Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Second week into my first TDY stint.

What is TDY?

It is "Temporary Duty Assignment." Yes, "Y" stands for "A." Okay, I made that one up.

I'm doing some optometry coverage in a town called Schweinfurt. I think means "pig fart" auf Deutsch. That's just my guess, so don't quote me.

The town is industrial and a business center, well off the beaten tourist path. It's interesting to be in a town again. When I first drove up, it seemed so big that I felt a touch of anxiety. Have I become a country girl again? Perhaps.

The reason I'm here is that one of our regular optometrists in Bavaria (from Katterbach) was deployed, thus creating a hole in the optometry coverage, which needs to be filled by juggling people around a bit. The regular optometrist here (Major Eddis) is going to Katterbach a couple
days a week. So I'm here in a hotel helping the locals.

I think anyway.

This morning, I racked up 12 patients in about 4 hours and this afternoon, another 8. I have to thank Kaiser for the speed of my skills and the ability to create meaningful social interactions with just ten minutes of patient contact time. Not a small feat.

In the menagerie of patients this morning, I also managed to lock up my ID card, which is how I am allowed to log into the computer and chart. I had the pleasure of driving to the other post here over lunch to plant my right index fingerprint on a reader and reset my pin, so that I would
not have a zillion charts to fix tomorrow.

The day is nearing the end. The sky is darking... My shoulder is paining. It is time to go.

Until tomorrow,
your trusty army optometrist,
Sara

2 comments:

geekdave said...

how come the army always issue those thick framed B.C. glasses? Or do they issue styling ones these days?

Sara said...

Ya, course they still have the BCG's -- how else would they keep unplanned pregnancies under control? Plus everyone needs halloween glasses, right?