Education

The story behind a cadaver: Fall down, get back up. Even after you’ve passed out

Education

February 7, 2018

I was taught anatomy and physiology by a pediatrician-turned-professor who found in academia an opportunity to meld his love of medicine with a propensity for the performing arts. His lectures were scripted and theatrical, and he gifted a generation of students with an awe and understanding of the human body that would serve as the foundation for hundreds of medical careers. Because he was a physician, ours was one of …

Change the experience: a Muslim medical student’s story

Manar Mohammad, MD

Education

February 6, 2018

I watched the young woman across from me wrap the soft stretch of fabric around her face. She folded a part of it that hung close to her ears and loosened it slightly, put her fingers slowly under the fabric and experimented with how much room there was. Would a stethoscope earpiece fit through each side easily? She unwrapped it again. Repeated the same finger test.

She had chosen a light …

Segregation in the medical school classroom

Max Jordan Nguemeni Tiako

Education

January 31, 2018

“Are you a left-sider or a right-sider?” my classmate asked with a puzzled look during an end-of-the-year dinner among first-year medical students. I was confused. He repeated himself then answered. “Do you sit on the left or the right side in class … that’s right; you sit on the right.” He then mentioned that everyone present was a “right-sider.” Nearly everyone was white.

For the past 18 months, we sat in …

What inspires this medical student

Jamie Katuna

Education

January 28, 2018

Someone who I care about deeply messaged me today: “I think I’m done with surgery.”

This person, a surgeon, feels like his potential is elsewhere. There are more opportunities, different challenges, and fulfilling experiences in other places and he is ready to explore.

I told him that he inspires me.

But I am in medical school. So how could someone leaving the medical field be inspiring to me?

Because inspiration does not come from a job description or a fancy …

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What inspires this medical student

Studying to be a doctor, while living as a patient

Claudia Martinez

Education

January 26, 2018

Walking up to the admissions desk I knew the routine. I stretched out my arm for my hospital band. A name, a number, and a doctor were what defined me during my many hospital stays. It was simple; my brain was too large for my skull. Brain surgery after brain surgery has occupied my life for many years, all while I have been studying to become a doctor.

I …

20 anecdotes that describe the world of female medical students and physicians

Jamie Katuna

Education

January 13, 2018

I recently collected anecdotes from women in medicine who have noticed the same thing I’ve noticed: We’re not as comfortable here as our male counterparts. Despite progress, medicine remains a patriarchy — an “old boy’s club” — and the women in this world are frequently reminded of this status quo. In collecting these anecdotes, I’ve noticed two main themes for the type of advice and comments women receive.

The first one speaks …

The non-difference between MDs and DOs

Brandon Jacobi

Education

January 8, 2018

“What’s a DO?” is something virtually every osteopathic medical student and physician have been asked at some point in their training. There is this public misconception that professionals who carry MD after their names are the only qualified people to medically treat their ailments. Any other degree is categorized as “alternative medicine” in their mental schema. Truth be told, DOs, or doctors of osteopathic medicine are just as qualified as …

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The non-difference between MDs and DOs

Please change the culture of surgery

Anonymous

Education

January 8, 2018

It is December 2017. I have been on the road for the last five months, completing my five months of elective rotations. I am a fourth-year medical student aspiring to specialize in family medicine. I also want to learn procedures, so I did two months of surgery, three months of family practice electives. At the beginning of this process, I had wanted to be a general surgeon, but I ended …

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Please change the culture of surgery

Lessons from the psychiatric ward

Kristin Puhl, MD

Education

January 7, 2018

The specter of the psych ward looms large in popular culture: video games, horror movies, novels — the concept of a locked inpatient psychiatric ward is shorthand for a variety of terrors. This perception is driven by a complex cocktail of factors. Psych ward patients have struggled with historical and current abuses, which are compounded by misunderstanding and ignorance around mental illness.

During third year, I spent a six-week rotation in …

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Lessons from the psychiatric ward

What it’s really like in a post-baccalaureate program

Neil Kondamuri

Education

December 21, 2017

More than 15 percent of last year’s new crop of first-year medical students completed a post-baccalaureate program. These programs exist in two flavors: one type helps students who want to improve their undergraduate academic record, and the other helps those who want to redirect their careers toward medicine, like me. Both are growing rapidly in number.

