Hello everyone! My name is Avery Wright, and this is my fourth and final week of my Pinternship. I have spent the last month studying Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery under Dr. Gregory Moorman on the island of Saint Croix.
Sunday July 18th was originally supposed to be a rest day for all of us. Us interns spent the whole day watching movies, working on our Pinhead blogs, and enjoying our down time. At around 11:00 PM I got into bed and started to get some rest for tomorrow. However, at 11:30 PM Stefan, Dr. Moorman’s son and the other Pintern, woke me up by banging on our door. When I opened the door and asked him what was going on he said “we are going into the ER.” I immediately got dressed, filled up my water bottle, grabbed my Gov Juan F. Luis Hospital and Medical Center identification tag, and got into the car. The patient had a vertical forehead laceration on their right side. The first two images above both show the laceration, but in the second image Dr. Moorman peeled back the skin to expose the bone. All Dr. Moorman had to do was suture the wound closed, but before he could get all his supplies from the ER Nurse, a pedestrian that had been hit by a car was being rushed into the Emergency Room. While we waited, Dr. Moorman taught us how to fill out patient paperwork and prescriptions. Once the other patient was taken care of, the ER Nurse gave Dr. Moorman all of the supplies he needed, and he started suturing. The third image above is the patient all stitched up. We left the ER at around 3:00 AM, and got into bed quickly as we had more surgeries to observe tomorrow.
Monday July 19th my alarm went off at 7:00 that morning. With only four hours of sleep in my system I debated on actually getting out of bed, but I knew I was starting to learn the Medical School student life. We had a very light breakfast and left the house at 7:45 AM. Dr. Moorman had two skin cancer surgeries and a finger tumor surgery scheduled. The first skin cancer patient had seven lesions that Dr. Moorman had to be removed. It took about an hour and a half for Dr. Moorman to prep the patient, remove all the lesions, and suture the wounds closed. The next surgery was the finger tumor surgery. Above is an image of the finger cut open with the tumor, and an image of just the tumor by itself. After about an hour Dr. Moorman was finished, and he let us go for the day because he saw how tired we were. We got home around noon, and I immediately got into bed. I did not wake up until 4:00 PM that evening. I am someone who usually can never nap, so let me say I was exhausted. The other interns and I decided to go to Caribbean Cinemas, the local movie theater, to watch Fast and Furious 9 at 8:30 PM. Dr. Moorman picked us up at 11:00 PM when the movie ended, and we all went straight to bed.
Tuesday July 20th was nothing more than a rest day. We spent the entire day making good food and watching great movies. My parents and older sister arrive on the island this Friday, so I helped them get everything they needed ready to land on the island.
Wednesday July 21st us interns decided to get outdoors. We left the house to head to the Carambola Tide Pools trailhead, and we started our hike at 11:00 AM. It only took us 40 minutes to hike to the tide pools. Above is a photo of one of the tide pools. The other two images are photos that I took during the hike. We spent some time in the tide pools, and then we headed back to the trailhead. Dr. Moorman’s wife, Gabriella, picked us up at 2:30 and took us back home. We immediately jumped in the Moorman’s pool when we got home. We played some volleyball, until one of the dogs poked a hole in the ball. After volleyball we taught the Moorman’s foster puppies how to swim. Once us and all the puppies were tired, we showered and spent the rest of the evening relaxing.
Thursday July 22nd we spent the day at Buck Island with Dr. Moorman’s oldest son. We left the house at around 11:30 AM, and we were at Buck Island by 1:00 PM. From 1:00 to 4:30 PM we swam in the beautiful blue water, walked on the beach, and absorbed as much Vitamin D as we could. At 5:30 PM we had dinner reservations at Tamarind Reef and Bar for Disco Bingo. There were three rounds of Disco Bingo. The first round required a capital “I” to be made on your board before you could yell out “Bingo!” You had to form a “X” across your board for the second round. For the third round you had to completely fill columns “B” and “O” to win. The fourth round needed a square perimeter on the outside of your board. Finally, the fifth round was a blackout round. The prizes for rounds 1-4 were alcoholic beverages, which usually is not useful for us interns who are under 18. However, Dr. Moorman’s younger son makes an amazing Rum Cake, so when he shouted “Bingo” during round 4, we were all very excited when he came back with a bottle of local rum. Now each BINGO board is $5, and all the money spent on the boards goes into a pot for the final prize. Tonight the pot was $1,150. Everyone at our table was three spaces away from blacking out our boards when someone yelled “Bingo!” Their Bingo card was approved, and they won the money. We left Tamarind Reef and Bar with a bottle of rum. Since it was my last night here we decided to watch my favorite scary movie: As Above So Below. Once the movie was over I started to pack. Once I finished packing I went to bed.
Friday July 23rd my alarm went off at 7:00 AM, and we left the house at 7:45 for Plessen Medical Center. On Dr. Moorman’s schedule today was a breast reconstructive surgery and a hernia surgery. Above is a photo of Dr. Moorman, myself, and the other interns in the Operating Room before his surgery. The breast reconstructive patient had had a double mastectomy surgery and a breast augmentation surgery before today. She had a lot of loose skin that gathered near her armpits. Dr. Moorman removed the excess skin, breast tissue, and fat to reshape her breasts. The surgery took Dr. Moorman took a little over two hours to finish. Once he was done he sent us interns to the sanitized break room. Dr. Moorman walked in to eat his lunch, and we were talking about the next surgery. The Nurse Anesthetist walked in, and she told us the hernia patient had been taking a medication that would shut off her body’s response to the anesthesia medication. Unfortunately they had to reschedule her hernia surgery for next week. Since Dr. Moorman does not like wasting the day, we headed to Gov Juan F. Luis Hospital and Medical Center to check on the car accident patient from Sunday night. Dr. Moorman had been asked to look at her wounds and see if they were healing correctly. Dr. Moorman looked at the wounds, and he was pleased with what he saw. He re-bandage the wounds, and then taught us how to fill out paperwork for what he had just done. He also taught us how to print and read pathology reports. We spent only an hour at the hospital, and then we went home. My parents and older sister fly in tonight at 9:00 PM to spend a week here since today is the last day of my internship. I spent the afternoon packing and spending time with the Moorman family while I awaited for my family to arrive.
This Pinternship has been an incredible experience that I am beyond grateful for. Thank you Dr. Moorman and the Moorman family for welcoming me into your family for these last four weeks. Thank you for opening your home to me, and showing me this amazing island. Saint Croix will always be a special place to me. Thank you Sarah Holbrooke for making a pitstop in Cortez to explain the Pinhead Institute Internship to me, and for everything else you have done for me.
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