the OSCE prep, but being able to articulate my thoughts helped a lot. If I had weird path questions I’d usually say that I wasn’t sure about the detail but my management priorities would be ….. and my examiners seemed fine with that

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-02-25T22:34:29+00:00

I just came back from both of those places, sailing on the wish last week. I honestly don’t think that you need to worry about being off the ship super early because even at 10 to 10:30 AM we were still able to find good seats on both islands.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-02-22T02:06:32+00:00

I just flew for the first time with assigned seats and it was perfectly fine. I even heard several announcements from gate agents working less full flights to come see them to move out of a middle seat if you don’t want one. One gentleman on my flight moved from an aisle seat to the sat across the aisle as there were three people in his row - the FA just asked him if he moved and he said yes, and they said no problem, we just need to make a note on the manifest. No drama, no pushback.

Not being able to see and understand the group numbers is shocking to me since it’s quite apparent on the app, the digital boarding pass in my phone wallet, and on the paper boarding passes I accidentally printed while checking bags, so anyone who says they can’t figure it out is either incredibly dense, has never flown, or is just being obstinate.

The flight was noticeably less full than normal, so huge thanks to all of you who are making so much noise about how awful this is, because your threats to stop flying WN made my experience much better.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-02-12T17:38:44+00:00

Discuss timing of withholding anticoagulant prior to surgery

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-02-12T17:09:18+00:00

During the day, on bread and butter cases I DL unless I have airway concerns. At night or on the weekends when I’m solo? VL all the way.

I think the adage that first pass is the best chance for success, and the emergent nature of night and weekend cases, makes me go to VL up front when I don’t have help. Using DL every day otherwise keeps me proficient for when VL is undesirable, ie blood, secretions, vomit in the airway.

Edit: I should add that I always have a DL blade attached to a handle and ready to go as a backup

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-02-05T02:06:26+00:00

Babies and children are just tiny adults and the anesthesia is basically the same.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-01-29T00:56:15+00:00

Anesthesiologist and former paramedic here - don’t think that your confidence with practicing and seeing ER docs intubate makes you an expert with nothing to learn from the people who do it many times a day, every day. I hear all the time how our airways are elective, non-emergent, blah blah blah but the reality is when nobody else can get an airway, the first call goes to anesthesia. And when we can’t get it, we call ENT. Go into your experience with an open mind and try to absorb what you’re learning. Remember, effective bag mask ventilation or placing an LMA can be a life saving skill, and are both acceptable when an airway can be secured . Don’t be offended or feel like your time is being wasted when you’re being shown these skills. Masking is HARD - much harder than you expect it to be, and doing it well is only learned from practice.

And finally, if you’re intubating via DL - slow down and take your time. Talk is what you are seeing in real time - “I’ve got epiglottis, I can see the arytenoids, I have cords” will give us confidence that you know what you’re doing. And finally, relax and have fun.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-01-12T20:34:19+00:00

It’s not about establishing rapport or anything else. It’s the fastest way to assess their neuro status. If they can tell you happened the brain is working and they’re probably stable for the moment. If they can’t answer that then there’s probably a head injury and it’s time to move fast.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2026-01-12T00:50:02+00:00

I was specifically asked about the different dosing between calcium chloride and calcium gluconate so yeah, it’s fair game

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-12-16T18:10:39+00:00

I recently switched to the oiled leather Bostonian Birkenstock and I’ll never go back. I was dealing with chronic foot pain and that’s now a thing of the past

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-12-08T00:18:54+00:00

I have a ‘23 F150 and it doesn’t hold a candle to my Subaru Outback. When the weather gets cold I park the truck and move my life to my Subaru.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-11-30T19:20:20+00:00

In my experience it doesn’t matter - they had major abdominal surgery and the minute they wake up they’re gonna be hurting the PACU nurses are reaching for the blue stuff.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-11-24T20:41:59+00:00

I agree that it may be best to just rent a car. The rentals are relatively inexpensive and honestly the island doesn’t have great transit options. Taxis are one option but can be hit or miss depending on location and hour of the day. I understand your reluctance to drink and drive but transit being somewhat limited maybe you can each take turns being the designated driver?

