My Journey To Becoming A Doctor

Pre-med. 21. Wisconsin.

[einstetic]

One of the main reasons why you don’t make progress or why you are stuck in the vicious cycle of procrastination is the lack of courage to take that one small imperfect step. The more you are fixated on the end result, the less likely you are actually going to do something to achieve it.

A case in point of this so called ‘phenomenom’ is when you keep putting of you essay for a class you are taking. You keep convincing yourself that you have lots and lots of time to write it and suddenly your deadline is tomorrow. What do you usually do in these kinds of situations? I bet you usually open a new document and just start writing something, a quick draft, because you think you just need to get something done. In other words, you are actually just taking an imperfect step towards your end goal, which in this case is a finished essay. When you’ve taken your imperfect step, you often get this flow and just keep working and working until you are satisfied with your input. It seems surprisingly simple, right?

To summarise everything, you need to stop being so focused on the end result. The process is the most important part of your work and you can always edit and work on it later. An imperfect step is the most important step and more people need to realise this. If you have a long list of things to do or deadlines to meet, then just decide to start somewhere. Make that awful draft, scribble down something, make a mistake, just do something. Sooner or later, you are going to notice that you’ve made a great deal of progress. These imperfect steps are what you need in your life.

[moved-to-emerysnotebook]

Day 25 (10/22): What motivates you?

the prospect of a future in medicine

[samsstudygram]

types of study breaks for every situation

if you realize you’ve been studying for hours: grab a snack to refuel your body and watch a sitcom to refuel your brain. then back to the books.

if you’re feeling stressed out: take some deep breaths, text your friends, maybe stair at a wall for a few minutes. gather yourself.

if you can’t seem to focus: get moving and get outside. take out the garbage, check your mail box, maybe walk your dog. just get moving and get fresh air. it’ll help bring you back.

if there’s something else going on in your life and you can’t get it off your mind: write down what’s going through your head, sort of like a diary entry. it’ll help you work things out.

if you’re just mentally and physically exhausted: set a timer for 25-30 minutes and take a nap. any longer and you’ll hit REM and you’ll wake up feeling just as tired. once you wake up, get some caffeine in you.

if the material is boring as hell: find another way to study. see if there’s a crash course video online about it or draw out what you’re trying to learn in diagrams and pictures to make it fun.

if people around you won’t shut up: listen to some music. soundtrack and classical music is always good because they won’t absorb you as much as music with lyrics. white noise (like ocean waves, rain sounds, etc.) also works.

if you only half understand a concept: call/message a friend who’s not in the class and try to teach the material to them. this will help you mentally work through the material and will help you remember it as well.

[laughingsquid]

Friend Makes a Woman Hospitalized with Short-Term Memory Loss an Informative FAQ

[lunapics]

This is the best friend a person could ever have.

[221cbakerstreet]

The last one 😂

[oswinstark]

I fucking burst out laughing at that last one

[forwardstyling]

If you like more useful content such as life hacks or DIY’s follow me @forwardstyling.

[eintsein]

HOW TO APPROACH CLASSES A guide to getting the most out of your classes and lectures

By Eintsein

Design inspired by this post by @journalsanctuary

[thepremedgunner]

If y'all need some study help. I know I do.

[eintsein]

Hey guys, so I’ve seen some posts around about daily routines so I thought I’d share my own. I consider myself to be great at being productive even early in the morning, and here’s how I achieve that. Hope this is helpful, and feel free to ask me questions if you have any!

[yournewapartment]

First Aid Basics

I just got certified in CPR and First Aid last month with the American Heart Association. I wanted to share this information with you, because a lot of what we see on TV is not at all accurate as to what you’re supposed to do to actually help someone. Here are some of the topics that were covered:

First Aid Basics

Here are the steps you should follow when addressing a situation where a person may be injured/unconscious: 

Check to make sure the scene is safe- you are no help to anybody if you also get hurt

If the person is responsive: “Are you okay?”

