3 weeks left on the island!!!!

I have 18 days left in the semester!!!!!  That means in 3 weeks time I'll be packing up and heading out.  Where has the time gone? How could 20 months pass by so quickly?  While in the thick of everything, the time seemed to creep by, but I guess it really hasn't.  And this semester seems to have gone by like a flash of lightening.  The 2nds, 3rds, 4ths, and 5ths--we're all looking around trying to figure out how in the world did the last 13 weeks go by in the blink of an eye.  That's what happens when you're busy beyond belief and scratching and scraping to stay alive in the Med School game.  It's no joke and you have to make every single day count.

The 5th semester students started our season of exam hell last week.  Here's the schedule:
Week 1: Wed-Comprehensive (Comp) Exam #1

Week 2: Wed-Pathology Shelf Exam

Week 3: Wed-Physiology Shelf Exam

             Fri-ICM 5 Final Exam

Week 4: Wed-Becker Comp Exam 

             Fri-Comp Exam #2

Who in their right mind wants to take 6 major exams in 4 weeks. Not just major, more like: You have to pass to go on to the next step type of MAJOR! And Comprehensive as in--give me the details from that little obscure nerve discussion from 1st semester, the 9th week of class, during the 1st 7 minutes that the professor talked about in Anatomy or better yet the enzymatic deficiency you learned about during the 8am Biochem time slot 2nd semester.  As bad as it sounds, unfortunately its a necessary evil.  All of these exams are preparing us for the all important USMLE Step1 Exam.  The Exam of all EXAMS!  Your Step 1 score is what determines which Residency programs you will be eligible for and which interviews you will be granted during 3rd year.  So it's a huge deal.  You want to do your best, the first time, on Step 1 because there are no do-overs once you pass.  You get whatever score you get and then you become your score. It sucks, but its reality.

So as we're preparing for the next round of exams we are also wrapping up our final ICM classes.  Our final session was an ER Simulation with "Sim Man"--a insanely expensive dummy that can talk, cry, get IVs, has a pulse, a heart rate, breath sounds and much more.  He can be programmed for many different emergency and non emergency scenarios and have the appropriate vital responses.  Our guy had chest pain which turned out to be an MI.  Our team felt like fish out of water because we really weren't sure what we should do first, last, or in between.  Eventually we got into a groove and started asking the right questions, performing a physical exam and running the appropriate diagnostic tests on our "patient." It was a pretty cool experience but before the next (live) patient codes right in front of us, I hope we'll be more prepared and ready to handle it.

My ICM group was together for the last 8 months(Intro to Clinical Medicine--because every time I say ICM my mom asks me what it stands for).  I'll miss their 9am antics and everyone's unique personalities.  Our Preceptor Dr. Greg did a great job guiding us along to being better students--him and his Little Green Book that confirmed everything he said was always right.  When you spend so much time with people and have to do things as a group, it's nice when everyone gets along and pulls their weight.  I couldn't have asked for a better bunch of crazy folks to be thrown together with!!! Hopefully we'll cross paths again at some point in the future and this is more of a See You Soon than a Goodbye =)

                                                     ICM Group C

Until next time...