Inside Med School

As you know, this morning was my first exam in medical school! I showed up about 30 minutes early because it’s my first test and I was really nervous/neurotic about not being late. It was a good thing I showed up so early too because they gave us a free continental breakfast before the test, which I thought was very nice. The orange juice really hit the spot. Any ways at about 10 minutes before the exam, it was as if a silent alarm went off and everyone slowly flooded into the doors of the exam room. It was funny cause right before the test everybody was talking and laughing outside, but as soon as we got into the room everybody had their game face on.

So right off the bat, the first thing that blew my mind was that the scantron had choices from A through J! That pretty much eliminates the guessing advantage of a multiple choice test. However, the proctor explained that this is the format of the USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination) well have to take at the end of next year. Apparently, the majority of our tests will be administered in a similar format to that exam, which is very helpful. No one showed up late, and without delay the exam was on its way. The pace of the exam was designed to give you 1.2 minutes per question, but right off the bat I was answering questions much quicker than that. So I actually had to slow myself down to avoid making silly mistakes. The test was pretty long, but I don’t think it was that tricky. There were about three questions that I wasn’t sure of, because I don’t remember every studying that material. Other than that, I think that since I got through all the material and studied it sufficiently I was fine for the exam. One thing that I keep hearing from older med students is that, the “material isn’t that difficult; it’s just the volume that’ll get ya”. So at least for this test, I would say that since I got therough the material I did well on the exam.

So the test ended at about noon. So right when I was ready to breath out a big sigh of relief they busted my happy bubble by passing out our next set of module notes. The last packet of notes for this exam was 275 pages. The new notes are 375 pages long! O well. So we had an hour for lunch and then had to come back for two more lectures.

The lecture after lunch was pretty cool. It was a nice break from the sciences courses like biochemistry, genetics, and microanatomy. It was about pregnancy counseling. It covered, typical concerns women and families have concerning pregnancies. It also covered the questions most important to ask in a patient interview, to deliver a proper prenatal diagnosis. The lecture was designed to be an introduction to our next set of lectures, which will be collectively related to the topic of an abnormal amniocentesis (a pre-natal diagnosis of genetic disorders detected from cells extracted from amniotic fluid.) It was nice because it was our first taste of how to approach a patient like a doctor/detective and how to ask the right questions. The lecturer said that by the end of a proper patient interview, you should have everything you need to make an accurate diagnosis, and the tests you order should be used to confirm or reject that diagnosis. It’s going to be exciting once all this information comes together, and I can start making such a diagnosis. I can’t wait!

Afterwards, during the following lecture on biochemistry, I got an email on my phone that said the exam scores were ready. This caused a little bit of a buzz during class. Most people said they didn’t want to check their grades till after the weekend for obvious reasons. I was on the fence, but I decided to check. I got an 86% on genetics and 90% on biochemistry! So I’m glad I checked cause now I’m in a great mood. Everybody else did well too, because the means were 86% and 84% respectively. So right now I’m on cloud 9. I’m not even upset that lectures starts at 8 am tomorrow. Plus tomorrow should be very interesting because it’s our first laboratory in Histology! And afterwards we have a very exciting welcome back dinner, where the first and second year students can finally meet and greet with the third and fourth year medical students! Should be really fun.

This is it!

In T minus 12 hours, I’ll be taking my first exam of Medical School! This morning we had two separate review sessions, which were very helpful. I had a few questions, and the professors did a very good job of clarifying the concepts that were a little unclear for me. After that, we had the rest of the afternoon to study. I spent the day glossing over all the details and followed up with another review of all my notes. I started studying at 11am and then stopped at 6pm to go to a meeting for the American Medical Association (Mostly cause they were giving out free pizza and drinks.) So after the meeting I decided to call it a day. I finally feel confident about this exam, and at this point I don’t think there is much more I can study. I might do a quick skim of my notes again, but nothing serious. At this point, instead of stressing out I’ll try and relax and go to bed early today. I’m actually very excited because I feel pretty confident about this exam. In the future, we will have much more difficult exams covering much more material in less time. I’m probably going to dread those exams, so for now I’ll try and savor this feeling of confidence and anticipation of my first test. Wish me Luck!

O yea before I forget. It turns out that if you’re lucky enough, some professors in med school actually have a good sense of humor. Here is a little picture I took in class with my phone.