If they are unresponsive, hit their shoulders hard and yell: “Are you okay?” to see if you can rouse them

Phone 911 and put the phone on speaker (you can delegate this task to somebody else if you’re not alone)

Have somebody get a First Aid kit (don’t leave the person if you’re by yourself unless the 911 operator tells you to)

Is the person conscious? Unconscious?

Check them for any obvious signs of injury

Check them for medical jewelry

Remember

Time is of the essence! Be decisive and confident. 

Don’t be afraid to call for help and assign people tasks

You can only perform CPR on a flat service. If a person needs CPR and is on a bed or in a chair, move them to the floor immediately. Don’t worry about hurting their head or anything, if they don’t get CPR immediately, their life expectancy is significantly less. (See my CPR post for full details)

Do not move the person unless the area they’re in is unsafe. If you have to move the person, drag them by their clothes and pull them to safety.

Adult Choking

There are both mild and severe cases of adult choking. In a mild case, the person choking will be able to make a sound or cough loudly. Typically these cases resolve themselves. 

Ask: “Are you choking? Can I help you?”

If the person cannot make a sound or cough in response, they are suffering from severe choking.

Walk around back of the person and put your arms around them

Make a fist with your dominant hand

Place your fist slightly above the belly button and below the chest bone.

Grasp the fist with your other hand

Give quick upward thrusts

If the person is overweight or pregnant, put your arms around the person’s armpits.

If you are unsuccessful in removing the blockage, the person will quickly become unresponsive. You will need to perform adult CPR and call 911.

After chest compressions (see above link) check person’s mouth to see if the thing they choked on is visible. If it is visible, remove it. Never going digging around in someone’s mouth. 

Amputation

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Get a First Aid kit

Both these steps can be delegated to someone else if they’re around

Put gauze on the wound and apply pressure until the bleeding stops

Do not remove the gauze if it’s bled through- this will remove any blood clots that have formed. 

If the gauze is bled through, add more gauze on top and keep applying pressure until the bleeding stops

Clean the amputated part with water

Warp the amputated part with dressing 

Put the amputated part in a small plastic bag

Get a larger plastic bag and fill it with equal parts ice and water

Put the small plastic bag inside the large plastic bag

Label the bag with person’s name and time of the injury

Asthma (How to Operate an Inhaler)

People diagnosed with asthma will typically be aware of it and may have an inhaler on them. If someone has an asthma attack:

Ask them: “Are you okay? Do you need your inhaler?” 

The person will probably be able to give some sort of indication in response

If they need their inhaler: 

Locate the inhaler

Put the medicine (metallic capsule pictured below) in the inhaler if it is not already in there, it will click into place

Shake the inhaler to activate the medicine

Attach the mouth piece if it’s unattached (not all inhalers have one, it is not pictured below)

Remove the cap (cap is darker blue piece pictured below)

Have the person put their head back

Put the inhaler in the person’s mouth

Push down on the canister and have them breathe out slowly

They should begin to feel relief immediately, but you should still have them sit down and take it easy for a while

Call 911 if they are still having difficulty breathing after the inhaler has been administered

Bee Sting

Usually bee stings present only mild irritation and pain. If the person stung has a severe allergic reaction, you will need to call 911.

Get a first aid kit

Scrape away the bee stinger and venom sack using a credit card or something similar in nature

Wash the affected area with lots of soap and running water

Wrap a bag of ice in a towel and place it over the affected area for 20 minutes or until the pain is gone

Watch the person for up to 30 minutes for signs of an allergic reaction

Call 911 if they present any classic allergy symptoms

Bleeding from Nose

Have the person lean their head forward

Get a First Aid kit

Or have someone else get one

Have the bleeding person apply pressure to the bridge of their nose using gauze from the First Aid kit

Do not remove the gauze if it’s bled through- this will remove any blood clots that have formed. 

If the gauze is bled through, add more gauze on top until the bleeding stops

Call 911 if the bleeding lasts longer than 15 minutes

Heat Cramps/Dehydration

Can lead to heat exhaustion! These typically happen when someone is dehydrated and tries to do lots of physical activity.

