HELLO, Bimanual Exam!

8:00 AM - Physical Diagnosis lecture.

Yum.

Moving

...Is. Not. Fun.

1st Week as an MS2

Sorry I've been AWOL. School started on Monday; been busy trying to console the new MS1s, packing (I'm moving this weekend!) and figuring out why I STILL need to know the Henderson-Hasselbalch equation. 

Why? Because pharmacology is annoying, that's why.

Here's a little preview/review for you. :(

Apps & Accessories for Med Students

After I posted about why I needed an iPad, several people asked me what to do with their iPad/tablet once they buy one (i.e. "What apps & accessories should med students get?"). Here's my answer.

Choosing a Stylus:

First of all, you need a stylus unless you're a world-renown finger painter. A good stylus makes all of the following apps usable. Second of all, the stylus must be MESH-TIPPED. I can't stress this enough. Rubber-tipped styli are worse than using your finger. I use this stylus by New Trent (comes in pack of 2 on Amazon) and love it. 

Choosing a Case:
Protect your investment. You will bump, thump, and probably drop your tablet. Read Amazon reviews and find one that works for you. I have a simple rooCase that's been good to me. Lots of people prefer a case that comes with a built-in keyboard, though.

Word of advice: double check that the case you're getting is made for your tablet. (The version matters! The size has changed between iPad version, and I'm sure the same is true for other tablets.)

Cloud Drives:
You need some sort of cloud drive, be it Dropbox (what I use), iCloud, or something else. But you need access to a large number of files (which will grow by the day) and a way to back up all your data. This ensures your data is accessible if you lose/break your tablet. (For example, iAnnotate syncs with Dropbox, so your notes/highlighting are still available when you open the file on a desktop). 

iAnnotate

I use iAnnotate for taking notes on my syllabi. It's essentially a PDF-editing app. It allows you to highlight, underline, write, type, and includes pretty much every other function you could possibly need for taking notes. My favorite feature: you can create custom toolbars (not sure if that's the word they use) with customized tools, colors, "pen" thickness and opacity, etc. (See my toolbars in the image below.)

My iAnnotate toolbars. Color coded.

Inkflow Plus

This is the app I use for drawing my cartoons! 'Nough said. —Just kidding. :)

This app has the best drawing/writing functionality that I've found. You can try their free version first (no "Plus") and upgrade if you like it. It's about $10. I don't know how they do it, but it's simply the best app for drawing. I also love it for taking notes by hand, drawing diagrams, and cartooning, of course.

You can create stationary using pictures or choose from plain, lined, music or graph paper. You can also cut and paste using the lasso tool, customize colors, choose your drawing implement (brush, pen, pencil), paste images, email files (in jpg, pdf, or iAnnotate format), etc., etc., etc. Did I mention I love this app?

(As a side note, 2 other note-taking apps I have are Penultimate & NoteTaker HD. I like them both but prefer Inflow Plus because of additional capabilities.)

Inkflow Plus

Paperless

The best to-do list app.

Paperless

Epocrates

You need this. Proof: several doctors recommended it to me. It is also free to medical students. 

This app allows you to look up (and favorite) drugs, including indications, dosages, contraindications, side effects, black-box warnings, formularies, drug interactions, etc. It's fantastic. This is a great app to use when you shadow, as well. You can look up drugs the doctor prescribes and come up with intelligent questions to ask. (The only tricky part is guessing how to spell the drug...)

Example of information available on Epocrates (Simvastatin)

Figure 1

This is Instagram for doctors. Need I say more? MS1s will especially enjoy this app, because docs often post in the "guess what this is" format. Also really cool when you're doing/have done Microbiology, because you'll find current pictures of things like Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease. Yay for clinically relevant material!

Figure 1

That's all for now. Please ask questions and let me know if I'm missing out on some other amazing apps! 

Updated Tuesday 8/20/13 at 4:40 PM

My First Day of Med School

This is what I remember about my first day of medical school... Let's just say I was a BIT overwhelmed. (The cadavers' faces were not covered, and THEY DIDN'T WARN US.)

Just know this: you'll be incredibly tired at the end of each day, but you will survive. And after the first round of exams, you'll actually feel confident that you can balance everything (enough to get by, at least). And by spring semester it'll feel normal, and you'll find yourself watching literally hundreds of episodes of Bones. (Or maybe that was just me.)

Have a great first day, new MS1's! And don't worry: it gets better all the time.

Please comment & share your first day experiences! I'm sure every school is extremely different. :)

MS1 Book-Buying Guide

A lot of incoming 1^st year med students have asked what books to get besides the syllabus.

Image of BRS Gross Anatomy, published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins

Let me start with a disclaimer: my school uses syllabi as the basic text for each course. Our lecturers write their own lectures and they all get compiled into a PDF that’s textbook-length. The syllabi are supposed to contain all testable material (although this isn’t always true). We also get a list of recommended texts. If your school uses a different system, these suggestions may not apply to you.

And if any of my suggestions don’t seem to make sense for you or your school, please ignore them. These are only based on my experience.

General recommendations:

1. ASK THE MS2’s AT YOUR SCHOOL. At least ask one. These suggestions apply to the curriculum at my school. Many of these will be helpful everywhere, but they might be a waste of time if you’re expected to know more/less information. Plus, check your schedule: you might not take all of these classes during first year.
2. Don’t buy the recommended textbooks. Exception: buy them if the MS2s at your school say you need to own them. First of all, there are probably multiple copies on reserve at your library or resource center. Second of all, if your school uses the syllabus system, you’re mostly better off reading the syllabus more than once. (If you have a photographic memory and only need to read the syllabus once, then go ahead and read the recommended text too. But know this: I hate you. Just kidding. Kinda.)
3. You do NOT need to newest versions of these books. Unless some major change happened in the past year. (And it didn’t.) Use Amazon.
4. Speaking of Amazon… Sign up for Amazon Prime. You get a student discount (unless they’ve changed that). As long as you remember to order books and materials online, it’s well worth the money in saved shipping costs, time, and energy. (Keep in mind you can buy your reflex hammer, stethoscope, scrubs, books, gloves, tuning fork, ophthalmoscope, etc. online. I also buy random items like: coffee filters, small appliances, CamelBaks, backpacks, earplugs, workout DVDs, etc.)

My Absolute Must-Haves:

1. First Aid for USMLE Step 1 – Use this for every single class. It. Is. AWESOME.
2. BRS Gross Anatomy
3. BRS Physiology
4. BRS Biochem
5. Netter’s Atlas of Human Anatomy
6. BRS Microbiology & Immunology

Optional (depends on study style):

1. Netter’s or Gray’s Anatomy Flash Cards
2. Rohen’s Photographic Anatomy Flash Cards

Other study resources are listed on my pages. (Pages are on the left if you’re viewing this on a computer. I think it’s a menu at the top on the mobile version.) I haven’t added everything to those pages (some might actually have nothing right now…) – so please let me know if there’s a subject you want to know about! I’ll add more detail to the page.

As usual: please leave comments or email me.