Thursday, May 30, 2013

Guest Spot on A Cartoon Guide to Becoming a Doctor!


Hey, everyone! Check out my guest spot on one of my favorite blogs, A Cartoon Guide to Becoming a Doctor.

Someone posted some links to her blog on our class Facebook page right before first year started and I just loved it. She's hilarious. Check out her archives, too!

Monday, May 27, 2013

Finishing First Year


Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Med Ed: Gunning Without a Goal


I finished my first year yesterday--WOOHOO!--so I'm now halfway through the basic science years. (For those of you who aren't medical, the first 2 years of med school are basic science years, which basically means you're in a classroom. 3rd and 4th year are clinical years where you rotate through different specialties, pick one, and apply to residency.) I also just watched another great TED Talk on education by Ken Robinson (see bottom). Ken and the end of first year both got me thinking, as I often do, about medical education (more seriously than my last blog).

Ken Robinson says, "Education is not a mechanical system, it's a human system." Hear, hear! I believe that all of my personal struggles with academics have been a result of this misconception. I've never been able to "just do it." Without having a personal belief that it's important for me to complete a task, I can't do so; and for me, the motivation can't be selfish. In other words, grades alone (perceived future success, status, etc.) can't and won't motivate me beyond a VERY limited point. (See my thoughts on grades in medical school.) I'm a person, not a machine, and no amount of Adderall (legally prescribed!) or coffee can get me to behave like a machine.

In many ways, medical school is an academic regression; I feel like I'm back at the same brick wall I faced during high school and the beginning of undergrad. I'm being told to work as hard as possible, to make the best grades possible, so I can... do what? I personally can't perform at my peak unless I have a specific motivation. It was easy for me to earn [almost] straight A's, to take practice MCATs every Sunday morning and to shadow at 5:00 AM when I knew I wanted to get into medical school. Now that I'm in, I need a new goal.

It's like I not only got sent back to Go, but then the game changed from Monopoly to something I've never heard of, and I have to play for 2 years before I can decide on my game strategy. (Kind of a convoluted simile, but just go with it.) The problem is that I've felt trapped in the classroom; I have a very limited ability to explore what specialty I want to go into. I can shadow at nights and on weekends and I can read as much as I want to, but there is nothing like actually doing something to help you quickly decide if you ever want to do it again. I shadowed an Ob/Gyn for almost a year, but I won't know if I want to be an Ob/Gyn until I actually deliver a baby and do a Pap smear myself.

I'm not proposing that every medical student has this problem, but I know many that do (please comment if you have any thoughts on this!). It's just much easier to be "highly motivated" (my favorite gunner expression) when you have a specific goal in mind.  Right now my goal is essentially "get to 3rd year," and I think that my grades reflect that. (Not that I'm doing poorly, but I'm certainly not honoring every class.) This is funny because I really, really thought my pre-med intensity would translate straight into medical school, but it didn't. I'm proud to say that I'm not a gunner.

So, my intention is not to complain but just to think about something that is true for me. I find it to be a very uncomfortable truth, because one of my greatest fears is waking up during third year and realizing I want to be a neurosurgeon or dermatologist and I don't have the grades to get a residency. Most of the time I can trust myself and trust that I would be more "highly motivated" if my calling was one of the most competitive specialties. I also trust that I'll be able to prove myself when I'm called to do so. If I'm really meant to be a neurosurgeon, someone will see that in me and give me the opportunity no matter what grade I earned in Neuroscience. But every so often I have a moment of doubt, which is usually when I write a blog. :)

Please enjoy Ken Robinson:





Monday, May 20, 2013

Reflections on First Year



What I Learned This Year:

1.  Bones
2. WASH YOUR HANDS!!!!
3. The Voice
4. Broca’s 50x QD, Wernicke’s 75x QD 
5. Criminal Minds
6. Don’t ever travel, especially south or east.
7. Parenthood
8. FOOSH, XLA, TURP, STEMI, JC, ACL, EEG, PAM, CMV, PKU, PIPs, DIPs, CVA, JVD…
9. The Bachelor
10. Don’t ever eat raw shellfish
11. The Mindy Project
12. What "melting fat off" really means.
13. DiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetes
DiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetes
DiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetes
DiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetes
DiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetesDiabetes...
14. Med school really can be fun!
15. No monkeys in the elevator.







Thursday, May 16, 2013

Biggest Fears


Before and after med school.


Friday, May 10, 2013

Why I Made the Right Choice In Not Caring About My Exam Today


Because it wouldn't have mattered and right now I'm calm and well-rested.

The amount of work required is essentially determined by your grade on the block 1 exam. If you don't honor or high pass that exam, the amount of work increased exponentially.

Therefore, if you're only passing, it's wise to just pass and devote your time to other courses. (Ones that might lead to saving a life, like Micro or Physio.)

Especially if you don't think knowing the location of the dorsal longitudinal fasciculus will ever save a patient's life (...which I do not).


Thursday, May 9, 2013

How Med Students Spend Their Time


The ones who aren't clinically depressed, anyway.


Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Grammar Rant



Image link: http://www.laughload.com/i-see-what-you-did-there-rjp8i9zs.html

Okay. One of my syllabi contains this sentence:

"The efficiency of this cooling conductive response (immediate- minutes, highlights the danger of cold water emersion."
(This is the exact grammar and spelling, without any alterations.)

I honestly do not understand how a medical school professor could write that sentence. I would actually have to turn off spell-check and grammar-check AND forget the definitions of “emerge” and “immerse” in order to write that sentence. It's barely decipherable (if it’s decipherable at all).

A different lecture contains this statement: “50% of the human population experiences changes in temperature due to the menstrual cycle.” Okay… is that 50% of the total population, as stated, or is it 50% of the eligible population, meaning menstruating women? Or is it 50% of women, including women that haven't reached menarche and women that have reached menopause? What a fantastically useless sentence.  (And this isn't a direct jab at the author of either lecture, because every syllabus for every subject is FULL of errors and obscurities like this.)

Maybe this is my literary/philosophical side bubbling to the surface, but I sometimes get angry when I find bad syntax, poor grammar and blatant errors in my syllabi... What is the point of being intelligent if you can't communicate what you think? It's like a genius having locked-in syndrome. What is the value of a person's knowledge when he or she can't construct a sentence?

Maybe I’ll just slam them on my course review later this month with this scathing quote:

“The scholar always needs skills of communication, since he does not possess his knowledge for himself, but rather for society.”
- Johann Gottlieb Fichte, “Fourth Lecture: Concerning the Scholar’s Vocation” 


Please feel free to comment and share your grammar horror stories, medical or otherwise.