Have the person sit down and cool off

Have them drink something with sugar and electrolytes

Water will work in a pinch but sugary drinks and gatorade are preferred

Heat Exhaustion

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Have the person lie down

Cool the person by pouring water on them or wetting them with wet cloths until they begin to act normally

Have them drink something with sugar and electrolytes

Water will work in a pinch but sugary drinks and gatorade are preferred

Wait with them until help arrives

Opioid Overdose

My instructor said that these will often happen in an unsafe or an isolated environment. Always check to make sure that the scene is safe- look out for needles. 

Naloxone is used to revive people who have overdosed on opioids. If you find someone who has overdosed on opioids you happen to have naloxone on you and know how to administer it, the American Heart Association recommends that you use it instead of waiting for help to arrive.

Responsive:

Yell for help

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Wait with the person until help arrives

Unresponsive

Yell for help

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Perform five cycles of adult CPR

Wait for help

Seizure

Seizures are abnormal electrical activity in the brain. Typical seizure symptoms: spasms, muscle rigidity, and unconsciousness. Seizures typically last between 60-90 seconds before the person gains consciousness. 

Do NOT touch the person who is having a seizure

Do NOT put anything in their mouth

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

If there are people around, ask them to get a First Aid kit while you wait with the person having the seizure

Don’t leave the person having a seizure if you are alone

Move objects away from the person having the seizure so that they don’t knock into them

If possible, place a small towel/pad underneath the person’s head

If the person starts vomiting, turn them over on their side so that they don’t choke

If possible use gloves and an eye mask from a First Aid kit to avoid exposure to bodily fluids

After they come to, they may be bleeding from the mouth. 

Use gauze from a First Aid kit to stop the bleeding

Have them apply pressure with the gauze until the bleeding stops

Stay with the person until help arrives

Splints

Splints should be significantly longer than the injured area. They’re used to constrict movement, so the person is injured should not be able to move freely once the splint is applied. Splints are use to treat broken/dislocated bones. It’s very difficult to tell if a bone is actually broken or just dislocated, so don’t worry about it and just splint the thing.

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Get a First Aid kit

Both these steps can be delegated to someone else if they’re around

Put on gloves/eye glasses from the First Aid kit to avoid contamination from bodily fluids

Cover exposed wound area with gauze

Do not remove the gauze if it’s bled through- this will remove any blood clots that have formed. 

If the gauze is bled through, add more gauze on top until the bleeding stops.

Place a strip of rigid material underneath the injured area

Use gauze/dressing from the First Aid kit to secure the splint by wrapping material above and below the injured area

Never tie material directly over the injury

Have the person stay as still as possible until help arrives

Stroke

Strokes are caused from blockage/bleeding from things like blood clots. Typical signs of a stroke: face drooping (or numbness), arm weakness (or numbness), and speech difficulty. There is nothing much you can do except wait with the person and try to make them comfortable until help arrives.

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Note the time that the stroke symptoms began (this will help hospital technicians)

Stay with the person until help arrives

Tourniquets

Some First Aid kits will come with a pre-made tourniquet. If your kit does not have a tourniquet you can make one fairly easily. Tourniquets should only be used for injuries where the person is squirting blood. No squirting blood? Use a splint.

Call 911 and put the phone on speaker

Get a First Aid kit

Both these steps can be delegated to someone else if they’re around

Put on gloves/eye glasses from the First Aid kit to avoid contamination from bodily fluids

Fold cloth or a bandage so that it’s long and an inch wide

Wrap the the bandage/cloth two inches above the wound

Never apply a tourniquet bandage/cloth on a joint (like elbows or knees). 

Find a small stick

Place the small stick atop the cloth/bandage and tie it there

You can now turn the small stick to tighten the cloth/bandage

Have the injured person lay down and try to move as little as possible

Do not remove the tourniquet- even if the bleeding stops.

