Mental Marathon Training

Things are feeling a bit surreal right now. Today, I took my last mandatory exam here on AUC's St. Maarten Campus!!!!! TWENTY [intense, life altering, mentally challenging, grueling, stressful, nerve wracking, anxiety laden--yet all worth it] months of Basic Sciences are over! Done! Finito!

It feels like just yesterday I was saying goodbye to all things familiar in the US and now, it's time to go back.  It's definitely bittersweet!!!  I'll miss this place (more of that in a future post) but it's time to move on to the next stage...errrr...STEP.  I'll be heading back home to the US to study for STEP 1 of the US Medical Licensing Exam which I'll be taking at some point this summer...pray for me y'all! 

While I feel like my brain has definitely gotten a serious mental workout, there's SOOOOO much I still don't know.  Here we learn the fundamentals.  The theory of Medicine.  Kind of like my theory of knowing how to change a tire but never actually doing it...The real, hands on, memorable learning will take place in the hospital wards and I can't wait!  I'm definitely a nerd like that.  Hopefully when the hours are inhumane and a patient has puked (or done worse) on me or too close to me I'll still have this same enthusiastic attitude.  But let me not get ahead of myself.  There's that little, pesky STEP 1 testing business that's standing in my way of getting started.  

Until I get to the hospitals and clinics and start seeing real patients with real problems, where I can translate my book knowledge into practical skill and application hopefully no one asks me for much medical advice.  If you're not imminently dying--I can actually call 9-1-1 (9-1-2 here on the island in case you were wondering) and even potentially perform CPR on you, please go see your doctor.  I still have a long way to go!

But until I get there, I'm going to enjoy this small victory!!

I have a couple "TOP 10" posts in the coming days, so check back soon.  In the meantime I'll be on the island packing then sunbathing, living the life of a tourist, and squeezing in everything I couldn't do while trying to be a good student and trying to get mentally prepared for what lies ahead!

For those taking finals next week, in the words of Dr. N "Best of Luck"!!

Until next time...

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...

Need help choosing a specialty?

Hi friends!  The end is nearer, ish, sorta kinda. My time on the island is coming to an end but my time in school is just reaching the half way point.  Right now we're in the throws of final exams.  I should be studying for my Pharm exam but I needed a mini break so I decided to hit facebook and see how much fun everyone else is having since it's the weekend. 

This road to an MD is soooooo long and one question that non-students ask me all the time, besides where am I going next, is what kind of doctor am I going to be?  I have an idea but I'm going to wait until my rotations get underway to see if it's really what I want to do.  You never know...I may end up loving something else more.  No decisions have to be made for at least another year and a half.  There's also that little test that will play a part in the final decision.  The looming STEP1 exam is really what will force you into one path or another depending on the score you get.

But, in case any of the other future docs out there don't know what field they want to go into yet, maybe this will help! Be sure not to cheat, or lie to yourself when going through the algorithm.  Goodness, this reminds me so much of how I used to study for Med Micro.  

 
the flow chart came from this website


Ok, back to the seemingly endless list of drugs.
Enjoy the weekend!!! Until next time...

A little inspiration

You've got to follow your passion. You've got to figure out what it is you love--who you really are. And have the courage to do that. I believe that the only courage anybody ever needs is the courage to follow your own dreams.

                                                                                      - Oprah Winfrey 
  
In 2 weeks we'll officially be finished with sitting through basic science classes, YAAAAAAY!!  I don't want to celebrate too much because once classes are over, there are a BOATLOAD of reviews and exams and ICM related evals but hey...if the folks before me got through them--SO WILL I!  I'm counting down.  I'm ready for the next part: years 3 and 4.  I'm trying not to rush things because what's around the corner isn't going to be a walk in the park but I'm ready to move on.  I'm not getting any younger...in fact I'm finding more gray hairs.  I'm trying to be patient but I feel like a kid who knows a trip to Disney World is coming up.  Not that I would ever compare the USMLE-STEP1 to Disney but you get my drift.  I can see the light at the end of this tunnel but I'll surely drive myself crazy if I try to think too far into the future.  So I'm going to do my best to slow my racing thoughts and take things one day at a time, one week, one block,one month at a time.
But for the record there are only 66 more days of this semester!!!! 

Ok, back to slowing things down. 

Waaaaaay down, because it's bedtime! 

 

 
Until next time...