Orientation to Medicine and Subspecialty Rotations at LBJGH

(Revised January 7, 2008)

 

 

Signing In

 

Call room key:  Next, go to the Physician Services Administration office, located across from the Pediatric EC to obtain provider number if you don’t already have one and a call room key ($15.00 deposit).

 

ID Badge:  Then go to the HCHD Security Office at the Kelley Street Entrance to get an ID Badge if you don’t already have one.

 

Parking Sticker:  Parking is free at LBJ, but you must have a parking decal.  Obtain your parking decal in the HCHD Security Office.  The first decal is free.  If you lose it, a 2nd decal will be supplied at no cost.  However, if you loose it again, there is a $15 replacement fee for the 3rd decal.

 

Internal Medicine Office

The Internal Medicine office is located on the 4th floor, west hall, near ward 4B.  The main phone number is (713) 566-4550.  Fax number is (713) 566-5025.  Kimberley Concepcion is the Residency Training Coordinator.  Drs. Patel, Smythe, Gardiner, Bhattacharjee, Fred, Cid, and Mehta have offices here.

 

There is a copier, which the residents may use. (use your assigned UT copy code).  There is a computer with internet access for your use.  Attending mailboxes are here.  Resident mailboxes are here.

 

The ACS Office is also in the Medicine office. The number is (713) 566-6199.  You should contact the administrative ACS at this number for issues relating to LBJ rotations during business hours.  Contact the Float ACS if you are sick or have an emergency and cannot report for work. Float ACS pager # 22001.  The float ACS pager is also on AMION under Ward Attendings.

 

Conferences

Attendance is REQUIRED by all residents, interns, and students assigned to LBJ.  You are responsible for signing in before conference begins.  Please consult your schedule on a daily basis as to where conferences are held.  The location CHANGES DAILY. The MICU house-staff are required to attend all of the educational conferences provided at LBJ, during the noon hour.  They are excused on post call days, days off, and are not required to attend morning report.

 

Dr. Orlander has requested that he be notified if any individual’s attendance is low. IF YOU HAVE LESS THAN 70% ATTENDANCE FOR THE MONTH, YOU WILL BE ASSIGNED AN EIGHT HOUR EMERGENCY ROOM SHIFT (likely on a Saturday afternoon during the next consult, or non-call month), YOU WILL BE REQUIRED TO MEET PERSONALLY WITH DR. ORLANDER, AND A LETTER WILL BE PLACED IN YOUR FILE.    Please be on time and turn you pagers and cell phones to silent during conferences.

 

If you have greater than 90% attendance, a letter of commendation will be placed in your file and you may be eligible for a book give away, if books become available to the Chief’s Office. 

 

You must sign the roster to get credit for attendance.  You must sign in no later than 8am for MR or 12pm for Noon Conferences.  Being one minute late will result in no credit.  Dr. Orlander has mandated all residents be released at 11:45, so that they can be on time for conference.   This includes Ambulatory clinic Residents and Interns.   If you have morning continuity clinic, go to morning report, sign in, see the first case, and leave at 8:30.   You are excused from noon conference if you have morning continuity clinic on that day; however, if you finish early and come to noon conference on time, you will earn an extra credit.  Furthermore, you are excused from both MR and NC if you must travel to another hospital to conduct an AM continuity clinic.  You are also excused from noon conference if you must travel to another hospital to conduct a PM continuity clinic.  Unfortunately, the LBJ office of the Chief of Service insists that we are not allowed to eat or drink in the Annex Auditorium.

 

We will have daily morning reports for all residents, interns, and students.  All morning reports, with the exception of Dr. Fred’s morning report, will include two cases presented by the on-call interns.  The presenting intern should bring relevant chest x-ray images to morning report.  It is important to be on time, such that two cases can be discussed adequately.  Please participate and contribute to the discussion.  The presenting intern will also be asked to bring follow-up or additional information to add to the case discussion.

 

OBTAINING RADIOGRAPHIC IMAGES FOR CONFERENCES: 

The hospital no longer prints copies of X-Rays as all the current imaging studies are now available online via the PACS system.  Every computer on the wards is equipped with the ability to pull up the image on the screen as well as the PowerPoint program.

  1. Open PowerPoint (usually under the Start menu) and open a new slide presentation
  2. pull up the radiographic image you desire to copy from the Epic system.
  3. Right-click “copy”
  4. “paste” onto the PowerPoint slide (one image per slide views best)
  5. When you are finished copying the images into the file – click “Save As” and title your file as you wish and save it to a memory stick or CD.

If you do not have a memory stick to plug into the USB connection, ask one of the chiefs, and they may loan you one for the conference.

