Medical Doctor
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Medical Doctor
Superiors: Chief Medical Officer
Difficulty: Medium
Guides: Guide to Medicine, Guide to Surgery, Guide to Ghetto Surgery
Access: Medbay, Morgue, Operating Theatre
Duties: Keep the crew healthy, save lives.
Alternate Titles: Nurse, Surgeon, Coroner.
This role is an extremely important one. If you know what you're doing, as a Medical Doctor you will save lives. Nearly every death can be prevented, provided you reach the victim in time. Since Medical Doctors are the only ones with the tools and the in character experience to save them, Medical Doctors tend to make a lot of friends.
You should know what most chemical medicines are (not how to make them, although you could use the notes in Chemistry Lab), so look that up on the Guide to Chemistry. It doesn't hurt to know what the other medical stuff does. But if you have a chemist that can make them, he can also tell you how to administer them.
Overview
You start with an advanced first-aid kit. Your main work will be in Medbay, where there are spares, vending machines with more supplies, and more specialized kits. You have some standard medication in the Medical Supplies room, though you should ask the Chemist for some more specialized ones.
As a Medical Doctor, your job is to heal people, save them from the brink of death, and bring those that do die into Genetics for cloning. You can diagnose injuries with the help of a health analyzer. Your PDA can also do a limited health readout.
In terms of your equipment, the general rule is that chemical treatment works at all health levels, whereas physical treatments have limits where they become ineffective. Rolls of gauze and ointment are for minor injuries, and so only work if the brute or burn damage total less than 50 HP. Advanced Trauma and Burn kits are more effective, and so work all the way to 0 HP. Beyond that, more advanced treatment is needed.
Health runs from 100% to -100%, and it's your job to make sure it doesn't hit the bottom end. Below are the main types of damages and treatments. See the Guide to Medicine for a more detailed overview.
Brute Damage
Whether it's from fists, bullets, or a kitchen knife, it's classified as Brute Damage. Brute Damage is inevitably the most common form of damage, and is easily treated.
There are two types of brute damage, bruises and wounds. Bruises are caused by blunt objects.They add to a persons brute damage, but unless particularly severe, they do not cause bleeding.
Wounds and cuts are caused by sharp objects, and cause bleeding, which can only be stopped with medical treatment.
If the patient is not in life-threatening danger, simply have them tell you where they were hit, use the body scanner in Medbay, or get them to strip off their jumpsuit and examine so you can see where. Apply gauze (for minor damage) or advanced trauma kits (for major damage) to affected areas and send them on their way.
Brute Damage takes the form of big red streaks, or blue-purple-red messes. Apply gauze or advanced trauma kits in those areas, inject with Styptic Powder via the Sleepers or, in cases of a helpful Chemist and extreme damage, a Synthflesh patch.
Blood Loss
Living things have blood. Blood is quite important for them to keep living. Cuts and loss of limbs will cause various amounts of bleeding, which require rolls of gauze or advanced trauma kits to stop.
Blood level can be found on the health analyzer read out with warnings when levels get too low. Loss of blood can cause fainting or paleness of skin. Blood can either be injected from a donor, or a donor pack can be placed in an IV Drip and connected to the patient.
When choosing a blood pack, find the patient records either on the Patient Records computer in the lobby, or the "Patient Records" function on your PDA. If you put the patient on an operating table, the operating computer also tells you his blood type. As a quick reminder, A, B and + are types of markers on blood, O and - indicate a lack of said markers. Don't give someone markers they don't already have or they'll take additional damage. If that doesn't make sense to you, a more thorough look is provided here under the compatibility drop down menu.
If you're unsure what blood type to use or the blood type of a patient, O- can be given to anyone. There is a limited supply, so only use it if absolutely necessary.
Burn Damage
The second type of damage is Burn Damage. This is caused by fires and blisteringly high or low temperatures, such as fire or space.
Burns work similar to wounds. Apply ointment or advanced burn kits to the affected area to heal it, or give them a Silver Sulfadiazine patch. Chemicals take a few seconds to work, so don't waste supplies. For severe burns, give them a Synthflesh patch (a Chemist will be needed).
Burn Damage appears as grey streaks on a person's body, or you can use the various scanners to tell location, so apply ointment in those areas (usually the chest area).
Toxin Damage
Toxin Damage is the third kind of damage and is relatively uncommon.
Be it from the aptly named toxin bottle, overdoses, or radiation, Toxin Damage has no visible form, so can only be recognized via analyzing.
Light toxin damage should be treated with an injection or two. More severe cases should be put into the sleeper and administered higher doses of charcoal.
Charcoal pills found in the anti-toxin first-aid kit contain 30 units of Charcoal, which should be enough for all but the most severe cases.
Suffocation Damage
The last main kind of damage often occurs when a patient is in critical health (-50% Health), and is usually accompanied by a another type of damage.
Suffocation can be cured using Salbutamol, Perfluorodecalin, or plain fresh air (if the patient is not critical). If the patient is in critical condition, then heal the other damage, and the suffocation should recover naturally. CPR also recovers suffocation damage slowly if the patient is in critical (click on them with an empty hand with the help intent).
Epinephrine halts Suffocation damage, but only when in Critical.
Uncommon Conditions
The above are the main types of damage people will receive. Other more unique damages and treatments can be found on the Guide to Medicine.
Genetic diseases can be cured by Mutadone or a Clean SE from your local Geneticist. So shake the chemist up and get a little to cure people.
Viruses and Diseases are in the domain of the Virologist. Scanning people with your health analyzer might show an 'Unknown substance' in their blood stream, which may mean a virus, or just some chemicals. Either way, take a blood sample and pass it to your Virologist to analyze.