With so many future doctors launching …

An eye-opening rotation at the Indian Health Service

Eric Schmidt

Education

December 8, 2017

For the month of September, I embarked on the experience of a lifetime, living and working on the largest Native American reservation in the United States. Sprawled across the four corners region of Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado, the Navajo Reservation in Chinle, Arizona, encompasses an area as large as the entire state of West Virginia. Its population, however, is only about 300,000, making it extremely rural. To leave …

How being an immigrant shaped the way I treat patients

Saisai Chen

Education

November 30, 2017

I was born in Shanghai, China. In September 2000, my parents and I left behind our family and friends, a language and culture dear to our hearts and social and financial stability to immigrate to the United States. I was six at the time. Although I don’t claim to have fully understood the weight of their decision to start a new life, I knew that my parents were making a …

How to inspire medical students to pursue primary care

Natalia Maria Calderón

Education

November 29, 2017

I distinctly remember the excitement I felt during my first year of medical school when exposed to the breadth of general and specialty fields that seemed all so equally rewarding and medically influential. I envisioned myself holistically understanding my patient, seeing the problem in the context of her other medical issues, her personality, her family and her environment — an approach I considered at the heart of the oath we …

The hidden threat of the 80-hour resident workweek

Anonymous

Education

November 27, 2017

In an article published by the Atlantic earlier this year, Ryan Park writes that neither truck drivers nor bankers work the kind of gruelingly long hours that doctors — particularly young doctors in their residency programs — do. It is no secret that residency life is demanding and exhausting. Over the last decade, it has also become controversial. Almost a test in itself, as if gauging doctors’ …

Picking up the pieces of a broken medical dream

Marteney Jacobs

Education

November 25, 2017

I was in the midst of my family medicine clinical rotation when my world came crashing down. I had failed my Step 1 boards. I would never be a doctor. It was a nightmare that unfolded over three failed attempts, from which I awoke in a new reality where I was no longer a medical student — and there was absolutely nothing I could do to change that.

I poured everything …

Why do doctors who hate being doctors still practice?

Kristin Puhl, MD

Education

November 20, 2017

How important is it for a doctor to want to be a doctor?

At first glance, that question is ludicrous. The path to becoming a practicing physician is so long and tortuous that no one would do it if they didn’t want to. Right? First, there’s the four years of undergraduate education, then four years of medical school, then at least three years of residency. No one has ever suggested that …

Medical students must have this mindset

Manisha Ravi

Education

November 6, 2017

It is early on a Saturday morning when I walk out of the elevator of Doan Hall looking for a nursing desk to call the fourth-year anesthesiology resident I am supposed to be shadowing. Instead, I am met with a set of double doors and a staff-only sign.

Before walking through the doors, I decided to read the placard placed on the wall next to them. As I begin to read, …

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Medical students must have this mindset

A place for music in the emergency department

Thomas Scary

Education

October 23, 2017

The emergency department is a place of unpredictability. Some days are a whirlwind, others drag, but both can be interesting. On a calmer day, I found myself, a fourth-year medical student, working with a physician I will call Dr. Smith. We discovered that we shared a common love for music, and between patients, we discussed everything from opera, to banjo, to Indian music. I am a composer and amateur classical …

An open apology to medical students from a resident

Karen Tran-Harding, MD

Education

October 20, 2017

Dear medical student, I’m sorry.

You had just finished two years of didactic learning and couldn’t wait to feel like a “real” doctor. You finally were starting your clerkships, that is, ultimately working with patients and getting deep in the trenches.

You were bright-eyed as you pulled on your pristine short white coat. You got to the hospital at 5:15 a.m., 15-minutes early for the first day of your very first third-year …

A letter to my sister (and all other first-year medical students)

Misha Armstrong

Education

October 16, 2017

Congratulations! At this point, you are almost halfway done with your first year of medical school. Either you have finally figured out what’s going on, or if you’re like me, you are still trying to figure it out. Relax, take a few deep breaths. Medical school is unlike anything you have ever done. The volume of information, constant testing, and overwhelming need to keep up with your peers is an …

Education

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