Well, your penis might fall off

Today I had a patient at clinic ask me for medicine that would give him a "boner" for 3 days in a row. He quickly changed his mind when I told him (on command of the attending), that 3 days of continuous erection could cause his penis to fall off.

Funny how the idea of a 3 day boner suddenly didn't seem so appealing.

Dry Socket

I've got one. That's always fun. So far going on 2nd week of excruciating face pain. Totes awesome.

Drinking From A Fire Hydrant

I once heard second year medical school described this way. And its dead on. I am seriously not having fun. I'm overwhelmed. Underprepared. Clueless how to study. And feeling like I'm going to be the worst physician ever. I thought the feeling would pass. But its been going on since September. I don't know what the eff to do.

STEP I

Is coming sooner than I want to acknowledge. I just submitted my app. (Before I only got my Q-bank)

Yesterday

Was the day. The male UG exam. Remember how I said I was nervous? Well I wasn't nervous. I was really really nervous. So nervous I thought there was a grand possibility I might throw up or cry. I don't really know why. Not like I've never seen/touched a naked guy before.. even in the hospital setting. But the SP's make me nervous. And the cameras, and the possibility of getting a jackass for a student partner. Alas, all went well. I was originally assigned to a really irritating guy who was supposed to be my student partner... but the coordinator switched me to be with another girl in my class who seemed almost as nervous as I was. So it worked out well.

I'm not sure what I was worried about exactly. That I'd eff up and hurt the guy? That he would be so hot that I would get nervous and not be able to concentrate? That I would laugh? That he'd get an erection and I'd be embarrassed? I can say this is officially the first time I examined a guy's goods this closely while simultaneously praying he wouldn't get an erection.

Anyway, I survived. Lets just say I didn't have to worry about any of the things I originally thought... as I am fairly confidant my SP had no attraction to women what-so-ever... and when I began the exam without asking him to "bear down", he just shrugged and said "that's ok. I'm an expert at this".

Whew.

Tommorow

Doing my first Male UG exam. Ugh. Not going to lie... a little bit nervous. I just know I'm going to get the (really) old guy.

Today...

I got to see Dr. R (see side for description). She's awesome. I want to be her. And I still love love love love Emergency Medicine. How do I know its for me? This convo took place between her and one of the other chief residents:

Dr. R: So if you really like doing tedious things like calculating osmotic gaps, EM might not be the place for you.

Resident #2 : What's an osmotic gap?

Dr. R: I don't know. I saw it on a research poster in the hallway.

This is so me it's ridic.

How To Keep On Truckin'

I've received a few emails asking how on earth I managed to keep my morale up when I failed as a pre-med. Like failing an exam, bombing an MCAT, hearing disparaging "advice", and whatnot. I guess the answer is that I didn't. I mean everytime something happened, I was distraught. And totally devastated. I started combing through my back up plans, applying to random grad school programs, looking up internships, and fantasizing about running away to the peace corps or becoming a writer or a chef or an FBI agent. It was awful. Awful because I had little perspective or knowledge that the path to becoming a physician is a long journey... marked by failures and successes. I'd see a few classmates or colleagues get right into med school with no sweat, and so I thought it wasn't meant to be for me. And so I'd head in another direction... like research, or public health, or epidemiology.... something that I THOUGHT would make me happy... as these are parallel fields to medicine.

And sure enough, these fields would keep me interested for about 10 months. Then I was bored. Soon I'd find myself back in the med school mode... tagging along with physicians, fantasizing about med school, plotting my next attempt at the MCAT or applying to med school. It was a series of try, fail, hibernate, heal, plot, try, fail, hibernate, heal, plot, try, sort of succeed (YAY!), try harder, fail, blah blah.

So I guess the answer is this.

1) Try to keep "success" in perspective. Know that when you're "up" you should enjoy it while it lasts because there will be "downs" too. And when you are "down" know that it's just temporary until the next "up".

