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TOday was take two on the trials of rat neurosurgery. Done solo w no help requested despite desperately needing it.
These days, the rest of the staff at the animal lab research are depositing their unwanted charges in my hands so that I can practise the protocol for injecting tracers. Just for the record everyone at the lab has been very nice thus far. They've been encouraging and helpful and willing to teach and accomodate. And their really fun too. Of all the labs on the 6th floor of NNI, I've noticed that Lab1 is the noisiest where laughter and shouting can be heard whenever you walk past it. the other labs are just so classic lab like...... DEAD.
Well...not to say the least. it wasn't all good. my first mouse died under anaesthesia.
Thankfully my second one didn't and manage to survive the 3 hour long surgery. Although it was kinda coming round whilst I was trying to suture the scalp wound. Let me tell you for anyone who's tried suturing will noe it's difficult for starters but just imagine yourself suturing a 2cm long wound with 3 clamps in the way using suture needles that are used in humans. Though I must admit that it's very good practice for suturing.
And drilling a burr hole is just SO DAMN FRUSTRATING.
I practically spent one hour trying to get the right spot to drill my hole, and actually drill through the skull. It's a combination of strainng through a microscope and lowering ur probe to get the right spot to drill and exposing that bit of skull which is forever too off to the left and covered my soft tissue which u somehow have to move out of the way to drill.
And shaky hands + reverberating drill = not getting the right spot = not accurate injection = failure of experiment = one innocent life lost.
Yup...so it was failed experiment in terms of accuracy but it was good in terms of practice and confidence building.
And the best part of it all was that my little patient was up and about when i went down to feed mice at 5 pm. 4 h after completing the surgery. Though with considerable weekness on the right contralateral to where I had injected the tracer which is probably an indication that I most probably destroyed some cortical fibres on the way in or went to far. REally hope that it survives the night. Though I must admit it suffered quite a bit of subarachnoid haemorrhage.
Fingers crossed. Prayer to God.
And may my first patient from yesterday's soul rest in peace.
And special thanks to Zhu for that very uplifting and supportive blog entry. Really gave me that extra boost! Cheers!