End of Placement 3.

What a placement. It actually went by a lot faster than I thought it would as I hated my first week of placements. In the end, it wasn't too bad. Definitely found out colorectal surgery is not for me. I can never seem to orientate myself in theatre especially during laparoscopic procedures. Everything looks the same! Just bowels here and there. Clinics were alright - completely understand why consultants hate it though. It's usually the same old things - over and over again. Only been to 2.5 clinics - and to be fair - it was starting to get repetitive and boring. I must admit, I am a bit embarrassed by the fact that I only turned up to ward rounds ONCE in the entire 4 weeks of placement. Oops. 7:30am ward rounds are too early - Note to self: don't get admitted as a patient to a hospital with 7:30am ward rounds - no wonder most of the patients we saw on ward round were cranky. You're ill/in pain and you're tired - 7:30 am a team of 5+ doctors (have seen teams of 10) crowd around your bed - doctor takes a feel/ask a few questions and then disappear. As a patient, that would really tick me off, but then again I'm not the most cheerful person in the morning.

What else have I learned on this placement? As previously mentioned in an earlier post - common sense takes you a long way. Oh and some consultants are actually human and love to talk about other stuff other than medicine. And again especially at busy hospitals - medical students are probably the least important things in the hospital - be prepared to get ignored/no one caring about you. That's reality and you just have to be proactive and be responsible for your own learning.

Next placement will be in endocrinology. Don't know what to expect; however, I don't even think I will have time to go into placement as exams are around the corner (December). Need to really study and start focusing. Can't tell you how stressed I am - it's mental. Like most students - I hate revising. The only thing that keeps me going is the future. I keep telling myself that once these exams are over I can slack off again and it'll be a year before my next exam. Can't wait as we just had our year-end exams in May - so it's only been 6ish months. The thought of 2nd year exams/revision still scares me - it was tough/a nightmare. At least this year's December exam will be more clinical (what I like) and not as science based. Still a bit lost as to what to study. Just hoping the best and hoping that I'm studying the right material as this year - we've hardly had any guidance. Eep.