 

Dr. Mehta’s morning report on Tuesdays (8:45am – 9:45am) is for interns only, or students only on Fridays at 1pm.  One intern needs to prepare a case you would like to discuss with Dr. Mehta.  The patient must be present in the hospital because you will examine the patient together as a group.  You will meet in 3C at 8:45 AM, or 1:00 PM for the students. Usually the on-call team presents unless the team on call happens to be Dr. Mehta’s team.  In that case, the pre-call team should prepare a case. This should be discussed ahead of time to give the intern or student time to prepare the case.  Please have the radiographic images pulled up on computer and all pertinent records available (e.g. old EKGs, laboratory information, etc.) Post call interns do not attend these rounds. 

 

Med-Radiology will be held every month.  Every resident is responsible for submitting to Dr. Fred for approval.  Once approved by Dr Fred, the resident will communicate the cases to the administrative chief with the final diagnosis and finding that would be beneficial for learning. These must be submitted at least one week prior to the conference.  The resident is required to be at the conference to give a history and answer any questions.  A maximum of 8 cases will be discussed.  Dr. Fred will assign the resident a learning topic and the resident will give a 2 minute oral presentation on that day.  If the resident has continuity clinic in the afternoon that day, they will present first.  Another alternative would be to move the clinic day for that week—with permission the clinic coordinator, at least two weeks in advance. Dr. Fred will facilitate discussion along with Dr. Guthrie.  See document posted on the Chief’s corner under Dr. Fred Morning Report. 

 

Med-Pathology Same rules as above, but with a maximum of 4 cases.  Dr. Fred will also help facilitate this conference. 

 

FOR UPPER LEVEL WARD RESIDENTS:

You will be expected to be prompt, well prepared, and eager to learn. Enthusiastic participation is encouraged for all residents.  Residents will also be expected to provide follow-up on patients presented at morning report.  Dr. Fred will evaluate each resident at the end of the month, and this evaluation will be included in the final monthly evaluation to go in each resident’s permanent file.

 

Dr. Fred Morning Report (8am): on Monday and Tuesday mornings for ward residents only.  Post-call residents will present.  Please see the attached schedule for the room reservation.  DO NOT BE LATE.  Residents are expected to read and familiarize themselves with Fred packets prior to their first Fred MR. Copies of the 3 articles that are required reading are available online at the “Resident Information Page” in the section “Chiefs Corner,” as well as in the Internal Medicine office at LBJ.  The articles are entitled:  “Morning Report Card,” “Tenets for Physicians in the New Millennium,” and “These are the Days.”  If your continuity clinic (LBJ) is on a morning when we have Dr. Fred morning report, notify your clinic a month in advance to schedule your first patient at 9:30am so that you can attend Dr Fred’s morning report.  If you have clinic at Hermann Hospital , you will be excused from that morning report so that you will have adequate travel time.  Your cooperation is greatly appreciated. Please check the schedule for conference locations as the location can change.  Let one of the ACS’s know when your day off or clinic day is ahead of time.

 

 

 

Dr.  Herbert L. Fred Rounds (See Schedule)

-Be prepared at 1:30 P.M. on Wednesdays and Thursdays (for whichever time your team is allotted).

-Only the resident presents, unless pre-arranged with Dr. Fred.

-All team members should help in preparing the cases. All residents, interns, and students directly involved in the care of the patient presented are required to    attend – you cannot have your day off on this day.

- **Residents are required to have one case each, ready to present. Dr Fred will choose which case he will discuss and willl likely discuss both cases. If only one    resident is present, then he or she need not prepare two cases. However, every resident should have a back-up case ready, in the event the patient that they    intend to present dies, leaves AMA, gets discharged without the resident knowing, etc.... .

 

-Case presentation: Use “The Card” as a starting point.

-Consult the conference calendar for the official location.

ALL RECORDS from ALL past admissions from whatever hospital (call long distance, if needed, through the page operator) should be obtained and prepared for review. 

-All x-rays/imaging must be available.

-Chest x-rays on the computer screen.

-You may try to “stump” Dr. Fred if you wish.

-Patient preparation: Pupils dilated, please.  You may use neosynephrine or Midriacyl ophthalmic drops.

-Bring functioning and fully charged ophthalmoscope, please!

-Patient in one gown only, open to the back.

-Bed elevated to its highest level (this is done when you enter the room to examine the patient).

-Please explain to the patients that Dr. Fred will be coming to examine them.

-Make sure the patients will be in their room, and not sent for a diagnostic study or procedure.

-At least 3 articles on the particular subject/diagnosis are mandatory and should be in the conference room.

-Don’t hesitate to take notes, as he will ask what you have learned from the meeting. 

-Ask questions!

 

Dr. Fred Physical Diagnosis Rounds

Ward team residents need to choose 3 patients between them with physical exam findings. 4-5 residents should attend. As long as there are at least 4 residents, the postcall team does not have to attend. Have enough pairs of large gloves available for Dr. Fred. Prepare the patient for his arrival. If the patient has cardiac findings, make sure all leads are off, the EKG is bedside, and the CXR can be readily pulled up. Use three drops of dilating per eye if you plan for him to do a fundoscopic exam.