Look closely! You are not mistaken; that is indeed a genetic pedigree of different flavors of Ben and Jerry’s! Apparently different alleles are analogous to different flavors of ice cream.

First off if you were wondering why I didn’t have an update this weekend, it’s because I ended up going to a family wedding in Dallas this weekend. I would not recommend doing that right after your first week of medical school! Needless to say I didn’t study as much as I would have liked. Regardless, there aren’t any excuses in med school, so I worked extra hard and slept less to catch up to the studying I need to do for this Thursday’s exam. After talking to the second year med students, the consensus seems to be that this test is a big wake up call compared to undergrad exams; however, it’s by far the easiest test of the year! Therefore, I want to take full advantage of this, and ace this test to buffer my grades for the rest of the year. To be honest if this was undergrad, it would feel like finals week, but it’s only week one of med school! Don’t get me wrong though, So far the material hasn’t been too difficult. In fact the concepts are fairly easy to grasp, it’s just that there is a lot of material to cover in much shorter time than I’m used to. But it’s totally manageable. So far, I’ve managed to go on two bike rides, a run, watch some TV, and even go to a wedding in Dallas. So my life hasn’t completely shut down. What I would say, is that I’ve really had to focus on adjusting and re-prioritizing my time. That being said, I still have to take that first test. Until I get my grade back, this is all just speculation. But I attended a few group study sessions and I feel pretty comfortable with the material so far. I just need to spend the next two days ironing out all the details. Any ways it’s back to studying for now.

Today was a short day. We had two hours of biochemistry (which got pretty dense,) and an hour of genetics. So we were done by noon. So I took advantage of the extra free time to go on a bike ride. I rode along the Schuylkill ( pronounced skookle) river, and it was really nice to see all the different university teams rowing on the river. It’s a very beautiful scenic ride and it loops around so you can get a pretty good workout. Sorry I didn’t take any pictures, but I definitely will next time I go. Any ways, I’ve been studying pretty much non-stop the last couple of days, mostly cause I’m still excited and have a lot of energy to do so. But this ride did help me clear my head and enjoy the outdoors. I also think it made me a little more productive today because I got through the readings and notes I wanted to a lot sooner than I expected to. So hopefully I can manage my time well when classes get tougher so I can do this more often because I really enjoyed it.

Hey everyone. So today was a short day. We had two lectures. Two hours of biochem (that was pretty rough) and one hour of genetics.  So we were done by noon today. So I took advantage of the extra free time to go on a bike ride. It was

Yesterday was our annual activities fair. I didn’t know what to expect, but I was pleasantly surprised by how many different booths were set up, to represent all the various clubs. There was a club or interest group for all the major medical specialties, like oncology, family medicine, surgery, etc. There was even one for aerospace medicine! Which was really cool, cause that’s an area of medicine that I didn’t even know existed before, but now I’m really interested to learn more about it.

Off the top of my head, I would say there were about 10 different interest groups/clubs about medical specialties. There were about 6 different volunteer groups that let their members volunteer at various clinics for underserved populations around Philadelphia. I was most interested in learning about the clinics. One of the clinics that I really liked was a clinic that focuses on wound care, infection control, and needle exchange programs, for drug users. Another one that was interesting to me was a Chinatown clinic that deals with a mostly migrant population, and offers students an opportunity to learn techniques to overcome language barriers in medicine. It’s nice to get involved in a clinical group like this, because when classes get really tough and I need a break to maintain my sanity I can always volunteer my time at a clinic and remind myself about why I’m working so hard in the first place. I think it’s important to remind yourself that becoming a doctor should be about treating patients. Plus we can all benefit from opportunities to help others, not just medically.

There were also some non-clinical volunteer groups that I signed up for. One was a group that reads to kids, and another is a group that performs talent shows at geriatric centers. I also signed up for some sports like intramural basketball, flag football, a bicycling club, and even a running club.

Let’s be honest, I probably won’t have time for most of these, and the students running these clubs realized that too. Basically, the advice the second years gave us before the event was to get on as many e-mail lists as possible and learn as much about the clubs as possible. That way, we can decide which ones we really want to participate in and we can always just unsubscribe to the email lists if we’re not interested.

Today was my first day of Medical School! As you can imagine, I’ve been looking forward to this day for quite a long time. In fact I had a mixture of emotions the night before. Some of it was nervousness, but most of it was excitement.  I was so excited that I set 4 different alarms for the day to make sure I got up on time. Turns out I didn’t need it cause I couldn’t sleep because of all the excitement.