2) After a "down"... don't be too hard on yourself, and don't make any drastic decisions that will alter your med school plans. The feeling of wanting to quit is soooo intense you can often fool yourself into thinking that you don't want to do medicine anymore.... even if you actually do. Give yourself some time to really regroup, re-evaluate, and make a better plan of attack. Immersing yourself in "parallel" fields like public health, etc. are great because they help strengthen your application while you regroup and get your ducks in a row.

From One of Our Profs.... AFTER Thanksgiving :)

PATHOLOGIES RESEMBLING FOOD

FOOD PATHOLOGY	DISEASE	NOTES
Anchovy paste liver	Liver abscess	Amebic
Apple core lesion	Colon cancer
Banana Sign (cardio)	Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy
Banana Sign (neuro)	Arnold-Chiari malformation	Abnormally shaped midbrain & elongated cerebellum
Bread and Butter	Pericarditis
Café-au-lait spots	Neurofibromatosis (I &II)
Caseous Necrosis	TB, histo, coccidio, crypto	Casesous = Cheese
Cherry Red appearance	Carbon monoxide poisoning
Cherry Red spots	Tay-Sachs, Niemann-Pick, Retinal artery occlusion	Macula
Chocolate cyst	Endometriosis
Coffee ground vomit	Upper GI bleed, PUD
Grape clusters	Hydatidiform mole
Hamburgery Sign	Uncovered vertebral articular facet
Honeycomb lungs	Eosinophilic granuloma, DIP, UIP, interstitial pneumonitis associated with collagen vascular diseases, asbestosis, berylliosis, sarcoidosis, LIP, DAD, recurrent aspiration, allergic alveolitis
Lemon Sign	Spina bifida	Scalloping/overlapping frontal bones
Millet seed appearance	Military TB on CXR
Nutmeg liver	Chronic liver congestion
Olive (sign)	Congenital pyloric stenosis
Onion skin arterioles	atherosclerosis
Onion skin (musculo/skeletal)	osteomyelitis, osteosarcoma, Ewing sarcoma
Peau d’orange	Carcinoma of the breast
Pizza pie	CMV retinitis
Popcorn sign	Fibroadenoma of breast
Port-wine stain	hemangioblastoma
Red-currant jelly	Intussusception, Klebsiella infection (sputum)
Rice grain calcification	Taenia solium infection
Rice water diarrhea	Cholera
Strawberry Tongue	Scarlet fever
Sugar-coated spleen	Chronic serositis

Is it a bad sign

When your ex-boyfriend sends you an article entitled "Who Needs Marriage Anyway? Men, Apparently."

Ok, I'm a cold fish. Sorry. I'm trying to stop.

Reasons Why You SHOULD NEVER Look at SDN

Yes, folks, these are real. Copied verbatim (except the purple.. that's me :). Sad to Say.

HELP!

I went to a community college and then transferred to ucsd. I've got straight a's in all my classes except my 1st semester at the community college was a c in calculus b in chem c in bio and b in English. my mcat score is 34. what are my chances for ucla medical school as well a's other uc med schools?

Am I worried for no reason?????

Stats:

GPA is around 3.85
sGPA is around 3.85
MCAT score was a 36Q
2 Summers of Hospital Volunteering (200+ hours)
2 Semesters as a writer for school paper
2 Semesters working as a team manager
Working at a Pharmacy for 2 summers (unpaid, 75+ hours)

Other EC --> Cultural Club and Intramural sports
-I had no research experience until this year but I currently am doing research and I also have a sports medicine internship (8 hours per week)
-I applied to like 20 schools
-I got 5 interviews so far (Rochester, Penn State, Buffalo, SUNY up and downstate) but I was already rejected from Buffalo and my other interviews are coming up..
-Also I shadowed two doctors in August, one for around 40+ hours and another for around 10, I'll be working with the former again this winter break...

Suggestions????

I am a Florida resident, 3.86 cumulative, 3.83 science & math, 31Q MCAT, majoring in Applied Economics and Biochemistry. I have 2 years of patient volunteering, 1 month of shadowing a rad onc, 2 science research projects, 1 economics research project on price discrimination in the health care system, and lots of leadership (SGA senate 2 terms and world affairs program), and I have worked as a chemistry tutor for 1.5 years. I have 6 letters of rec, 3 from the professors I did research with and took classes with, 1 from the volunteer coordinator of local hospice, and 1 from rad onc shadowed, I know them all pretty personally.