Wait until help arrives.

[michellepsychologist]

Myths & Facts about Mental Illness 

source: Global Medical Education

For more follow us @ Awake Society

[thefutureofmedicine]

Seriously make $5 in under 5 minutes

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[shanpaistudies]

Hi studyblr community! This is my first original post; I hope it serves you well! I got my research position through a program in my school, so the process was a little more formal at first (I had to write essays), but I still used these when it came down to communicating with my PI (principal investigator). Good luck!

THINGS YOU SHOULD CONSIDER BEFORE LOOKING FOR A LAB

1. Do you have time to do this? Don’t just think about gaps between classes in your schedule. Think about how hard your classes are and how much time you need outside of class for homework and studying. Orgo and psych might both be one hour classes, but they are definitely not going to require the same amount of time outside of class. You need blocks of time (3 to 4 hours at a time) to spend in lab.

2. What kinds subjects are you interested in? Those departmental websites are where you’re going to be looking. (Don’t be shy about looking into research that isn’t within your major. You never know what kind of answers you’ll get!)

3. What kind of work are you expecting to do? Do you want to do benchwork (wet lab)? Or do you want to do things that are more computational (dry lab)?

FINDING OPPORTUNITIES

1. If you were really interested and did well in one of your classes this semester, look up that professor’s website. Read about their areas of research, or…

2. Go to your major’s website (or website of any other department you were interested in) and find the faculty list. Start reading everyone’s research interests.

3. For the professors whose work catches your eye, go to their lab websites and do some more reading! (Better learn to love it now; research is a lot of reading.) Look up journal articles authored by these professors (pay attention to the year they were published. More recent ones will give you a better idea of what could be going on in their labs right now). You don’t have to understand everything in the article. At the very least, read the abstract and skim through the introduction and conclusion. This will give you a better feel of the problem and what was accomplished in the project. It’s important to know this stuff because you’re going to…

3. E-mail the professors! And don’t write cookie cutter e-mails. Individualize each e-mail and make sure to voice your genuine interest in that lab’s work.

THE E-MAIL

1. Be concise. Ain’t nobody got time to read your perfectly crafted 5-paragraph essay on why you should be taken into the lab. 

2. Introduce yourself, your year, and your major. If you’ve taken relevant coursework, you could mention that too.

3. Mention that you came across the professor’s research and be specific about what caught your attention.

4. Say that you’d like to talk to them about their research (this is code for “Please can I work with you?”)

5. Only send a few e-mails at a time. If you don’t get a reply after a couple of days, you could send a second e-mail as a follow-up. If you get a no, respond courteously. You could ask one more time and insist that you really loved their research, or you could just politely thank them for their response and wish them the best. If you get a yes (congrats!), find a time and place to meet the professor, and ask if there’s anything they’d like you to read in preparation for the meeting.

6. DON’T BE DISCOURAGED IF YOU DON’T GET AN ANSWER OR IF YOU WERE TOLD NO. KEEP LOOKING!

THE “INTERVIEW”

1. I’ve been told that the meeting is basically like an interview, but my “interview” was really casual and not something I should’ve stressed out about at all. I still wore something nice (casual dressy).

2. If the professor gave you something to read, do your best to read it. Don’t freak out if you don’t understand, but don’t just read it without trying to understand. Google any recurring words and phrases that you don’t know (odds are that if they appear often, they’re probably important). Write notes and questions down (even if it’s more technical ones like “how does this work?”).

3. If you didn’t get anything to read, try to look up past papers again and skim anyway. Take notes and come up with questions. Don’t go in there without having anything to say or ask.

4. When reading scientific literature, don’t dwell on the details of the methodology. Go for understanding the big picture: what kind of work came before this paper? What were the findings of the paper? What are the implications for future research? What’s the next step?

5. At the meeting, admit that you didn’t catch much of what you read (it’s humbling and very likely to be true). Ask questions and talk about what you did understand.

