The picture in today’s post shows the hearing testing room in the office. One child came in today with a poor hearing test result. Upon looking in his ears, we saw a build up of fluid that was blocking the sound from entering his ears.
Sadly, today was my last day with Carolina Kids Pediatrics. I began the day switching between visits with Dr. Emmet and Dr. Willey. As usual, we saw a few 6 month, 9 month, 1 year, and 18 month patients. Additionally, I saw some 7 and 8 year olds.
The main difference between the 7 and 8 year olds as opposed to the younger patients is that the older kids can tell you what is wrong with them. A school aged kid can tell you when they’re throat hurts or where their stomach hurts while a baby can only cry and whimper. The main signs of pain given by kids younger than 2 years old are crying, ear tugging, drooling, whimpering, kicking feet, and rubbing their teeth. The ear tugging, drooling, and teeth rubbing all signify teething pains. Although teeth usually begin appearing at 6 months, some kids experience pain before and after. Also, many kids will drool due to a sore throat because it hurts too much to swallow their saliva.
Although seeing babies is great, I also got to learn about special procedures. I did not get to see it but Dr. Tanaka performed a procedure to fix a tongue tie. To put it in simply terms, Dr. Tanaka used sterile surgical scissors to snip the lingual frenulum. In the end, the lingual frenulum will just exist cut in half, allowing the tongue to have a wider range of motion. To numb the area beforehand, Dr. Tanaka just used solid lidocaine on a q-tip to numb both sides of the flagellum. I also got to listen to a heart murmur. A regular heart has distinct beats while the heart murmur I listened to sounds less clear. To put it in lay man’s terms, the heart murmur I listened to sounded wishy washy. I am very thankful to have listened to the heart beat in real life because I don’t know where else I would get the experience.
Overall, the past two weeks have been the best two weeks of my life. I’ve learned so much from not only Dr. Willey, but also the other doctors and nurses in the practice. They taught me how to treat patients with care and efficacy. Each doctor has their specific styles of treating patients, but they all demonstrate a pure love for kids and a desire to help them feel better.
Fun Facts:
– Dr. Willey loves almond butter!
– I’ve had an awesome time at Carolina Kids!
– All the members of Carolina Kids made me feel so welcome.
– I can’t wait to learn more about peds!