 

The 3 cases should be determined the day before. If there are “no cases”, the postcall team should be prepared to present at the classic postcall morning report as described above.

 

General Internal Medicine Service

There is an on-call pager (713)687-0124 which must be passed between teams.  This is how the ER will contact you.  You must have the call pager and have received checkout from the ER by 6:45 am on your call day.  If you are carrying the admit pager, take down the patient's information, and then find the appropriate resident to take the admission, even if you are capped. You must then give the check-out to the resident who is actually taking admissions (be that the next day on call team or the float) and hand them the pager. The resident to which you transfer the patient's care can always call the EC for more information, if needed. The admitting physician should not have to page 2-3 different people to hand off an admission to the Internal Medicine service.

 

Once a patient is admitted to you, the RESIDENT should write cover orders within 30 minutes, at which time the team sticker should be placed on these orders. The team should make sure the team sticker is on the front of the chart once the patient arrives to the floor.

 

It is your responsibility to call & cancel your continuity clinic on days your team will be post-call.  This should be done as far in advance as possible so patients can be re-scheduled. (at least 1 month ahead of time)

 

Call is every 4 days.  Call team takes admissions from 6:45am-2:00am.  Each resident has a cap of 10 new patients.  Each intern has a cap of 5 new patients.  New patients include all MICU transfers, admits, and “bounce-backs”.  Admissions after 2AM or after the team caps will seen by the float resident.  Please call the float resident yourself with the info from the ER– do not expect the EC physician to figure out who to call.

 

Bouncebacks - Patients who are under the care of a General Medicine team from the 3rd of the month until the 2nd of the following month and require readmission to a medicine service during that time, will be readmitted to that same General Medicine team that originally discharged the patient. If the Readmission occurs when that team is post call, then the On Call Medicine team will take the admission and pass it back to the primary care team the next day. If the primary team is not post call, then they will take the readmission that day up until 4pm on weekdays and noon on weekends. However, if the upper level resident is off or otherwise unavailable on the day of readmission, then the Attending physician of the primary team will decide who takes the patient for that day.

 

Team structure is as follows.  Teams are A,B,C,D.  Each lettered team is made up by 2 subteams composed of 1resident/2intern pairs.  On each call day, the cap is 20 total patients. 

 

Upper level residents are to be in the hospital by 6:45am to see and examine every patient on the team each day prior to attending rounds (this means that interns and students will likely need to be here even earlier).  There needs to be a note by the upper level resident for each admission.  If there is an intern note on a patient, this may be a brief addendum stated that you have seen & examined the patient with emphasis on assessment & plan. This includes MICU admissions. Again, this may be a brief note focusing on assessment & plan if an intern note is on the chart. 

 

The MICU team is allowed to transfer patients out of the unit 24 hours a day.  If you get a transfer before 2am, the patient is yours.  After 2am, the all transfers will be managed by the float resident.

 

If IR is doing an outpatient procedure ordered by a medicine service or clinic, and the patient has any medical issues after the procedure, it is the responsibility of the IR attending to determine if the patient should be admitted, since they are responsible for the patient. If the IR attending decides to admit the patient, the Admit team takes the patient (unless they are capped ; then it’s the float resident). If the IR attending is not in-house, the IR resident should make the decision to admit. If neither the IR attending or resident is available, the resident should go assess the patient, admit the patient, or contact the on-call medicine attending if the resident is unsure.

 

If you are post call on your continuity clinic day, you will need to call your clinic coordinator and have your clinic rescheduled within the same week.  The coordinators will need at least 3 weeks notice. 

 

Every house officer is required to take an average of one day off in seven, or four days per month. Upper-level residents must not take a day off on the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd of the month. The staggered switch of interns and residents on the 1st and 3rd, respectively, is designed to provide continuity of care for the patients. This continuity is interrupted by the resident taking off on the 1st or 2nd. furthermore, days off should be coordinated such that there is at least one upper-level resident in the hospital on any given day.

 

­Chart Stickers

 

Each Ward team will be assigned a set of chart stickers, displaying the team name, team members, pagers, and post call cover.  You are REQUIRED to put a sticker on the outside, upper-right hand corner of every chart.  Also, put a smaller sticker on the admission orders.  The stickers will be provided by the Internal Medicine office.

   

 

FLOAT RESIDENT

Monday through FridayAfter 4 pm, the Float Resident will be responsible for taking medicine admissions after the team caps, emergent cardiology consults, geriatrics consults, renal consults,  and renal admissions.

