Medical education

2,303 articles · Since 2007

Articles, page 34

Why medical students shouldn’t always fall in line

February 9, 2020Feb 9, 20203

As I saw the fellow purposely manipulate her fractured ankle, I knew I was wrong in not stopping him. Three hours earlier, Mr. Sanchez*, a past boxer, and soccer player, came in with a broken pinky. He was moving from…

As I saw the fellow purposely manipulate her fractured ankle, I knew I was wrong in not stopping him.

Three hours earlier, Mr. Sanchez*, a past boxer, and soccer player, came in with a broken pinky. He was moving from Atlanta to Houston, and in the process of moving boxes, a rock smashed his finger against something. Odd story, but he was the nicest patient I ever talked to up to …

Losing a patient in an emergency

Ton La, Jr., MD, JD

February 6, 2020Feb 6, 2020

“Are you serious! What are you doing to my son! How can you have him tied to the bed like this!” Michael’s* mother was irate and yelling at my resident as I stood at the back of the room. Michael…

“Are you serious! What are you doing to my son! How can you have him tied to the bed like this!”

Michael’s* mother was irate and yelling at my resident as I stood at the back of the room. Michael had HIV/AIDS with a CD4 count of 20. Hours before, he had bit his mom on the hand, leaving visible bite marks. As his mom continued to scold my resident, my …

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Losing a patient in an emergency

Use technology to fix medical education

Jimmy J. Qian

February 5, 2020Feb 5, 2020

Medical training is lengthening as students increasingly take gap years before and during medical school. Excessively long training times contribute to many problems. Trainees show high rates of burnout, depression, suicidal ideation, and alcohol abuse. Crippling student debt, compounded by…

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Use technology to fix medical education

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The questions people ask medical students

Menachem Gurevitz, DO

February 3, 2020Feb 3, 2020

Wow, you're in medical school? So you are going to be a doctor? What year are you? When are you going to finish? What are you going to go into? You should become a skin doctor, what do they call…

Wow, you’re in medical school? So you are going to be a doctor? What year are you? When are you going to finish? What are you going to go into?

You should become a skin doctor, what do they call them again? It doesn’t matter, but they do good. But they are not real doctors, so maybe it’s not worth it.

You should become a doctor that gives vaccines. Are vaccines real? …

A medical student’s advice for clinical rotations

Ton La, Jr., MD, JD

February 2, 2020Feb 2, 2020

As a rising fourth-year med student, these are my words of wisdom for all students who are on their clinical rotations. Your mental health is paramount; do not neglect how you are feeling! There is not one med student that…

As a rising fourth-year med student, these are my words of wisdom for all students who are on their clinical rotations.

Your mental health is paramount; do not neglect how you are feeling!

There is not one med student that I know of who hasn’t felt anxiety, paranoia, or depression. Some of your peers may even be diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and take medications. And that is OK! As a mentor of …

The impact of panels early in medical school on informing patient-centered care

Sangrag Ganguli & Varun Mehta

January 26, 2020Jan 26, 2020

As first-year medical students, we learn that the hallmark of a holistic medical education is an emphasis on the human, personal side of this profession. One way we develop our patient-centered competency is through attending patient panels as part of our curriculum. Here, we learn from people who experience healthcare from the opposite end. From cancer survivors to leaders in healthcare policy, these panels supplement our education by encouraging us …

Ironically, our first assigned patient encounter as medical students would be a corpse

Lauren Joseph

January 23, 2020Jan 23, 2020

"Death comes for all of us. It is our fate as living, breathing, metabolizing organisms. Dealing with the fact of death is unsettling. Yet there is no other way to live." - Paul Kalanithi, MD Recently, first-year students of the…

“Death comes for all of us. It is our fate as living, breathing, metabolizing organisms. Dealing with the fact of death is unsettling. Yet there is no other way to live.”
– Paul Kalanithi, MD

Recently, first-year students of the medical and physician’s assistant classes completed their seventh and final practical exam in clinical anatomy. Through fifteen weeks, 117 students learned the structures of the human body organized by region, working from …

This patient interaction is a reminder of the power of being human

Johnathan Yao, MD, MPH

January 17, 2020Jan 17, 2020

During a day of shadowing during my first year of medical school, the physician I was following had been running behind schedule and instructed me to keep the final patient company until he caught up. I knocked on the door…

I knocked on the door and found myself facing a wide-eyed, middle-aged man staring down apprehensively at his severely bloated stomach.

As I asked the patient what was going on, he suddenly looked up at me and …

A medical student recognizes the power of the phrase, “I don’t know”

Sadiq Rahman

January 16, 2020Jan 16, 2020

I’ve often been struck by a painting of Maimonides in my medical school. The artwork features him holding pages of a book that say, “Teach thy tongue to say I do not know and thou shalt progress.” That quote resonates…

That quote resonates with me more each day. As a first-year MD student, I’ve uttered the words “I don’t know” much more than ever. I’ve discovered that, whether I’m naming nerves found in the …

It’s important for physicians and medical students to stop and realize how far they’ve come

Anonymous

January 12, 2020Jan 12, 2020

As I was finishing up with my doctor’s appointment for the required immunizations I needed for medical school, my doctor asked if he could give me some advice for my upcoming journey. Being the clueless pre-medical student I was at the time, I said, “Please do.” He said something along the lines of “They’re going to try to rewire your way of thinking, but stay true to who you are.” …

Medical school ends with a leap of faith

Orly Farber

January 11, 2020Jan 11, 2020

"What do you want to be when you grow up?" It's a question I frequently hear from physicians on my clinical rotations. Phrased somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the wording allows me to answer either in jest or in earnest. "An astronaut," I…

“What do you want to be when you grow up?”

