O&G - Done!

One of the most stressful days ever. Let's just say this placement never really got my heart rate and blood pressure up until today (my last day). Waited to do my final assessment with my supervisor and I was really stressed out. Hate waiting around. You see if this was one day earlier, I would not be as stressed out. I was a bit of a smart ass and booked to leave for home 1 day before official holiday. Seriously talk about luck. Supervisor couldn't do my assessment until my final day...5 hours before the departure of my train to go to the airport. Essentially, we are allowed to resit our assessment if our supervisor believe we are incompetent. You would usually resit the assessment immediately or the week after, BUT because we are doing our assessment in the final week  on my last day of placement, I don't really get another go. So that means I have ONE shot at this assessment. I pass...I pass. I fail...let's just say that is NOT an option. I essentially needed a bit of skill (to pass the assessment) and a heck lot of luck to not only pass my assessment, but to also catch my train. Doing an assessment is already stressful enough especially when you've got only 1 shot at it. Travelling is also another very stressful thing. Put the two together (assessment AND travelling) is the formula for a heart attack. Yes why should I be worrying about my assessment? I worked hard. I came in every day. Didn't skive. Studied...a bit. Practiced my examination skills quite a bit. So why am I not confident? Simple. Anything can happen eg. bad luck such as getting a difficult patient, blanking out aka brain fart, nerves, etc. I think I'm pretty chill with my supervisor and I don't really "fear" him that much, BUT at the end of the day yes he is a person...but he is also my SUPERVISOR, which I cannot forget. He essentially is the one who determines whether I pass or fail this placement. Kind of hard not to be a bit scared/nervous/stressed/intimidated.

Anyways luckily I passed my assessment and it all went very well. Got all my forms signed off, handed in my locker keys, and next thing I knew, I was saying my goodbyes to the staff and shaking hands with my supervisor: "I guess that's it. 7 weeks. Done. I really enjoyed the placement. Thank you. Maybe we will meet again in the future, maybe not. It was a pleasure to meet you and your team. Thanks again." It was probably the first genuine "thank you" I have said to a supervisor at the end of a placement. These last 7 weeks have opened my eyes and taught me not to judge. I have never done so much active learning in one placement. Best bit: I wanted to learn. I wasn't forced. What a great overall placement. I guess the only way to show your gratitude towards a placement is to work hard and show that you have learned. Actions certainly do speak louder than words. Even my good friend said that if only my supervisor saw what type of student I was on placements and how much I have changed in terms of motivation and work ethic - only then it is obvious how much I enjoyed this placement.

What a placement. Who would've thought.

5 Weeks.

Well okay not exactly 5 weeks but close enough. Anyone care to take a guess 5 weeks until what?

If you said exams...you are CORRECT! It has come to that time of the year that every medical student dreads - EXAMS. Well for my university...not sure about others...passing the year 100% relies on 3 exam papers which are done 3 days in a row. Stressful much?! I dread it so much. It can easily be the 3 worst days in my life. No matter how much you study you will not know everything on the paper. Unlike back in school - you study...you go to the exam...you know everything - easy. Medicine? Study like no end...think you've covered everything...get to exam day and first page of the exam - BAM - you have no bleeping clue about the question. It is BOUND to happen. Now as a 2nd year medical student we have to also know last year's material so technically we will be examined on 2 years worth of knowledge. Not like one year isn't hard enough eh?

I have started studying since end of February...now I am about 3/4 way through the material. Now thinking back...I don't think I remember really anything from what I studied in February (which was all of last year's material). Great. Oh and NEVER look at a specimen paper in the middle of revision just because you got curious or whatever. With no doubt you will most likely scare the crap out of yourself as you'll see questions in there that you have no clue about and then cue panic attack/major stress. I made that mistake a few days ago...and I nearly cracked, but I haven't actually studied the section that the question was aimed for, but still - it was not a pleasant feeling.

The only nice thing about only having 3 papers is that we can get it all done with in 3 days. Nice and short - just extremely torturous. At least now having already taken an exam last year, I know now what to expect in this year's exam and will be more prepared. Last year, I had absolutely no clue what the exam would be like. Armed with experience I think I am a bit more confident this year than I was last year. One major difference is that I started studying MUCH earlier than I did last year so I won't be rushing through revision and causing unnecessary stress.