Saturday and Sunday: After noon, the float resident will be responsible for taking medicine admissions after the team caps, emergent cardiology consults, geriatrics consults, renal consults,  and renal admissions.

Every night: From 2am to 7am, the Float Resident will take Medicine admissions and Medicine consults, and hand them off to the appropriate team by 7am.

Medicine consults Monday through Thursday: After 4pm, Float Resident will see medicine consults and will hand off the patient to the Medicine Consult Team at 7am the next morning.

Medicine consults Friday after 1 pm until Sunday at noon: Medicine consults will be seen by the on-call team (the float resident would only take medicine consults from 2am to 7am, or if the team caps). The on-call team will be responsible for the patient over the weekend, and hand them off to the Medicine consult resident Monday morning.

The Float Resident will also provide help to the float intern.  The float will be limited to a total of 10 patients. After the float has 10 patients, any other patients to be admitted from the ER will need to remain in the ER until 6:45am (even if there are open beds).  

Students

Students will be assigned to each ward team.  You are expected to educate them.  They will evaluate you at the end of each month.

 -no more than 3 new admissions per student per night

-no more than 5 active patients per student

-Their month ends on Saturday, not the last Friday of the month.

-They are excused from all duties Thursday prior to their exam and have no call on the Wednesday before the exam

-They must have on average 1 day off per week on the weekend.

- MS 4’s doing acting internships on a team should follow patients with the upper level resident, not the intern.  Every day the upper level resident must write a full note on all the AI’s patients.

-Due to a shortage of call rooms, only two of the four students on call will stay in house overnight.  The others will go home at around 7pm, or sundown, and return the next morning to pre-round on their new patients prior to attending rounds.  They rotate this way for the month.

 

General Medicine Consults

All general medicine consults will be done by the pulmonary resident from 7am to 4pm Monday through Thursday. The pulmonary resident will take consults on Fridays from 7am to 1pm.

After 4pm on Monday through Thursday, the Float Resident will see Medicine consults and hand off the patient to the Medicine Consult Service at 7am the following day. After 1pm on Friday until noon on Sunday, the Medicine team on-call will see Medicine consults, continue to follow the patient through the weekend, and hand off the patient to the Medicine Consult Service Monday at 7 am.

Consults do not contribute to the 12 bed cap. Residents must see the patient whether or not it is an “emergency.” Please notify the requesting service of any recommendations. All medicine consults must be staffed by an attending within 24 hours. During the week, the Medicine Consult attending will be responsible.  During the weekends, the on-call medicine attending is responsible for staffing all new medicine consults, as described above and in the Float Resident Section.

Patients with primary orthopedic problems and uncomplicated medicine problems get admitted to orthopedics with a medicine consult.  These patients are checked out to the medicine float intern at 4pm. If these patients either become complicated or have more serious acute issues arise, the float resident will be called to re-consult on the patient (this will count as an overnight consult).   These patients need to then be signed out to the appropriate resident in the morning.  The team on-call on Saturday will cover these ortho patients over the weekend. A progress note is required on both Saturday and Sunday, and the medicine attending is required to write a note on one of the two weekend days.

**If someone calls you with a consult, regardless if you are the correct person to see it, you must take the information and give it to the correct resident.  You will be responsible for either seeing the patient or finding the appropriate resident to see the patient.  Do not make other services page many different people looking for the correct resident.  If in doubt, take the patient and then page the chief to see who is responsible.  

 

CCU/Cards consults

CCU/Cards residents do not take call.  The team is composed of an attending, fellow, and at least 2 residents.  They sign out their CCU patients to the MICU resident on call. 

 

MICU

Team consists of an attending, fellow, at least 3 residents, and at least 3 interns.  Call will be either q4 or q3 depending on the number of residents and interns.  They must have ONLY 4 days off in a given month, regardless of the number of interns/residents.  Rounds usually start at 8am.  Post-call team leaves by 1PM .  Short call team stays until the non-admission work is done for the day.  Short call residents and interns on the weekends do not come in.  It is your responsibility to contact your continuity clinic and cancel your clinics during your unit month.

 

MICU Transfers should be called through the medicine on-call pager only, not through individual resident pagers.

 

 

Float Intern

The Float Intern provides cross coverage for the general internal medicine, inpatient nephrology, inpatient geriatrics, and inpatient hepatology team. Each day, a member of all internal medicine inpatient teams, including the post-call cover resident on weekdays, will provide both a written and verbal checkout of their respective patients. Checkouts that are given over the phone or by simply pushing a checkout sheet under the door to the Float’s call room is unacceptable and will not be tolerated

The medicine consult resident will be checking out the orthopedic patients he or she is following to the float intern.  These patients should have uncomplicated medicine problems i.e. HTN, DM.  On Fridays, keep the checkout from the Medicine Consult Resident so these patients can be followed over the weekend if need be.  The on-call residents will take medicine consults over the weekend and check out to the float intern if necessary.  Please see any of these patients if an acute issue arises.  If these patients become more complicated they need to be either transferred to the medicine service or reevaluated by the on-call medicine resident or float resident (they can count it as a consult).  