It’s a question I frequently hear from physicians on my clinical rotations. Phrased somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the wording allows me to answer either in jest or in earnest.

“An astronaut,” I sometimes say, hoping for laughs and no follow-up. Other times, I try out different responses like Halloween costumes: a critical care specialist, an emergency physician, a surgeon. If I want the questioner’s …

My name is not “Med Student”

Anonymous

January 8, 2020Jan 8, 202017

"I should explain to you, Socrates, that our friend Cratylus has been arguing about names; he says they are natural and not conventional; […] that there is a truth or correctness in them." - Plato I once heard that the…

“I should explain to you, Socrates, that our friend Cratylus has been arguing about names; he says they are natural and not conventional; […] that there is a truth or correctness in them.”
– Plato

I once heard that the sound of one’s name is the most beautiful thing in the universe, which is probably an overstatement. But one’s name is one of the first words one hears from birth, as parents …

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My name is not “Med Student”

Give your psychiatric patients a reason to trust

Anonymous

December 29, 2019Dec 29, 2019

I had been diagnosed three days prior, given lithium to stabilize and a benzodiazepine to sleep. I went home. Things did not get better. I had been admitted just that morning after a long, confusing night in the ED. I…

I had been diagnosed three days prior, given lithium to stabilize and a benzodiazepine to sleep. I went home. Things did not get better.

I had been admitted just that morning after a long, confusing night in the ED. I did not yet understand the severity of what had happened — or even what had happened. The mania was still mostly euphoric and speckled with bursts of joy, but between these …

The excitement of clinical rotations: Not just learning medicine but doing medicine

Orly Farber

December 27, 2019Dec 27, 2019

The first time a woman went into the final stage of labor, I watched from a corner of the room. As a third-year medical student, I was on my six-week clinical rotation in obstetrics and gynecology, and it was day one of the two-week portion on the labor and delivery floor. As a loudspeaker announcement projected over the woman’s screams, and nurses and doctors rushed in response, I instinctively clasped …

For students with test stress, medical schools leave a void

Steve Blatt, MD

December 27, 2019Dec 27, 2019

I’m writing this for my tribe of worriers and self-doubters, people for whom ever-present test stress is inextricable to the med school experience. Sure, every medical student becomes preoccupied fretting over exams to some degree. That’s part of what you sign up for. But our preoccupation is something greater than that—it towers over us and bullies us. It makes us cower in the corner, begging to be spared from harm.

We’re …

Why this medical student is pursuing a dual MD/JD

Ton La, Jr., MD, JD

December 26, 2019Dec 26, 20195

I am frequently asked: "Why are you pursuing a dual MD/JD?" Neither profession is a family business; no one in my family is a doctor or a lawyer — but I’ve always dreamt big. I always wanted to get the…

I am frequently asked: “Why are you pursuing a dual MD/JD?” Neither profession is a family business; no one in my family is a doctor or a lawyer — but I’ve always dreamt big. I always wanted to get the most possible out of my education. Beginning in elementary school, I knew I wanted to be a doctor, but it was not until college that I …

What I learned from starting medical school in January

Gaelle Antoine, MD

December 14, 2019Dec 14, 2019

I graduated from an international medical school this past spring. I'm currently in the midst of a preliminary year as an internal medicine resident at St. John's Riverside Hospital in Yonkers, N.Y. Next year, I'll start my dream residency in…

I graduated from an international medical school this past spring. I’m currently in the midst of a preliminary year as an internal medicine resident at St. John’s Riverside Hospital in Yonkers, N.Y. Next year, I’ll start my dream residency in anesthesiology at Brown University.

Like many physicians, my journey to medicine has had its share of twists and turns. But my story is slightly different than the …

The scents in the hospital are from diseases you’ll never forget

Yoo Jung Kim, MD

December 13, 2019Dec 13, 2019

There's a pivotal scene in the 2007 Pixar movie Ratatouille, in which the restaurant critic Anton Ego takes a first bite of the movie's titular food. He is then whisked back to a moment in his childhood, during which his…

There’s a pivotal scene in the 2007 Pixar movie Ratatouille, in which the restaurant critic Anton Ego takes a first bite of the movie’s titular food. He is then whisked back to a moment in his childhood, during which his mom provides love and comfort through a helping of her homemade ratatouille. This scene is a homage to Marcel Proust’s seminal “Madeleine Episode,” as described In Search of Lost Time, published almost …

A letter to a cancer patient in palliative care

Alison Vasa

December 10, 2019Dec 10, 2019

I heard about you a few times before I ever met you in person. It was my first day on the palliative care service — a week that felt like a relaxing break from the sixteen-hour days I was used…

I heard about you a few times before I ever met you in person. It was my first day on the palliative care service — a week that felt like a relaxing break from the sixteen-hour days I was used to on surgery. Many people don’t know what palliative care is. But I suspect these days if you are still living that you know it well.

I first heard of you …

What challenges do you see yourself facing as a doctor?

Eric Tian

December 3, 2019Dec 3, 2019

“What challenges do you see yourself facing as a doctor?” I’m sitting in a suit, facing a young Asian woman with black, round glasses across a desk. On the desk in front of her is an iPad, and she sits…

“What challenges do you see yourself facing as a doctor?”

I’m sitting in a suit, facing a young Asian woman with black, round glasses across a desk. On the desk in front of her is an iPad, and she sits cross-legged, hands resting on her legs. I’m in my interview for medical school, and the woman across me, who introduced herself as Angela, is awaiting my response.

I pause and mentally check …

Medical education

Articles, page 34

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