5 weeks...jeez. I'm really scared. Haha. Instead of losing an hour sleep can we possibly increase the days to about 30 hours just until exam time? It would be very useful. Oh and to make matters worse, the SSC attachment I have been talking about...well my final report (2500 words) is due in a few days. Great...time to wave goodbye to good quality sleep and hello long hours of studying through the night!

Unnecessary Stress?

Lately I have been getting a bit stressed. And I do not know if I am giving myself unnecessary stress. I've been having a lot on my mind. As some of you know, I am a Canadian and an international student studying in the UK. Just for good back-up should I take the Canadian registry exam so if things go bad or for some reason I have to return home to work I can. I have done some research and some people say take the exam after 2nd year because all the sciences stuff will be fresh in your mind. Some say do it after 3rd year so you have a bit more knowledge about the clinical side of medicine. Then there are some who say after 5th year (aka after graduating from medical school) because I would be more mature to take the exam. There are pros and cons for each year but you know if I am considering taking the exam after 2nd year or 3rd year I should really get thinking. I really do not know what to do. I'm stuck. In a way I am a bit hesitant about taking the exam after 5th year as I am worried I'll forget all the sciences stuff. But on the other hand, 2nd year could be too soon as I need time to study and it is now November...well in a few days it will be November and I also have to study for my final exam in the summer. Might be giving myself too much work! So in a way 3rd year seems like a good time but is it really too early to be taking the exam?

Second, I have a strong passion for surgery. Ever since I had the opportunity to learn/discover about surgery I have been non-stop thinking "I want to be a surgeon". Also for my 2 week hospital placements to shadow surgeons/doctors, I was fortunate enough to be paired with a general surgeon and a paediatric surgeon. Compared to others I found surgery really interesting. Can't believe some people say it is boring and actually would do anything to avoid going to watch surgery. I have been criticized by people that I am thinking too early, but to be honest, it is never too early. I want to prepare myself and really try to find as early as possible what I want to specialize in and whether or not surgery is genuinely right for me. About three years ago I was first exposed to Orthopaedic surgery. I was hooked. I thought it was interesting and I really enjoy sports medicine. When I reached medical school, I have seen a lot of surgeons/doctors teasing orthopaedic surgeons which essentially put me right off. "The carpenter of the hospital." "Oh you hear the hammering and drilling sounds? Ah must be the orthopaedic surgeons working." It seems to be that orthopaedic surgeons don't get enough respect. I personally feel that they should get a lot more respect than they really do as they do help a lot of people's lives feel better. Yeah they might not always be saving a life like a neurosurgeon or a trauma surgeon, but they have their part in changing someone's life for the better. Anyways so after being put off from orthopaedics, I found that I had a huge interest in learning about the heart. So I thought about cardiothoracic surgery. Sounds great. Love the anatomy of the heart, get to save lots of lives, prevent people from dying, and great pathology. Oh wait....it is at risk of getting phased out by them interventional radiologists. Plus the other day I went to attend a talk by an Orthopaedic - Spinal surgeon who discussed about thinking about the future. Need to think if the specialty you want to go in will still be here in 10 years time. He listed cardiothoracic and vascular surgery will be at risk. Great. Hmm. I obviously want to do something that has a lot of potential and has plenty of time to develop and not be at risk of disappearing. I did pay a lot of money and study really hard to get into a UK university and I definitely don't want to spend a lot of hard work at training into a specialty which could diminish in a few years time. I like to be on my feet, and excited about the future. The new technologies for surgeons and a field that is developing.

So the other day after attending the spinal surgeon's careers talk, I gave orthopaedics another look. Like it is a field that is developing and we have an aging population. There will be higher demands for hip replacements, knee surgeries, etc. So yeah I'm now jumping back and forth. Deep inside me I feel like I will end up in orthopaedic surgery as I always tend to go back to my first choices. Orthopaedics clicked with me early on and yes pathology isn't huge...but I could do a sub specialty into something that may involve interesting pathology.

Some others I have thought about are surgical oncology and ...well that's as far I have gotten to for now. My mentor is a surgical oncologist and specializes in breast cancer and after having a brutal four hour lecture from him, it actually seems quite interesting. Cancer will be out there for a long time and I don't see it disappearing anytime soon. It is constantly developing. Huge research goes into it. LOTS of people are affected by it. Very interesting pathology. Quite enjoyed it last year when we had lectures on it.