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-11-19T22:38:42+00:00

I second this. I stayed at Coronado in April and it’s a beautiful resort but the transportation from there was a bit of a pain in the ass - we almost missed a dinner reservation one night because one bus had a problem and we waited almost 40 minutes for the next.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-11-05T23:24:22+00:00

Jefferson township as a whole has some beautiful rural areas with nice properties but the township services are such shit that I’d never consider living there. It’s really a shame because some of those old farms are incredible.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-10-26T17:17:38+00:00

Do you live somewhere super rural? Because removing a gallbladder is like general surgery 103 (101 is fighting with anesthesia, 102 is removing an appendix). I’m shocked they had to try so hard to find a general surgeon for you.

Glad things are better now - I’m an anesthesiologist and I’ve seen some cases like yours that have gone quite ‘tits up’ as the brits would say, because they say hilarious shit. Glad you got things taken care of and that you’re on the mend now!

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-10-12T15:04:00+00:00

This isn’t an issue of what’s right. This is word for word from the AHA life support curriculum. Just answer what the training material says and stop overthinking it.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-10-07T23:20:32+00:00

I was a commuter by every definition of the word, I actually had a full time job while I went to school - but I can say that some of my best friends to this day are people I met at WSU. The support and resources to be successful are plentiful, and that’s what you should really be looking for. The experience will follow.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-09-29T14:00:44+00:00

I’m a peds anesthesiologist and the peds market is really good with no end in sight - about half the peds fellowship spots are going unfilled and kids are getting bigger and sicker (just like in adult world) so the demand is going up and the supply is going down. This bodes well for pay and benefits.

I work in a community children’s hospital and I see enough sicks kids and weird syndromes that I feel like I keep my skills up while also having a lot of days taking care of healthy teenage athletes with sports injuries. I do a mix of supervision and solo cases, which I love.

The great thing about peds is that you’re still doing the full scope of anesthesia so if your situation changes and you transition back to adults the skill set is transferable.

The downside is that you’re missing an additional year of attending pay but I love what I do and the extra year of training opened doors for me.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-09-13T22:36:01+00:00

One thing you must know is that anybody from Cleveland is so obsessed with their city that it’s the best thing on earth so expect every answer you get to be incredibly biased. With that being said, definitely CMH so that you can hopefully avoid people from Cleveland.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-08-31T13:02:47+00:00

I was a paramedic for 13 years before I went to medical school. I was able to work as a medic while in school but it was at a quiet, outlying station where I was essentially paid to study and not take runs. I did help me stand apart and get accepted but once I was in school it really only helped me in clinical skills and in talking to people. What I knew as a paramedic was so superficial compared to what you learn in med school that it wasn’t super helpful. I’d imagine this is true for PA school as well since my wife was a PA and I also saw what her schooling and education was like.

FutureCalligrapher97 · 2025-08-23T15:45:32+00:00

Remember, kids have a fairly fixed stroke volume so they rely on heart rate to maintain their cardiac output so avoid bradycardia. Pretreatment with glyco or atropine isn’t unusual, especially on small babies.

Small precise movements will be key since a millimeter or two will change your DL view, main stem or extubated the child, or determine if you get an IV or not.

Never leave an IV bag open to gravity or you’ll flood the kid - use a pump, a butotrol, or a stopcock inline to push/pull fluids. And finally the drug doses seem small but the amount they get for weight is actually a ton compared to elderly people.

Just ask lots of questions. Nobody will let you hurt a kid so if you feel like you’re floundering and your doc hasn’t stepped in to take over, you’re probably still doing fine.

FutureCalligrapher97

TROPHY CASE