6. At the end, thank them for meeting with you and ask about openings in the lab. If they have one and offer it to you, thank them and say that you’d like a few days first. Ask if they could talk to other students in the lab so you can get a feel for the environment. Also ask about who you’d be working with, what their project is, etc. You want to know what you’re getting into.

7. Once you’ve made your decision, e-mail the professor.

IN THE LAB

1. ASK QUESTIONS WHENEVER YOU’RE UNSURE OF ANYTHING. If you have anxiety like me, it’s scary. Admitting you don’t know something is anxiety-inducing, especially when you’re in an environment where everyone has tons more background knowledge than you. THAT’S OKAY. You’re new. You’re an undergraduate student. Of course you don’t know as much as everyone! You are here to learn and you learn by asking questions. SO ASK!!! 

2. If you’ve made a mistake, don’t try to cover it up. TELL SOMEONE ASAP! Be honest and responsible! 

2. Keep a notebook with you so you can take notes on lab procedures. Be diligent! 

3. If things aren’t going well (you’ve lost interest, trouble with your mentor, etc.), talk to your PI. It’s not fair to you to be doing work you’re not excited about (this is an extra-curricular activity, after all), and it’s also not exactly productive to the lab to have someone who doesn’t really like being there anyway. You have to love research to do it well!

4. Do your best. People are using their time and resources to train you. In return, you should dedicate yourself to it! (Doing your best does not mean sacrifice your emotional, physical, and/or mental well-being. Understand where your boundaries are and stick to them.) 

5. If you’re pre-med, this is a way for you to illustrate your passions. Research can end up being a talking point for you if you end up dedicating a lot of your time and energy into it!

[linetteyde]

08/01/2016 - Reminder ✨☕️📚

[confusedconcept]

I was studying (like a good noodle) today at a coffee shop and this doctor came up to me and told me it would all be worth it and it was everything I needed to hear. 

[lovehate-romance]

MCAT study sessions at Starbucks 💕

[wishbone-md]

Also, I lied to the premeds when one asked me how many times I took the mcat. It was 3 times but I only said 2. I haven’t even told my boyfriend this so I’ll be content to never speak of it again. Especially since he studied for a couple of weeks and made a 36 casually.

[lifeofkhan]

A Few Helpful Videos

Step 1 and Done.

I don’t understand how some people can straight read First Aid and retain. Here are a few videos I found to be very helpful for understanding and memorizing concepts. With the plethora of YouTube videos out there, I feel like there should be a database of worthwhile ones somewhere (please tell me if there is already). Feel free to add any you’ve found particularly helpful. 

Anatomy

Brachial Plexus Speed Drawing

Brachial Plexus Explained

General Anatomy Overview Channel

Anatomy Figure Drawings - Helps visualize muscle actions

Biostats

Watch these a couple of days before your exam for a refresher. Many of his review questions are based directly off of UWorld questions.

Practice Questions

Cardio

General Cardio Overview  

JVP explained with relevant path correlations 

S3/S4 - the simplest of explanations (the accent does’t hurt) 

Antiarrhythmics - follow up with SketchyPharm 

Antiarrhythmics - Refractory Period Explained 

Embryology

This cardio video is amazing. He explains the cardio congenital defects in context of what causes each defect during development. This makes recall much easier as you’re learning the process and can work out each one even if you forget the small details. (make sure to watch both parts)

Heart Embryo Derivatives - mnemonic 

Intestine Development - Overview

GI Development - Foregut, Midgut, Hindgut Orientation

Embryonic Folding 

Pharyngeal Arch Mnemonic (die)  

Microbiology 

Algorithm/mnemonic for viruses. Pure gold.

YouTube Channels of Interest

Armando Hasudungan 

Anatomy Zone

Dr. Najeeb (my hero)

[aarumeanssix-deactivated2023122]

MY HERO 😍

Starting that Step grind soon, and this SO couldn’t have come at a better time…

[wtf-fun-factss]

Elizabeth Blackwell - WTF fun facts