 Each weekday shift starts at 4pm and ends at 7am. Weekend and holiday shifts start at noon and end at 7am. The official UT holidays are in the Hermann online orientation packet. You have a co-intern, and you should come up with a schedule you are happy with, as long as all the shifts are covered. Please email your planned schedule in advance so the chiefs can fax it to the pager operators. Let the chiefs know if you are leaving town during the month.

 

You are required to do all 4 continuity clinics this month. If you need to, you can contact your clinic coordinator to reschedule some of your clinic days but they must all be in 4 separate weeks (for example, you can’t have 2 clinics in the same week).

 

HOW TO TRANSFER A PATIENT TO THE MICU

  1. Call the MICU team on call and inform them that you need to transfer a patient to the MICU and give them check out.  Once they officially accept the patient, they will inform the MICU Charge Nurse that they need to prepare a bed for your patient.
  2. Inform the Charge Nurse on your floor that the patient needs to go to the MICU.  He / she will arrange for a bed in the MICU and tell you once the bed has been obtained.
  3. Write Transfer Orders and a Transfer Note while waiting for the bed.
  4. Accompany the patient to the MICU if you have time and follow up with the MICU team later regarding the patient’s status.
  5. Inform the Primary Team that their patient went to the MICU the next morning.

 

Additional Tips

You have backup!

  1. The LBJ MICU Resident is your first backup. The on-call UT General Medicine Attending is your official back up attending. You may also utilize the Float Resident if they are in-house.
  2. Don’t forget that the Float Chief Resident pager is 22001 and can also be paged through amion.com under “Ward Attending”.
  3. You are welcome to call the team if you need help with management, especially if they have instructed you to page them with questions or if it’s early in the evening. However, keep this to a minimum so as to give them a break (remember what’s it’s like when you are on wards!)
  • Get here on time – There will be lots of people watching the clock and waiting on you in the 3C resident lounge.
  • Sign all your verbal orders before you leave the hospital.
  • If a patient dies, you need to call the team, and write a death note (instruction are in the LBJ orientation packet) and fill out paperwork the nurses give you. The team can dictate the death summary the next day. You should also call if a patient unexpectedly deteriorates and needs to be transferred to the unit.
  • Figure out the cafeteria hours so you don’t get stuck without food! Don’t forget your meal cards. If you tell the chiefs what day you are on, we can bring them to you at the beginning of the rotation.
  • It may cut down on your pages if you make rounds on all the units to see if there is anything you can do before you go take a nap (so that the nurses will leave you alone for a bit).
  • Don’t settle for bad checkout! Housestaff are to checkout in person, no exceptions. We need to know if there are any repeat offenders that are giving back checkout!
  • If you implement a new management plan for a patient (other than the usual Ambien, Tylenol, etc,) write a short note so the team knows what you are thinking.  If you are called to evaluate an unstable patient, write a note.  Go see patients with new fever, pain, chest pain, shortness of breath, or hypotension and write a short note. Page the team the next morning for any significant events.  When in doubt, go see the patient and write a note.  If a patient is unstable, notify the ICU resident early on. If you cannot quickly stabilize the patient, initiate transfer to the ICU under the supervision of your backup resident.
  • Don’t give patients big boluses of insulin when the nurses call you at 9pm with a high blood sugar!
  • Watch out for renal and hepatic function when writing meds!  
  • Get an idea what the team wants you to do if an event happens. For example, if a patient is here for an infection, what do they want you to do if they spike a fever?
  • If the team wants you to follow up on labs (i.e. q 8 H/H’s) ask what time they expect the next lab to be done (and what they want you to do if they Hgb drops! – if the answer is transfuse – make sure they have consented their patient).
  • Ask the team to write as many “prn” orders as is appropriate.
  • Politely defer family discussions until the primary team is available the next day.
  • Good resources: The Washington Manual Internship Survival Guide, Survival Guide for Interns by Hammond, the UCSF Hospitalist (http://medicine.ucsf.edu/housestaff/handbook/index.html).
  • If something fishy is going on, like a nurse can’t figure out what team a patient belongs to, and they’ve been calling around, go to the chart and help her figure it out. There have been lots of patients sent to the floor without a doctor. You can help avoid having a patient on the floor several days without ever being seen by a doctor – it happens!
  • Remember to coordinate your clinic days this month with the clinic coordinators at LBJ or Hermann, and adjust your float schedule accordingly.  
  • Keep the chiefs in the loop for any issues we can help you with, or instructions we need to clarify, so we can resolve it quickly.
  • The official code team is made up of the ICU resident and intern. If you are called that a patient you are covering is coding, assist the code team by calling the primary team and the family of the patient. Ask the code team resident if there is anything else you can do to help out.
  •  Enjoy your 14 days off!

