Chucky Charlie

I need to post something to get away from my thought block. It has been like 2 months which I did not have any idea on what to write. This apply to all my blogs and also my work. I have a manuscript to finish and another 2 case reports to complete. Yet, every time I grab my keyboard....nothing. I guess my post here is will help my writer's brain kick start again. Perhaps because of my new baby girl , born 26 June 2019. After the new addition in our family, I stopped writing. Always busy trying to do something else. To my surprise, I did pick up my guitar back and start learning new song in that time period. Thus, my brain see more abstract thing, the music, the art, not the numbers or fact. Other than that, nothing much happen. I have to set a dateline of task that I need to do. The first one is to write a post on Syndromic approach which now have replace most of the traditional microbiology method. At one point of time, my friends and I start addressing ourselves as a trad

Every day we encounter cases of catheter-related bloodstream infection. With the increasing incidence of Diabetes leading to renal failure, more and more people are going for dialysis. More people in dialysis, more catheter was inserted for the purpose of that.  Using venous catheter for dialysis came with a risk which is - infection. The catheter is one the favorite place for bacteria to hang out. Produce their biofilm and just stay there forever. You flush it, you wipe it with alcohol, whatever you do, it will not move away easily.  Then came the decision of attacking them with antibiotics and this is where everything goes wrong.  To diagnose catheter-related infection, the best method is to quantify the growth from the catheter. Catheter tip culture usually will tell us whether a patient has a catheter-related infection or not. It's difficult to do and labor intensive. Thus, a semiquantitative approach was developed. This method was much easier to do. Just culture the

It has been a long time since I've updated this blog. Here today I would like to update by giving a wish of good luck to all Part 1 Mpath students that are currently taking their exam in UITM Sungai Buloh. Best wishes for all of you including my wife. Ann also for Part 2 student which started their exam last week. Surprisingly Hep C was not included in this year part 2 exam. Well, that's good cause possible bonus question for next year. :)

The issue of racial discrimination is on going uptrend. In America, people the black community that has been oppresssed for quite sometime are demanding their equals right. In our country Malaysia, the Malays are demanding their rights from whoever is oppresing them. Discrimination can be deadly. And one the deadliest discrimination is antibiotic discrimination. Some doctors hate certain antibiotic without any particular reason and love another antibiotic also for no reason. For example, cloxacillin. This antibiotic has been around for ages. It has been doing its job quite amazingly clearing up Staphyloccocus infection from every site you can imagine. It is cheap and available in oral form and parenteral form. But, a lot of people hate it. They favour more fancier drugs such as Amoxicillin-Clavulanate, pipperacillin-tazobactam, cephalosporins, and the most favourite antibiotics among all, carbapenems. Without any particular reason, people just hate prescribing cloxacillin. It’

Congratulations to those who pass the exam today. And those who did not, there will always be next year. And for those who did pass the exam.. I know you can't sleep tonight awaiting the interview. Don't overthink. Just answer honestly. This is not a medical school interview or exam. I believe those who came this far, are not a mere house officers who just finish the last posting few weeks ago. Everyone are experienced medical officer who has a story to tell. Enough experiences to answer what the interviewer will ask. 1. Be honest. Don't be a liar during interview, unless you are Frank Abagnale Jr. 2. Don't be a yes man. Even if they ask you to jump into the ocean you will say yes. Bad idea. This is about your future. Not to get score in exam. You already pass the exam. 3. Tell your future plan realistically. Don't make up story, for example, you plan you will not get married or pregnant, not until you became specialist or you said you will go to a remote

First year pathology : No life, read book until vomit. Second year Microbiology: Honeymoon... I will read book when I feel like I want to read. Third year Microbiology: Damn busy with presentation, research sample collection and writing, case report writing, and 2-3 text book to finish reading before entering final year, oncall, elective attachement. ...