Working life: Dr Geraldine Hosny, internal medicine specialist

Dr Geraldine Hosny, General Internal Medicine Specialist and Clinical Lead, Medical Assessment Unit (MAU), Bon Secours Hospital, Dublin.

5am

I’ve an early start to squeeze in some housework/prepare lunches before setting out. It’s a busy household: three kids aged 15, 14, 11, a husband and a dog.

8am

I touch base with my in patients before focusing on the Medical Assessment Unit. It’s a new venture and the first time the Bons has had an acute service. I used to work for the HSE, so the transition to private healthcare is a very different experience. In the HSE we were always fighting for resources. That’s not the case at the Bons. This morning I saw a patient with chest pain and he had an angiogram by the time he went home.

10am

On Fridays, I do the late shift which starts at 10am, allowing me to deliver my transition year daughter to a vet’s practice for work experience. The catch-up is pretty hectic at the MAU. One patient has severe headache, another chest pain. I order tests while they take it easy in our eight-bed bay. Among the patients I am reviewing is a woman who attended the MAU with uncontrolled blood pressure.

12 noon

Lunch is a sandwich while writing up notes.

1pm

A consultant in radiology sends a patient our way. Their report was not good but they are not sure what the problem is. General internists such as myself are not limited to one type of medical problem or organ system. We are specially trained to solve puzzling diagnostic problems.

Our patients have symptoms ranging from chest pain, to heachaches, to kidney problems, to liver disease, to rheumatology problems.

2pm

A woman is sent over from the infusions clinic. She needs iron infusions for osteomylitis, a bone infection. Her heart rate is fast and she has shortness of breath. She has a history of lung clots so the likelihood is it’s either a clot or an infection in a heart value. I spend an hour examining her and treat her for an infected value.

8pm

The MAU closes at 6pm. I run back up on the wards to check my patients. I also have statistics to compile in relation to the MAU, so it’s close to 8pm when I get home, hopefully in time for family dinner.