 

 



Renal Team

The renal team consists of at least one fellow, one resident, and at least two interns.  They will take consults and admit the following patients: 

1) ESRD patients being admitted for HD only, with the approval of the Renal fellow. Any other medical issues such as pneumonia, line sepsis, osteo etc would make it a medicine admission.

2) All patients admitted directly from  renal clinic

3) All patients admitted only for renal biopsies.

3) Any other patient with primary renal issues that the Renal fellow wants to admit to their service (for example, acute renal failure).

The ER needs to call the renal fellow for all admissions so that patients can be appropriately triaged. If the float resident or admit resident is called before the renal fellow, then he/she should contact the renal fellow to decide which service the patient will go to. The Renal fellow makes the ultimate decision as to which service a patient is triaged to. They may occasionally admit a patient after 5 pm during the week and after noon on the weekends, at which time the Float resident must come in to see the patient.

 

Hematology and Oncology Team

The Heme/Onc team consists of one intern, one resident, and one MD Anderson oncology fellow.  They will share the service and take either type of consult.  Rounds will be conducted by separate attending for Heme and Onc, but rounds will be coordinated by the fellow to allow time to see old patients and new consults.  There will be Oncology clinic two times a week and Heme clinic once a week. Details will be explained in the MDACC orientation.  Attendance will be subject to consult service requirements.  Both house staff will be required to attend orientation at MDACC, to get computer access and badges for overnight call responsibilities.  Overnight cross cover call will be held q 5 at MDACC, again details will be given at the orientation.  However, you will not be expected to drive back to LBJ post call for clinic or to round on patients.  You will leave from MDACC and go home. 

 

ER

Dr. Phong Nguyen is in charge of the ER rotation. If you have any special schedule requests (such as a wedding, longstanding doctor’s appointment, etc.), he must be informed via email at least 6 weeks before the start of the rotation. Email him at Phong.H.Nguyen@uth.tmc.edu. Internal Medicine conference attendance during ER is not required. However, you are to attend ER didactic lectures every Wednesday from 7 am until noon in MSB 3.001. Report back to LBJ by 1 pm. You are not required to go to the didactic lectures if it is your day off or you worked the night before.

 

The upper level Internal Medicine resident will see the Shock Room patients. However, if interns are interested and have time, they are welcome to go as well.

 

When giving checkout, give the kind of checkout you would want to receive if you were admitting. This means have the chart in front of you, know pertinent labs, patient location, and indication for the admission. After giving report, protect yourself and the patient by documenting WHO accepted the patient and the TIME it was accepted. Emergent and urgent procedures should be done in the ER; this month is a great time for you to fill your log book if you put forth the interest.

 

It is IMPERATIVE that you briefly review the Encounters tab and Discharge Summaries on Epicweb. Do this before you call report on an admission to make sure the patient is not a “bounce back” to an Internal Medicine, Family Practice, or other team. It is part of your job to review any recent discharge summaries as you work up the patient anyway. Please also review the criteria for ICU/IMU admission when calling for a bed.

 

Please note that the first two admissions of the day go to the Family Practice service if they are not capped. You need to call the on-call Family Practice resident before calling the Medicine team for admissions. The Family Practice admission guidelines are available on the Chief’s Corner.

 

 

Surgical Consults

Call 713-566-5095 (Tanya or Monique) for all surgical consultations between 8AM-5PM .  They will be handled through the surgical office.  All requests must have in the medical record a note or a physicians order from a faculty physician, not a resident, treating the patient.  If no one answers at the office, please leave a message unless the consult is urgent then please page the junior resident on the call schedule.  If the resident does not answer the page within 15 minutes, please page the AM consult surgical faculty.  If no one answers, please page Dr. Tien Ko or Dr. Kao, the Vice-Chief of Surgery at LBJ. {Note: paging a surgery attending should be done by your own attending, if feasible and not an emergency} 

 

After 5PM, weekends, or holidays, junior in-house surgical resident should be paged.  If after 15 minutes no response is obtained, the PM consult surgical faculty should be paged

 

Please enter an accompanying pager number after the call back number so that the surgery on call resident can page back if they cannot return the call immediately.  Also please ask them to document their name, pager number, and team color clearly in the chart so we can contact them if necessary.

 

PSYCHIATRY CONSULTS
The telephone number to call for a psychiatry consult is: 713 566 5964.  You will be asked to leave a brief message stating your name and pager, the patients name, MR#, location, and reason for consult.  They are available to see patients M-F 8am-5pm. There are no resources for after hours psychiatry consults at LBJ. Call security if there is an unsafe situation.