Despite all the anticipation, and the importance of this event, the day was actually pretty un-eventful. In fact, it was actually a really laid back day.

<9:00am -9:30am> Intro to medical biochemistry

<9:30am -10:30am> Fundamental Concepts in biochemistry

<10:30am-11:30am> Genetics: introduction

<11:30-1pm> Lunch

<1-2pm> Biochem: Macromolecules: Nucleic Acids

<2-3pm> Biochem: Amino Acids

The schedule is a lot like being in high school, cause you’re in class from the morning to afternoon everyday. The lectures are a lot like the undergrad lectures I had. The only difference is that the pace is A LOT FASTER! Fortunately, today and for most of this week, most of the topics were’ talking about will be a review for me. What I’m worried about is that if they keep lecturing at this pace with material I haven’t seen before, that’s when things will start getting tough. Also, one thing that’s different from undergrad is that you don’t have a break between lectures. All lectures are in the same lecture hall and the professors come to you, instead of the other way around. Also the transition between professors and classes is instant. So it ends up feeling like one really long lecture.

So far so good. Class was pretty light today, and I have a bunch of time to pre-examine the lecture material for tomorrow and the rest of the week. We’ll see how long I can keep this up. The main thing that everyone says is that whatever you do, DO NOT FALL BEHIND! So I’ll try and take advantage of this easy week and study ahead to give myself a cushion, because I know damn well, I’m going to need it later on. For now, I’m just looking forward to starting histology labs, and our first exam, which will be next Thursday.

There are three major milestones in the career of a medical student. The first is the white coat ceremony, the second is match-day (the day you find out what residency program you matched to,) and last is commencement. Before the ceremony, I thought this was a pretty strange tradition, because it’s almost like a graduation before we’ve even done anything. But by the end of the ceremony, I realized the full significance of this event.

The ceremony is designed to re-iterate the importance of everything the white coat comes to symbolize. They emphasized that the white coat is the most recognizable feature of a physician and comes to represent compassion, empathy, caring, responsibility, and honor.

The ceremony lasted about 2 hours, and consisted of several very inspirational speeches. They reminded us medical students that everything we do from this starting point of our career, should be for the benefit of our patients.  Our profession is one of compassion, and sacrifice, and a white coat is a symbol of that commitment.

It was a very surreal experience to hand over my white coat to my cloaker. As she cloaked me with my coat, I gotta admit a chill went down my spine. It ‘s an amazing experience. In an instant, I fully understood the scope of the task that lies ahead, and I was eager and willing to accept it for the good of my future patients.

Once we all received our white coats, we all recited the Hippocratic oath, and the residing physicians renewed their oath. I think it’s important to include the oath in its entirety.

The Oath of Hippocrates:

I SOLEMNLY SWEAR OR AFFIRM, by whatever I hold most sacred:

That I will be loyal to the profession of medicine and just and generous to its members;

That I will lead my life and practice my art in uprightness and in honor;

That into whatsoever house I shall enter; it shall be for the good of the sick to the utmost of my power; holding myself far aloof from wrong, from corruption, from the tempting of others to vice;

That I will exercise my art solely for the benefit of my patients, and will give no drug, or perform no operation, for a criminal purpose, even if solicited, far less suggest it;

That whatsoever I shall see or hear of the lives of patients which is not fitting to be spoken, I will keep inviolably secret.

These things I do swear or affirm.

After the ceremony there was a very nice reception where we all got to mingle with the alumni, physicians, and our parents. I was skeptical at first about the importance of this ceremony, but I truly believe this will be a memorable point in my life that I will come back to often. So for those of you, who are skeptical like I was, make sure you take this ceremony seriously, and try and get your parents to join and participate in this important milestone. Trust me, it’s worth it.

Here is a quick update from the previous two days.

On Tuesday, we had another set of seminars that ended at about 3:30. After that, a really good barbeque restaurant catered a barbeque out on the front lawn.

From there we all set out on several trolleys to take a historic tour of Philadelphia. Our tour guide was really funny, and I learned a lot about Philadelphia and American history. From there the trolley’s dropped us off at a really cool Irish pub. We had the entire second floor reserved. Most of the class showed up, and we had free appetizers, so it turned out to be a really good time.

Thursday was the last day of orientation. Fortunately the schedule was shorter, cause most people were pretty spent from the night before at the pub. We had a few seminars about infection control and some more administrative stuff. Then we ended pretty early to take our class of 2013 group picture. This week orientation week has been pretty fun.

