A fter making aliyah I had the “privilege” of doing a three-month Observership at a local hospital. The Observership is a period of time during which a doctor trained abroad joins a medical team to learn the way it works in their new country and for me this was part of the process of obtaining a new medical license in Israel.
It was a wonderful and humbling experience. Wonderful in that I got to work with amazing colleagues and help some incredible people reach their recovery goals. Humbling in that I had more than my share of déjà vu moments when I felt as if I’d returned to my intern year. Back then I once had to take the blood pressure of all of my patients (the medical assistants didn’t feel like doing it) and draw blood tests for all of the patients in the unit (there was no such thing as a hospital phlebotomist). Now years later and in a new country I was given the same job. It didn’t matter that I hadn’t drawn a blood test on a single patient in over seven years it was all part of the experience.
“It’s like riding a bike ” said my new boss Dr. P. “You’ve done it once you can do it again.”
“Riding a bike is what I do for pleasure Dr. P. ” I argued. “This is more like assault — because when I’m repeatedly unsuccessful all I’ve accomplished is poking folks with syringes.”