Give your infected patients Spaceacillin to slow the spread and keep them isolated. Wearing gloves and a sterile mask helps to stop anyone else getting infected.
Medical States
There are three type of medical states. The first is 'shock', which is the least dangerous of the three. If someone takes enough damage from each damage type, they may go into shock. This causes stammering and slow movement, and eventually collapsing and loss of consciousness. This can be cured by dealing with all the other types of damage, or temporarily by using Morphine.
The second is known as 'soft critical'. When someone is below 0% health (having taken more than 100 points of damage), they will suffer shock until they are above 0% health.
The third is known as 'critical' and occurs at -50% health (more than 150 points of damage). At this point, the patient will go unconscious, stop breathing, and take suffocation damage. This can be stopped with Epinephrine or CPR. Chemical or Cryo treatment is usually necessary at this stage.
Surgery
You'll have to deal with broken bones, appendicitis, and autopsies. All of which can be performed by you, and only you (IC anyway) .
A guide to surgery is here.
Modern Miracles
Cryogenics
Setting up Cryogenics is easy and simple.
Firstly, ensure the O2 canisters are connected to the ports. There's a wrench nearby to do this. Secondly, fill the tubes with Cryoxadone - beakers should be on the table. Then set the freezer to the minimum to start cooling the chamber down.
In order to use it for a patient, take off any temperature suits that have (RIG, Spacesuits, void suits, fire suits, etc.), grab them and put them in the cryo tube. Then turn it on and wait. You can monitor the patients vitals from outside. It's usually easier to strip all their items, and will allow cryo to cool them faster. Remember to eject them when they're better.
Medibots
Medibots magically synthesize Saline-Glucose, so you have to fill them with beakers of other chemicals for them to do any major good. Good news for you! Or maybe not when people actually start dying.
Using your ID, you can alter his settings, and fill him with a beaker of Omnizine or Mannitol.
As a traitor, you can fill him with a beaker of FluoroSulphuric Acid, or even emag him. Once Emagged, the delightful little medibot buzzes around injecting everyone and everything with not-so-helpful chemicals.
Useful Tips
- This is the first and most important one: if you do not know how to treat something properly, ASK QUESTIONS! A (perceived) dumb question is better than malpracticing.
- Equip yourself. You should always wear a medical belt, a health scanner HUD, a labcoat, latex gloves and a sterile mask.
- The health analyzer is your right hand, the advanced body scanner is the left. It never hurts to scan anyone. Always be on the watch for damaged internal organs!
- Always carry a non-specialized first aid kit. The advanced one you start with will usually be enough for the whole round. If you run out of brute/burn kits, the vending machines have more.
- It's a good idea to always carry a syringe filled with epinephrine and another with charcoal. Label them for easier use.
- The front desk should always be manned, and the crew monitoring computer watched.
- The medical closet has a box of autoinjectors, filled with ones like that one in the advanced medikit. These injectors are one-use and contain Epinephrine. Use them to stabilize critical patients even more or on yourself if you get in trouble, or have to rush in somewhere dangerous quickly to save a patient.
- Only bad doctors shove everyone in the cryo tubes. Treat non-critical patients with first aid and chemicals instead.
- ALWAYS treat bleeding and suffocating patients before putting them into cryo. A risky organ or internal bleeding surgery is often more safe than letting someone suffocate/bleed out in the cryotube.
- Remember to check on cryo patients regularly. People don't like being left in there forever.
- Remember to use sleepers. They can dispense valuable chemicals. But remember, you can't treat critical patients in them.
- Use the medical fridge. It's not there just for show.
- If the chemist made salbutomal or perfluorodecalin, it's usually a good idea to keep a few pills or a bottle on you.
- Same goes for patches of Synthflesh, it heals both brute and burns at the same time and at a 1 to 1 ratio.
- The labcoat has two slots you can put small items into. Use it to carry spare syringes or autoinjectors.
- When trying to clone people, Mental Interface Failure means their ghost has left their body. Wait a minute, and try again.
- Clones are always born with severe brain damage and usually a combination of genetic mutations. Use mannitol and mutadone to treat them, respectively.
- Infected wounds are usually caused by doctors not washing their hands before doing surgery. The infection itself can be treated with spaceacilin or ointment. You can find ointment in the emergency NanoMeds (small medical closets on the walls) and spaceacilin syringes can be vended from NanoMeds.
- In case of a virus, usually the most you can do is to pray that the virologist and the CMO aren't totally incompetent. Other than that, use internals or procure a biosuit, distribute spaceacilin and bring infected people to isolation.
- If you are doing bone surgery, and the body part you're trying to repair has more damage than 25, it will NOT be able to be repaired.
- IPCs cannot be treated by traditional means, only welders and cable coils can heal them.
- To bring back a dead IPC back to life, attach the head to the chest, and weld a damaged body part.
- Slime people don't have a heartbeat because they lack organs. They also bleed water.
- NEVER give vox Salbutomal or Perfluorodecalin. Oxygen is toxic to them and those chems make them suffocate.
- Water is toxic to Greys. When vaccinating a Grey, inject them with blood instead of watered down cure.
- Don't steal the soap. Seriously.
Traitoring
There is so many wonderfully terrible things you can do. See that sleepy pen item? Guess what, when people get stabbed with those, they drag them to med bay to be "doctored" by you and other people. You can then take them some place private in Medbay, and take what you want or go for malpractice to end them. You can hide victims by putting little notes by morgue trays saying "This man has been cyborged" or "This man has been cloned" and no one will bat an eye at why they are naked, and why they are there. Usually.
Roleplay Tips
- You most likely have a decent knowledge of people and medicines. Use it to help people.
- Feel free to play a nice guy, or the next House. Just make sure people get healed, it's what you're there for after all.