We’ve been going out every night and having fun, but we got our first tangible taste of reality today when they handed out our class notes for August 10th to 20th. It’s 275 pages of notes!!! And they said that this is the lightest it’s ever going to be!

Since we ended early, we had some time to rest before we went to the alumni barbeque. The barbeque was really nice. It was at a country club, so the food was really good. Everyone got to play some volleyball, swim in the pool, and play some ultimate Frisbee. The best part was that the alumni came around to the different tables and sat down to talk to us about school and life as a physician.. Best of all was that the alumni passed out business cards and seemed very eager to help us out with anything we might need.

After that, most people headed out to an “unofficial” social event at another bar that was hosting some pretty good local bands. We got there at about 10, but the place didn’t start getting crazy till about 12. The live bands were really good, and the DJ on the second floor started playing some good music by the end of the night, so the dance floor got pretty packed. People were still rolling in by 12:30, but I decided to head out to get some rest before the White coat ceremony on the next day.

Orientation!!! Today was the first day of orientation, and I must say that I officially feel like a med school student. As far as the schedule is concerned, orientation wasn’t that much different than undergrad orientation. Despite the fact that Drexel Med has a relatively large incoming class of about 250 students, the main thing is that med school class sizes make for a much more intimate orientation than undergrad. Everybody was very eager to meet new people, and it really is a unique experience. Throughout the day, you could literally go up to anyone and spark a conversation, because everyone was excited to meet each other. Over the next four years I suspect we’re going to create a pretty close family among our classmates and it was exciting to get to meet them for the first time.

Like I said, today was a pretty full day, so I guess its best to give a rundown of the day. The schedule was organized from 8am to 11pm.  The day started with all the 1^st year students arriving and receiving their nametags. From there, we partook in a pretty cool tradition. The school set up a giant map of the United States, and each of us placed a sticker on the city/town we are from. It’s cool, because they keep this map and will update it with the location of the residency programs we will go to after med school.

From there we had a typical continental breakfast/mingling session till the seminars started. The seminars were typical of stuff you’ve probably gone through several times in your life. The topics covered professionalism, campus resources, financial aid, safety, and other administrative stuff. That lasted from about 10-12. From there we had lunch for an hour. One of the surprises was a mobile cupcake truck that delivered cupcakes. I guess it was a big enough deal, cause there was local radio news coverage of the cupcake arrival.

After lunch we had a few more seminars, and then broke out into small groups. In our groups we received our white coats so that we could try them and make any modifications before our prestigious white coat ceremony, which will be this Friday at Aug, 7^th,2009.

Lastly, we went for another campus tour in our small groups. Which was nice, because even though we got a tour on the day of our interview, it’s hard to appreciate everything when you’re still an applicant and are nervous about your upcoming interview.  Also, the school looks a lot different with the new perspective that this will be my home for the next four years. So I definitely enjoyed the tour a lot more this time around.After the tour, we had to go through several different lines to get ID cards, other photos, and make modifications to our white coats.

When all the mandatory stuff was taken care of we had about an hour and a half before we left to see the Philly’s game! We took several buses to the park and got there about 2 hours earlier, so most people just went into this really big sports bar attached to the stadium. We hung out and had a few drinks before the game started. I must say, people in Philadelphia take their sports very seriously. The stadium was a sea of red shirts, and I felt very out of place with my blue shirt. But other than that, it was awesome, and Citizens Bank Park is a really nice stadium. We all sat in the same section and enjoyed the game, mingled, and had an over-all good time. Unfortunately the Philly’s lost, but it was fun either way.

We got back to campus at about 11am and a bunch of people then went to a local bar to keep it going. By that time I was pretty tired, so I passed on the bar. It’s pretty funny cause I heard a couple times that med students study hard, but party harder. I really doubt that, but I’m starting to see how that could be true. All in all, a major impression I got from today is that most of the day was a pretty strong confirmation that I’m in for a difficult year, full of lots of stress and hard work. However, today’s events also gave me a glimpse of the fun I can have to break up my rigorous schedule, and most importantly, I got a very re-assuring glimpse into the co-operative family atmosphere I’ll share with my classmates. Till then I’m going to get some rest and get ready for another full day. Any ways, I still have a full day that starts at 9am again tomorrow, so I’ll fill you in on that later.