“I just want to learn the abdomen and the pelvis”, I thought to myself, while staring at our donor’s metastasized body. Nothing looked normal, tumor was everywhere, and for the 4th lab my group looked at each other, looked at the lab steps, and concluded it was going to be “just another day where we just … found what we could find and did … …
Cancer in the gross anatomy lab
I recently had quite a long conversation with a college senior that was just accepted into medical school for this coming fall.
As a rising fourth year medical student myself, I would like to think that I have navigated the waters of academia and figured out both efficient paths to success and avoidance of roadblocks and setbacks. …
5 easy steps to become a better medical student
Here’s some advice to think about before starting clinical rotations during the third year of medical school.
Don’t sit in the back of the plane
The basic sciences are important to learn the vocabulary and grammar of medicine. Clinical rotations are different – it’s where you actually learn to be a physician. If you use the analogy of learning to fly, …
Practical advice for medical students starting clinical rotations
I went off to medical school thirty-seven years ago.
For the era, I went to what folks regarded as a very progressive place. It had a curriculum that was quite revolutionary for the time. Among other things, we started having interactions with actual patients during our first year, rather than the third year, as was traditional then.
These days many, probably most, medical schools …
Why medical students should be closely observed with patients
Medical school should be free.
That’s an argument made by physicians Peter B. Bach and Robert Kocher in the New York Times.
This isn’t a new concept. I’ve discussed whether medical school should be free for students who choose primary care. And, for some in the country, it’s already happening. Like at Case Western Reserve University, for instance. The Cleveland Clinic …
Would free medical school be enough to save primary care?
Armed with tools I have never used or seen before I entered a physical exam practice room for the first day of learning.
Having finished history-taking practices last semester, we were now beginning a new chapter, learning to take a head-to-toe physical exam. Before class began, we were told to read a book and …
Doing the physical exam for the first time as a medical student
Why does health care seem to lag behind other industries in innovation?
There’s a temptation to manufacture reasons that don’t necessarily explain why health care has not seen the kinds of revolutionary changes evident in industries from computing and telecommunications to music and retail? People routinely marvel at how easy it is to manage their bank account these days, but they don’t appreciate continuing to wait hours in their doctors’ offices, …
How medical students are key to innovating in medicine
by James Lamberg
When medical students are applying for residency positions, what do program directors care about most? This may become the ultimate question for many students on clinical rotations.
Thankfully, publications exist to help answer this very problem.
Unfortunately, many students are not aware of this published information. In a 2005 article from Medical Education Online titled “Residency Selection …
Getting into residency: What medical students need to know
by Kristine Casal
The moment you get accepted to medical school, you never really think about how everything is going to be different. You figure everything’s going to stay the way they are, with the exception of the inevitable long and laborious hours of studying day and night. You don’t think about how much time you won’t have …
Transitions of a first year medical student
On May 15, 2011, 147 students embarked on their careers as doctors as they graduated from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
One student, Jenny Rowland, who will pursue a career in Radiology and continue her training at Penn, shared her personal thoughts and emotions as she prepared to graduate.
by Jenny Rowland, MD
I’m not a typical PennMed student.
I’m 31 years old, and I …
The difficult road to becoming a doctor
I recently had the opportunity to go to the anatomy lab and help the first years go through the pelvic anatomy. What a blast! There is nothing like dissecting a cadaver to tune up one’s surgical anatomy skills, and helping young eager medical students through it is a great experience.
Prior to going into the lab, I spent many hours going through Netter’s atlas to brush up on the anatomy so …
Going through Netter’s to teach medical students pelvic anatomy
An excerpt from Med School Admissions Secrets.
by Jason Spears
There are currently 134 allopathic medical schools in the United States and you need to select approximately 20 schools.
You are not going to randomly pick, instead there is a system to getting into medical school.
The first step is ranking schools in the following manner:
Obviously, the top-tier med schools have high admissions standards based on MCAT and GPA. No …
The science of getting into medical school
When does medical school officially begin? Is it when you are given your white coat? When you sit through your first orientation activity? When you listen to your first lecture? Or when someone first mistakes you for a doctor?
While medical school commencement is truly is an amalgam of all of these things, the answer to this question is …
Medical school starts with anatomy lab
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The Theresa Brown furor has got me thinking. To be honest, I don’t think the doctor’s apparent offense was really that bad. I remember giving and taking worse.
When I was at medical school and in specialist training, there were senior doctors and nurses of legendary temper and bad disposition. Tiptoeing around them, and working to their satisfaction, however unreasonable, was an accepted part of the job. But the …
A tough disposition is required to endure physician training
Becoming a doctor is a long and arduous process. Between taking pre-med courses, taking the MCAT
, applying to medical schools, matriculating, then taking test after test after test until you take the big one (USMLE Step 1) before which you did questions all day long for weeks from a good USMLE question bank …
Why doctors should pursue another degree
Like any kid who always wanted to be a doctor, I went to medical school to learn how to help people. Just wearing the white coat during orientation week had people looking at me differently, expecting me to know something more than I did just a week before. One of my classmates was even asked for …
Medical students asking a patient about death
“Psychiatry consult, returning a page,” she said, cradling the phone between her left ear and left shoulder. Digging around in her pockets, she eventually pulled out a half-sheet of paper that wasn’t already covered in barely legible writing and boxes marked with Xs. Her right hand clicked the pen and prepared to write.
“Hi, this is Cardiology,” the male voice on the phone said. Doctors tend to lose their names when they …
Why medical students should go through a psychiatry rotation
I am really enjoying my geriatrics rotation.
Although my attending preceptor is primarily a geriatrician, and practices deep in the heart of retiree central in southeast Florida, he also sees some patients who are younger. I took a history on a patient who was younger than me today, in her early thirties.
She started off complaining about insomnia and headaches, and then said …
Bereavement related depression and consoling a new widow
I realized last week one of the hardest mindset transitions that I’m having to make as a medical student. It has to do with not really feeling like I belong, and the need to really make my patients … well, MY patients!
As a medical student, you can actually function reasonably well without ever having to actually see a patient.
You can read …
Medical students are part of each patient’s health care team
by Chris Chen
Recently in lecture, our professor wryly mentioned that in his many years of teaching, he had never seen so many laptops out as well as so many people taking advantage of the option to watch videos instead of attending class.
That was fine with him, he commented, as long as people were learning—although he was skeptical that students on laptops would learn as much, …
How skipping medical school lecture is preparing doctors for the future
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