Clinical Medicine Day #1

Well, I survived my first two years of medical school.  I don't know how or where I rank in my class but I did it.  Last week I took the USMLE Step 1 exam, which I had been studying for 2 months prior.  I must admit that it was the worst two months and subsequent exam in the history of me.  The results come back sometime this week and to tell you the truth I am utterly terrified to look at my results.  For the first time in two years I will be objectively compared to my peers and and my future career options hang in the balance.  I need a 190 to pass and anything above a 220 is a  must as far as applying to any field other than Family Medicine. Right now I feel like I may have achieved a 191...  But as I sit here preparing for my first day learning clinical medicine I am driving the exam as far from my mind as possible.  This past weekend my mom celebrated her 60th birthday.  The whole family met up in Seattle, dined, and watched a spectacular play Les Miserable that my dad bought us all tickets to see.  It was spectacular and I enjoyed every minute with the family, especially beach time with the Hogans.  This first two week clerkship is Anesthesiology.  I may be interested in this field so I hope to achieve Honors.  I realized that I have not written in a while and I have skipped over some amazing/terrible experiences but hopefully I will start writing more frequently now that I don't have to take my work home with me every night.  Wish me luck and stay tuned!!

Fainted

Fainted.  Today sucked. I was up all night with Laila grumbling about how no one wanted to go out and live a little while we sat in bed and did nothing all night.  The next morning we had a skin clinical tutorial where we see over 20 patients with different skin diseases.  We woke up late, as it was the 8^th day of the week we had to be up early and missed our bus to the clinic so we walked the 1.5 miles there (waiting for the next bus would have taken longer). We arrived just in the nick of time and were thrust into a group of my peers some of which I knew.  Our first rotation was in the break room where we enjoyed pastries, water, and coffee.  Then we went to our first patient who had alopecia universalis (baldness all over their body).  It was a very interesting case and even though we only had 5 minutes we were able to ask plenty of questions.  The second patient was their with their mother and we all crowded into this tiny exam room (all 13 of us).  I was at the far end and as we got started I knew something was wrong.  The room felt incredibly hot and I could feel the blood draining from my face.  I thought to myself “5 minutes, only 5 minutes and we can get out of this hot room”.  I leaned back hard into a counter and braced myself as best as I could.  It was like I started to dream and then I awoke to standing in the middle of the room with everyone’s hands on me.  I dazedly looked around and asked what was going on.  “You fell over” was the reply.  I couldn’t believe it.  They sat me down and lifted my legs while the dermatologist asked, “Was it something you saw?” Ya, sure, it was the scared skin that sent me over the edge… Luckily the only thing I hurt was my pride, which didn’t get any better as I laid out in the hallway and every 5 minutes a group of my peers past by on their way to another patient and inquired as to why I was there. I finished out my rotation still a bit light headed and everyone joked with me, which made the embarrassment tolerable.  Though I worry about surgery and standing for long periods of time… We’ll see how this will turn out.  Now I am on a bus up to Bellingham to see my sister, brother, and nieces.  It’s going to be a lonnnnggg week.  Until next time….

TEDMED

What a trip. Last week I was in DC for the TEDMED conference, which I won a $5000 scholarship to attend. If you don't know what TEDMED is than click on TED. They are these amazing free lectures on innovation, imagination, entertainment, and design. I am an avid fan of this so winning the scholarship was the highlight of my quarter. The conference was held at the Kennedy Center in DC and was filled with healthcare big wigs such as the director of the FDA, NIH, National Cancer Foundation, CEO of the Cleveland Clinic, Katie Couric, Billy Jean King, and many others. TEDMED was recently acquired by the billionaire owner of Priceline and in my opinion he did not do a sufficient job of having the right lectures/topics. There was a lot of hand waving (ie "diabetes is a pandemic.") and very little innovative material. Though there were a few fantastic lectures. The highlight of the event was the social interrelation hub and dinners at the library of congress and the national buildings museum. A quick story, while we were thoroughly enjoying the library of congress I happened to get a little tipsy and noticed a bunch of people wearing TEDMED t-shirts under their jackets. I approach one of them and inquired about the shirts to which he replied "its a secret". I then figured they were going to do a flash mob! What I didn't realize was that it was the DC gay man's choir and some of the men I was talking to were flagrantly flurting with me but I had no clue. Then they all bust out in song and I started to dance. Little did I know that I was the only one at the entire event who was dancing. They conference media camera then spotlighted me and the whole room got a show. Laila videoed part of it. I even got to hangout with Ben for a little bit. went with this girl from my class named Laila who I have been seeing. She is a riot. She took me to the Palestinian embassy to get her Iranian passport, needless-to-say I felt out of place. But she had a family friend the named Nick and his wife who took us out to dinner on our last night. All in all it was a fun trip but I didn't get any studying done and now I am stressed trying to catch up. Big pharmacology test coming up, not happy. On a brighter note I have started to run (once) so that makes me very happy. Until again!

Med school the 'adventure' continues

Well, I am in my final quarter of the academic years of medical school. Phrases like 'burned-out', 'in a fog', and the like have become very familiar. To recap a bit on what is currently going on; I am sloshing my way through the last of my classes, reproduction, GI, skin, pharm II, etc. And at the same time trying to begin studying for the USMLE Boards (yet another test that will 'define the course of my life' just as the SATs, and the MCATs etc) which is terrifying and stressful all in one. To offer a better understanding of this test, imagine taking full time upper level graduate science courses for 8 quarters including biochemistry, cardiopulmonary pathophysiology, all the organ system classes (all physiology, pathology, pharmacology, diagnostics, epidemiology, etc), pharmacology (over 1000+ drugs, side effects, mechanisms of action, etc) and being tested with extreme detail over all of this material. AND this test is the only thing that distinguishes you from your peers in terms of job placement. AND everyone you meet, bump into, and work with is constantly reminding you of how important this test is and how terrified you should be feeling at the moment. It is a 9 hour test that you only can take once. We do get a month to study for it but it is over the course of the sunniest month in Seattle. Ugh....

Recently was my last spring break. It was a little heart breaking to spend it all in Seattle (most of which I spent studying... :(

This is what my desk is going to look like in June (USMLE Hell Month). I only managed to get through 2 subjects.

I did get out and about and found that Seattle has a bunch of fun jazz bars. I found this little hole in the wall place called Tula's and though it was a touch $$ the music was amazing and the people there were very interesting.

It was a music themed week because I wound up with free tickets to the Seattle symphony. The experienced turned out to be great! The was free wine and appetizers for this concert and the pieces were all newly composed and I fortunately found my self sitting next to one of the featured composers.

Unfortunately on the other side of me sat a dean or head honcho of research at UW. I have no experience or real interest in research... I wish I did but... I didn't get that gene from my dad.

The rest of the week was eating out at fantastic restaurants, drinking great wines, and walking throughout Seattle. It did feel good to recharge. Well that is the mini-update for now. I will try to keep up a little more frequently...