Your Friendly Neighborhood Med Student @friendly-md - Tumblr Blog

✔️Preclinicals

Back in school after almost three months of studying for Step 1, and “school” as I know it has had a complete transformation. It's different now - I feel like everything I'm doing is much more practical than when I was in preclinicals. Honestly, I haven't really had the chance to do anything with my hands since one session a while back we had on shock (we went to the Sim Center and were taking care of mannequins who had different kinds of shock - and we had to figure it out the type of shock and treatment for ourselves; love the trial by fire mentality). I was really hoping that would be the norm, but it wasn't - we went back to sitting in chairs and looking at screens for 14 hours a day; there's only so much of that you can do before you start to go a little crazy and forget why you came to med school in the first place.

I feel like everything that I do now finally matters. I know as a medical student I’ll have a much smaller role to play than other providers, but to know that soon I'll be in the hospital treating people the using the information from these classes... that’s refreshing. I’m even invested in the team building exercises we’re doing now, which is completely unlike me! Before we would make paper towers with other people in our groups - now we’re running codes. I got to lead a team through taking care of a decompensating patient. Sure, our mannequin was somehow more dead than when we started, but I learned pretty fast what I do and DON’T know, and what it means to run a good team. And I enjoyed it.

I haven't been excited about medical school in a year, and to get this energy back is proof to me that somewhere deep inside of me still lives the person who wants to help people and learn while he does it. Now to keep this fire alive on my surgery rotation...

- Your Friendly Neighborhood Med Student

#med #medschool

Going back to old hobbies...

You know that feeling?

You used to be so very good at something, and then you spend a couple years not doing it. Then, out of nowhere you get the sudden urge to be a master brass player and leave all of you med student responsibilities behind. I’ll be as good as these guys -

I picked up a trombone I had laying around (because that’s normal). My how I’ve missed playing music. I drew my first breath, and blew into the mouthpiece -

And it was so bad. It was so very very bad.

Which is to be expected since I never played the trombone in high school/college - I played a similar instrument (the glorious EUPHONIUM).

but still...

Regardless, I had fun. I enjoyed what will eventually become the beginning of a story where my neighbors kill me. I’m going to do it again and again until I’m good at it. I even logged my 30 minutes into an app called Mastery.

#medschool #hobbies #trombone #band #euphonium

Taking Back the Reins

Howdy everyone - around the beginning of the month, we second year medical students had an exam on the working of psychology and the brain (I won’t get into it here, but man PSYCH IS COOL). You might say that by now, I would have figured the whole pre-clinical part of med school out after 14 exams.

No.

There’s always the nagging feeling (anxiety) that I have to do well on these exams. That I can’t leave one world left unread in the lectures because ‘they’ might put what I didn’t cover on the exam.

It’s a dumb way to think. It stresses me out, and after staying up night after night I started to feel like I didn’t care about any of the learning anymore - just the memorizing.

And then the exam came. And went. And I did well. Just like every. other. exam.

Something different happened to me after that exam - I felt completely disconnected from myself. We had just learned the clinical criteria for depression, so indulge me:

Sleep changes? Sure, mostly self inflicted

Loss of interest? Absolutely - I didn’t even touch a video game, which is blasphemy for myself

Guilt? Nah

Lack of energy? Yup.

Inability to concentrate? Oh yeah.

Change in appetite? I’m a foodie, which made this a scary yes

Psychomotor agitation? Nope.

Suicidal Ideation? Thankfully, no.

That’s 5 of the 8 SIGECAPS criteria (great mnemonic btw). All I needed was to have this for two weeks to be considered depressed. That was an odd realization. I had never really considered myself at risk of developing any mental disorder...

So I decided to conduct an experiment -

I am a graduate of Syracuse University and was once a proud member of the band program there. I have so far, never missed a homecoming for my college - I love going back to see what band is like from the audience perspective, plus, who doesn’t love drumline? But homecoming weekend was the weekend before the next exam.

I studied my butt off before we left. I studied while we drove there. I studied in the hotel. I studied in my old life sciences building (#nostalgia). I studied while driving back.

I did not study while hanging out with old friends. I did not study at the Quad Show (where the band performs before the football game). I did not study during the game (I tried - it didn’t work).

