An insight into what it's like to be a first-year junior doctor - the ups and downs, the drama, and how terrifying it is to finally be making decisions.

Diagnosis and death; uncertainty and urgent laxatives; sleep deprivation and synthetic drawstring trousers: this debut work by Izzy Lomax-Sawyers chronicles her first year as a tired junior doctor at Auckland's Middlemore Hospital.

How can Izzy be a thorough and compassionate doctor while still leaving work before 7 p.m.? How does she uphold dignity and autonomy for people whose liberty has been taken because of severe mental illness? How will she know when what can be done for a critically ill patient is different from what should be done? And is this floor clean enough for her to sleep on?

Izzy grapples with these questions and more as she rotates through psychiatry, orthopaedics, medicine and surgery.

Thoughtful, funny and at times heartbreaking, Vital Signs invites readers to join Izzy through the highs and lows of being an apprentice in the art and science of medicine. Get your scrubs on, chug your coffee; ward rounds start at 6.45.