GI Consults
Effective Monday, October 1, 2007, Dr LeSage has implemented a change to improve LBJ Gastroenterology Consultations. All calls for GI consultations should be directed to our main academic office: 713-500-6677 (for after-hours calls, there is an answering service.) This service was implemented at Memorial Hermann Hospital, during September, with positive results and it is believed will improve GI Service at LBJ.

 

Meal tickets and Dictations

Please see Kim Concepcion in the medicine office. She distributes meal tickets.

 

Incomplete medical records are a chronic problem.  The upper level resident is responsible ensuring that the discharge summary is dictated.  Several mechanisms address this problem:

The hospital requires that you specifically write the following words “d/c patient home” and “d/c IV”.  Also, you must complete a triplicate “final progress note” which combines discharge orders, final progress note, and prescriptions.  You also need to co-sign every single note made by medical students.  Here are a few tips for dictating charts:

a.       Dictate charts at the time of the discharge no matter how late it is or how tired you are.  Please be sure that you note the dictation confirmation number in the chart upon completionEvaluations will be withheld or withdrawn if medical records are not complete.  Ultimately, you will be suspended from clinical services if medical records are not completed. 

b.       The discharge summary is not a detailed account of every single event that took place in the hospital, but a useful document for the next physician taking care of the patient.  The most important information, therefore, refers to the patient’s condition at discharge rather than on presentation and includes every thing on the “final progress note”:

·         discharge diagnoses

·         cause of death if applicable (Do not say “cardiopulmonary arrest”)

·         results of major diagnostic tests and brief hospital course

·         discharge medications (in detail)

·         activity on discharge

·         condition on discharge

·         diet on discharge

·         follow-up arrangements

 

Post-Call

You must be leaving by 1:00PM without exceptions.  If you are violating the 1:00 sign out time, both you and your attending will be contacted. The post call cover resident is there to help you with any of your work, including procedures

 

 

Educational Materials and Resources

Current textbooks are available in the Residents Lounge, the ICU, and during business hours in the Internal Medicine office.  In addition, the hospital library (located in the east hall on the 4th floor) is accessible with your I.D. badge.

 

Many computers are connected to the UT network and the internet from which you can conduct literature searches at any time. (library on 4th floor, computer lab next to the dialysis suite). There is also a computer lab in the Annex.

 

The Resident Lounge is located in 3C.  There is a TV/VCR, microwave and a computer for internet access.  Please keep this room clean.

 

 

Routine Patient Care

Admit patients to an attending physicianSpecify your attending physician on the order or requisitions when ordering all diagnostic tests that require another physician’s interpretation, e.g. radiologic, cardiologic, pulmonary, cytologic, or surgical pathology.  This is a requirement by insurance and the federal government.

 

Select the most appropriate clinic for follow-up. 

The community clinic:

Send patients to the community clinic if they have stable problems or a primary care physician at the community clinic.  Please send a copy of the “final progress note” with the patient to the primary physician

 

LBJGH Medicine Clinic:  6-4465.   This is a Primary Care Clinic – this is a clinic for patients in the Hospital District with insurance, Medicare or Medicaid

 

Resident panel clinic at LBJGH:  6-5205 (requires agreement by attending or resident)   

If you take care of patients who are followed by a resident in the panel clinic (actually you should do this with all PCPs), please inform that resident promptly of the patient’s admission and arrange with him or her the appropriate follow-up at discharge. 

 

If you believe that a patient is appropriate as a new patient in the Panel Clinic, fill out a referral form and contact the resident of that panel clinic.

 

Subspecialty Clinic. 

Complete a referral form.  You may be able to contact the fellow of a particular specialty to get an appointment quicker.  They may refuse.

 

Coumadin Clinic

Many patients with cardiovascular, renal or hematologic diseases need anticoagulation.  A nurse managed “Coumadin Clinic” at LBJGH is available, although the majority of patients have their prothrombin time checked in the community clinics.  Be sure an specify on the referral sheet the exact indication for coumadin, their current dose, and their last INR.

 

“Coumadin Patient Educator” is available in-house during regular hours to teach your patients about food and drug interactions with coumadin. Call the LBJ Pharmacy at (713) 566-4613.  Need 24-hour notice.

 

Transfusions – Specify rate of transfusions, e.g., 2 U PRBC over .  Blood transfusions must be accompanied by an informed consent.

 

Fasting Glucose – Do not discharge patients until their fasting glucose is <200 mg/dl.