So you're probably thinking:

1. Are you done ranting?
2. Ok so what's the big deal? It isn't like you're graduating next year.
3. ZzzZzzZzz

On top of what I mentioned earlier, to become a surgeon you need a CV that stands out from the rest. What did I do last summer? Relax aka did absolutely nothing. My classmates? Oh well they volunteered and worked at their GP surgeries, went to the hospital to shadow surgeons and doctors. Great....my CV is already looking real unique now...more like in a bad way. So now I'm on full blown motivated mode. To be honest I need to speak to someone about my future. At the moment we are in the midst of changing our mentoring program and we still do not have our new mentors. I don't know how much longer will I have to wait to get my new mentor and I don't know how much longer I can wait with so much in my head. I don't know who else to ask other than my mentor from last year as he seems quite knowledgeable. Maybe I should have a chat with him, but he is soooo busy I feel bad wasting his time when I am no longer his "mentee". Hopefully he'll have the answers. If not, time to search for someone to ask.

Sorry for the long post. Hope everyone is having a great time at uni still and enjoying medicine!

FRESHERS WEEK - SEPT 21, 2009

So today was the very first/official day of Freshers Week at the university. I was super nervous about this day as I didn't know anyone and thought it would be super awkward just wandering around. Gotta say today was probably the most hectic day EVER. So my schedule was kinda like this:

9:30 am - Welcome to the University (Induction talk)
1:00 - 2:00 pm - University Registration (online)
1:15 - 2:15 pm - University Health Services Registration
2:00 pm - Medicine Welcome Talk

Now obviously I had a lot of time between the induction talk and registration. Well as you can see Uni registration and health are at the same time....and then there's a welcome talk from the Medical Department right after. The medical school is about 10-15 walk from the registration place...so that means I should be done registering by 1:45ish. Well when I got to the registration place (Sports Hall) the line up was freaking MASSIVE. I knew right then and there that I was not going to make it to the welcome talk on time...or even be able to make it at all. I got to the line at 12:45pm and didn't get registered til 1:40pm. Then I had to go to health registration and their line was SUPER long as well. No joke I was stressed because I really didn't want to miss the intro talk for Med. The coordinator of health registration said that they will be open til 5pm so I literally just jetted to the med school (and got lost on the way). I was about 10 mins late for the lecture and thank god the lecturer didn't mind.

After the lecture, which was 45 mins long, I decided to go back to health registration (and got lost AGAIN). The line was much shorter now and I had to fill out some forms. Nothing too hard. After health registration I met someone who was in my course. Right after that I seemed to have found a bunch of other medics from my year which was really neat. I've met some of them on facebook already so it was neat to see them in real life. They all seemed so different from their fb pictures so I was a bit surprised. So once I met a few people we all decided to go to the library to register for our email accounts. That was really fast so we decided to take a tour of the library. Every floor pretty much looked the same - no wonder the library is known for an excellent place to play hide and seek.

Once all the registration stuff were done it was about 5pm so I decided to head back home to rest/organize my stuff. I managed to pick up loads of flyers and booklets/welcome packs and my bag weighed a ton. So far it was a pretty exciting day and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Overwhelming but fun. Finally feels like I am at university!

Gotta say I've never lined up for so long to do something...and walked so much. Got home and my legs were aching. I decided to skip out on partying today as I was wayyy too tired and I feel a bit overwhelmed by everything. So far I'm only planning to go to the Medics Fresher Fever party on Thursday.

Oh and some good tips about freshers: MAKE SURE YOU ARE IN THE RIGHT LINE! I saw a few people lining up for an hour plus and didn't realize they were in the wrong line. They were so pissed to have found out that they wasted an hour + of just waiting for nothing. Make sure you follow your schedules and bring a map along if you aren't in a campus university. Also don't be afraid to ask people where things are. People generally are pretty nice and will help you out. I think the best way to get to know a place is to get lost and figure out your way back. You learn the roads better. Also try and meet some people. Say hi to everyone and you'll surely meet someone from your course! It is a lot easier to get around when you know someone.