I submitted my secondary to UF on 10/4 and have yet to hear anything. If offered an interview should I provide an update at the interview or after the interview? I am starting a new volunteer experience (tutoring mentally disabled adults and teens for GED), a new research project, and will be submitting 2 papers for publication in the coming months as 1st author. Any general suggestions? THANKS!

PLEASE HELP!!! 3.34 GPA and 39 MCAT!!!

Please help me out here, what do y'all think my chances are? I'm pretty nervous because of my low GPA. Below is a concise 'resume'...if you need more info just ask I am a junior at Duke, so my science GPA is my projected GPA for the end of this semester, presumed that I keep the same grades I have now.
science GPA: 3.34 (Overall: 3.41), with an intended Major in Biomedical Engineering and an already completed Minor in Biology at Duke University. I really screwed up freshman year, but got a 3.4 fall semester sophomore year and have been trending upwards in GPA.
-MCAT: 39, taken only once
Extracurriculars: Leadership positions in 2 major school clubs (1 club sport), worked 7000+ hours (WTF???? 7000 HOURS???) in 2 labs (1 clinical, 1 biochemistry) since high school, published as author on 3 journal articles ( 1 in Nature). 200+ hours clinical volunteering, shadowed 2 physicians for 120+ hours. My summers were spent working full time in labs, volunteering and shadowing.
Michigan resident, Asian background
I have a feeling my GPA will come back to haunt me.

PLEASE LET YOUR HONEST OPINION GUIDE ME!!!!

I started to think about going to medical school in my senior year of college (one year to go, its a five year program). due to an event I experienced.
I jUST WANT TO KNOW my chances through this forum, recommended by many pre-med students I know

my info:
Syracuse University
Major: bioengineering, and Physics
minor : Linguistics
GPA: 3.2, I believe I can pull it up through my electives to 3.4
Science GPA 3.6
I took Kaplan MCAT (free event, it was like a real test scenario but without the writing section). I scored a 35.
Academia awards
Dean list
Honor List
chancellor award (two year consecutively), the highest award you can get in my university
Experience
worked in factory (part time)
Independent study in Darfur, planning to go back again at the end of this summer
Research Assistant
president of Society of Public Health education
President of Syracuse Breakdance Club
public relation of Biomedical engineer society
United Nation Ambassador of good will
Volunteers
Say Yes Education
Amaus Drive
taught refugee kids after school
and many others non related to medical fields
non academic Award
won the redbull Street futbol (as a team) in Germany 2008
competed in the preliminary of Redbull bc one
Langauges
English
Nubian
Portuguese
Arabic
Dutch
(taking spanish courses as of now)
I shadowed a doctor recently (for a week) to see if I really want to be a doctor or not
****I know that I don't any type of clinical experience, research and hospital volunteering.
but I should start to hospital volunteer by next semester, and Hopefully researching.
Please let me know what you think!!!!

SIGH. Lets just all set ourselves on fire. Bleh.

Idiocy of Men Part I

Met a pretty hot older-than-me guy at my favorite wine bar on Thursday. We talked for maybe an hour... mind you very proper and lovely.. (Lolo was there too)... and he gave me his card and asked me to text him later so he'd have my #.. so I did.

The following series of texts resulted.

Ella: Hey thanks for the drinks. It was nice meeting you.

Dumbass: Hey thanks for the fun company! Let's hang out again!

Dumbass: Call or text if you want to meet up tomorrow.

Dumbass: Or we can hang out another day!

Dumbass: Hey your last name is MedStudent, right?

Dumbass: I'll find you on facebook.

Ella: Facebook huh? Ok, lol

Dumbass: Don't laugh at me, I'm older than you. Much older than you.

Ella: Much...?

Dumbass: Guess

Dumbass: Honestly

Dumbass: Ok, I friended you on FB

Dumbass: Gorgeous profile pic btw

Dumbass: Guess

Ella: Ewe. This is a dangerous game. 42? Give or take 2 years?