 

Social Work, Counseling, and Psychiatric Services

Social workers:  Numbers you can never seem to find:

Social Worker

Tanya Lattimore

6-5555

281-952-4634

Social Worker

Deveeta Porter

6-5579

281-952-4495

Social Worker

Paul Lyons

6-5556

281-952-4633

Social Worker,

Affairs of the Kidney

Brenda Watkins

6-5559

281-952-4639

Clinics

Margaret Tanyingu

6-5557

281-952-4635

Diabetic Educators

 

Karen LaCour

(call in request 6-5314)

6-5177, 281-952-3898

 

Discharge Planning

Perrie Wilson

6-5953

281-952-5360

Discharge Planning

Sandra Henry

6-5020

281-952-7122

Physical Therapy

Occupational Therapy

 

6-5570

Psychiatrist

Dr David

6-5964

Psychiatric Commitment, (also adoption, CPS)

Juana Amaya (Operations Mgr for Business Services)

6-5400

Pts with HIV

Ruben Ceron

6-5562

281-952-4034

Pts with TB

TB Control Houston

713-278-6600

Substance Abuse

Kim Jackson

6-5763

281-952-4632

                                   

Discharge Planning Meeting

You should arrange a daily time to meet with your case manager/social worker to discuss patients and discharge needs.

 

Home IV therapy is arranged by Ms. Henry, discharge planner, at 281-963-7126.

 

Rapid Access to Radiology Reports

Procedure:

1)      From any phone, call 566-5543.

2)      Enter 362867 (DOCTOR) when prompted for USER ID.

3)      Enter 362867 (DOCTOR) when prompted for STAFF ID.

4)      Enter #1 to enter review mode.

5)      Enter 1 to review by MEDICAL RECORD #

6)      Skip to next report, touch 5   or   Touch 9 to disconnect the system.

*** It is important that you touch 9 to disconnect the system.

Failure to do this will cause the system to shut-down.

7)      PLEASE DO NOT CALL THE LBJ TRANSCRIPTION OFFICE.  If you are unable to get the x-ray report or need assistance, call 566-5447.

 

 

Policy for Housestaff Needlesticks and Other Exposures to Body Fluids

***If you sustain a needlestick or other body fluid exposure, page the UTHSC Exposure Hotline at (713) 951-8013 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  The UTHSC Exposure Coordinator will instruct you as to the course of immediate action depending upon the type of exposure you have had.

 

Problems/Complaints

There are times when problems arise regarding ancillary services ranging from social workers to the laboratory.  If you have a complaint, you are encouraged to place a 4x6 inch card, the patient involved medical record number, date, and the specific events regarding the problem and give this card to one of the chief medical residents.  These cards will be brought to the attention of Dr. Finkel and any necessary action will follow.  Often time, complaints are brought up but nothing can be substantiated because specific events are not available. Specific DETAILS are needed in order to pursue any solution.

 

Internal Medicine Call Room Assignments

 

Location                      Room Number                        Room Assignment

 

Back Hall                     4SP70002                                 Float Team

 

Front Hall                     4SP30014                                 Ward Team

 

Front Hall                     4SP30005                                 Ward Team

 

Back Hall                     4SP90002                                 Ward Team

 

Back Hall                     4SP90004                                 Ward Students

 

MICU                          3IC61003                                  MICU

 

   


Entitle note “Pronouncement of Death”

Information note needs to contain:

(1)                Called to see patient re: (cyanotic: no respiration, pulse, etc.)

 

(2)                Physical exam: pulse 0 and BP 0

                       HEENT: Pupils fixed and dilated

                       Chest: no spontaneous respirations

                       CV: No heart sounds

                       Neuro: Unresponsive to deep pain

 

(3)        Patient pronounced dead at: (give time, date).

-(Specific family member) notified via (phone or in person).

-Dr. (Attending) notified.  (County coroner notified as needed).

-(Family refused or agreed to) (full or limited) autopsy.

-Patient (is or is not) candidate for organ donation.

-Funeral arrangements (have been or are) being made for (funeral home).

 

Ready Reserve

Everyone on Ambulatory or Geriatrics will be on ready reserve.  When you are on ready reserve, you are expected to be reachable 24 hours/ day, every day that month (unless on vacation).  It is your responsibility to always have your pagers on and with you.  Please leave cell phone numbers and home numbers with the administrative chief at the beginning of the month.  If you need to leave town, you must clear this with the chief at the beginning of the month. You must answer your pages in a timely manner (within 15 minutes).  Failure to do so will result in additional months of ready reserve and possible other disciplinary actions by the department.

 

Abuse of the system will result in disciplinary action, including not meeting your graduation date and having to remediate certain medicine months.  The ready reserve is set up to help those who truly have emergencies.  Let’s all try to help one another, as we will all need some help at some time.

 

 

Official UT Holidays 2007 – 2008

 

On these days, both the Float Intern and the Float Resident will report for duty come at noon:

 

Ø       July 4, 2007 – Independence Day

Ø       Sept 3, 2007 – Labor Day

Ø       Nov 22, 23 2007 – Thanksgiving

Ø       Dec 24, 25, 26 2007 – Christmas