I felt that nagging feeling again. It was worse this time, telling me that I was going to fail because I hadn’t studied nearly enough as I normally did. We got back home at 4pm because of traffic and I sat down to study but it was too late. The ensuing 11 hours weren’t very productive. I went to sleep -

And then the exam came. And went. And I did well. Just like every. other. exam. In fact, I did better on this exam. Bette than on any other exam.

Experiment successful. I was beginning to feel some burnout. I was beginning to feel the beginnings of depression. The worst part of it was looking at medical information and thinking to myself - “I just don’t care about medicine anymore”. But that all changed when I got far far away from med school and gave myself permission to enjoy my weekend.

Take care of yourselves medfam. That’s what I learned. Take the reins back from med school, guide yourself to something you like doing/seeing/whatever. Then guide yourself back. We’re doing this on our terms.

That’s all I got! TL;DR?

Take breaks.

EDIT: You know what really gives you back the reason you came to med school in the first place? Going to work in a Children’s Emergency Department. Even better is going to work at a Children’s ED and meeting a very kind baby with Down Syndrome (Trisomy 21 - gotta start prepping for boards).

#med #medschool #school #breaks #second #year

Aaaand we’re back.

Hi med fam.

It’s been a long time since I wrote anything on this blog, but I’m realizing I need an outlet. So I’m changing the look and feel of the blog, since I’ve changed since I started it.

I can’t call this blog pre-med anymore - for good reason, I was accepted into med school! Hooray - except that happened almost 2 years ago. That’s how long it’s been. I don’t even look like my old avatar anymore:

I have a beard now -

I’m also changing the name to “Your Friendly Neighborhood Med Student” - a homage to the superhero I think of when I think of helping others (thwip!). The url is going to change to friendly-md.tumblr.com, because I think I’ll keep this one around for a while.

All the old posts are still available; they’ll just all be tagged #old.

Anyway, I’m going to use this blog to fulfill two purposes:

1. To provide an outlet/excuse for me to go have fun experiences outside of medicine/med school

2. To provide an outlet/excuse for me to dive into things I think are interesting in medicine/med school

3. To inspire others to take a couple eggs from the med school basket and put them in life’s other baskets (relationships, outdoor experiences, curiosities, etc etc) - and be inspired by others on the medical blogosphere.

#newbeginnings #medicine #med #school #medschool

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#14 - Just google the answers to the online homework.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #savetime #googleit #yahoo answers #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#18 - You passed out. It's okay.

#100thingspremed

Sometimes it's a little much to take in. I stepped out of the trauma room while watching a chest tube go in. I didn't want to pass out in the trauma room, that would suck. I didn't pass out after all.

Which is hilarious considering I DID pass out when I got my blood drawn once last year. I hadn't eaten in a long time, so I guess everything fell into place as I fell to the floor.

A tube of blood > Chest tube.

The point is: It's okay to pass out/step out. It's not like you're a doctor yet, you haven't been exposed to this. But here are some encouraging words from an emergency resident I was working with:

"You know what, I still get queasy from watching stuff in the ER. But when you are actually doing the procedures you'll forget about it. You'll be doing rather than watching, so you'll be fine."

So stick through it. Once you're actually able to do some hands on stuff, you should be fine.

#premed #medblr #passing out #syncope #stick through it #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#12 - You can't prioritize classes. No matter how stupid one is, it still affects your GPA.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #100thingspremed #aglet #bringtheworldtogether #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#10 - You know the endoplasmic reticulum plays a role in tolerance. Your ER and caffeine are like roomies.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #100thingspremed #endoplasmic reticulum #tolerance #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#11 - Sometimes you wear PJs to class. You might as well be comfortable while you sleep.

Also, you wear slippers. And sunglasses. Even if you're not going to sleep, who has time to get dressed up? Not me.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #100thingspremed #PJs #pajamas #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#6 - The entire curriculum was designed to make you feel uncomfortable.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #100thingspremed #uncomfortable #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#46 - After one month of studying, this is how you feel, this is how you look.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #100thingspremed #old-posts #old-premed

100 Things You Learn as a Pre-med.

#9 - Caffeine will only get you so far.

#100thingspremed

#premed #medblr #caffeine #100thingspremed #old-posts #old-premed

Tip of the Day: Pseudostratified epithelia

Pseudostratified epithelia is epithelia that appears to be multilayered epithelial tissue, but there is only one true epithelial layer to rule them all.

#tipoftheday #premed #medblr #pseudostratifiedepithelia #old-posts #old-premed