Dumbass: Pretty good... 45!

Ella: Well, don't be offended. It must be my soon-to-be-doctor side coming out. I'm usually pretty good with age, height and weight. I'm sure another woman would have said 35 :)

Dumbass: I'm not offended at all!

Dumbass: What I really want to know is how you look in just a doctor coat and glasses and high heels.

And that was the end of the conversation until the next morning.

Dumbass: I'm sorry about that last comment. I think it might have been the beer.

Still the end of the conversation.

And then he friended Lolo.

Last night

Was our University's annual grad school party. With everybody. Law School. Med School. Social Work. You name it. It was awesome if not a bit overwhelming as there were easily over 1000 people there. But it was totally fun. It was a cocktail party in a huge venue with dancing and food and extremely cheap drinks. (Champagne for $2, yay!)

Of course...

Steak Cilantro Tacos with Home Made Guacamole

Home Made Mayo

About Boys

Ugh.

That's really all there is to say... it goes downhill from there.

Med School Classes - A Different World Than Other Medical Programs

Somebody asked me... so here it is. Well they specifically asked "how many" classes you take at once... and there is no simple answer.

Two things are simple:

1) All med schools have to incorporate the same minimum course material as dictated by the LCME.

2) All students in each class follow the same curriculum. So you don't "compete" for classes like you did in undergrad. All first year students take anatomy at the same time, etc.

Whats different is that med schools have some freedom in the way their curriculum is designed. Most go by "blocks"... basically little stints on one subject that end with an exam. They can be long blocks... 14 weeks for anatomy with 3 exams... or short ones... 3 weeks for genetics with just one exam at the end. Some do quarters, semesters, etc... but every school is different (and for sure drastically different than the curriculum at a nursing program) First year at my school we got lots of breaks and downtime.

As for how many you take at once? I don't know. Its different all the time. There was a time during first year that I had histology, biochem, and physiology all at once. At the end of the year I only had one class, Neurology. Plus you take a clinical foundations course that is mostly hands on examinations, nutrition, etc.

Suffice it to say, you'll be busy. Some times are definitely less stressful than others... but everything I did was manageable. My school has an online calendar that we are responsible to check everyday. Basically, it is subject to change at any moment. Sometimes little gems pop up and I'm surprised, like "hey! I didn't even know I was in this class".

Just roll with it.

The Best Advice I Have Ever Received...

Ok, maybe not the best ever... but the best career advice I think. I have a fantasy of someday building a self-sustaining clinic in a developing country... that is completely independent of foreign aid or doctors... a project description best left to another post. But.... I know a physician who did just that! And so of course I pester him quite often about how/what/where/and how the heck can I be just like him.

Here's his advice. Write this down. It's like gold.

In order to be a physician and incorporate international projects into your career... here you go!

1. Broadening your horizons with an MPH or the like is very helpful. An MD is for medicine.... but anything you can do to increase your exposure to public health issues is extremely beneficial.

2. Learn languages, and learn them well! Communication is the #1 key to success in every field!

3. If you want to make the world a better place, medicine isn't the only way to do it. Business, politics, research, nursing, economics, environmental conservation, teaching... you can make a huge difference in many fields.

4. Pick a residency that you LIKE. Don't pick something that you assume will be useful internationally. It all will be useful. You'll be happier if you follow your passions.

5. (My personal favorite). Choose a spouse who has compatible goals and who supports your international endeavors. Having a supportive or non-supportive spouse can really make or break you.

It's About That Time

I'm signing up for STEP 1 and buying my Q-bank this week. That and we just had our 3rd/4th year rotation scheduling meeting. Just one question. How the EFF did this happen so damn fast????

And feel free to throw in your advice for scheduling rotations. FYI, my school considers 3rd and 4th year the same... so you can complete rotations in ANY order. Any order, seriously.

More Food.... what else??

Lemon cupcakes via a recipe from the Hummingbird Bakery in London

Blueberry French Toast made with Sourdough from the Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco

Rock Cornish Hen roasted with citrus and cranberries, braised with port wine and shallot sauce

Moral of the Story? Don't wear a "bump it".