no sex in the on call room

I dont have internet at my apartment anymore so I am sitting by the pool write outside my building using the wireless from the complex. Im sitting here eating a bowl of ice cream watching people work out in the gym right next to me. hehehe oops.

thought i would just start with that. ok. so today...

5am- im up

5:45- pick up nicole

6:30- get to hospital

7am- orientation

7:08- ohhhhhh man, what have i gotten myself into

In a room full of 3rd and 4th year medical students, an administratior from the Graduate Medical Education Office has a few do’s and don’ts for us. Among the highlights, “no sex in the on call room, don’t pee in the trashcan, do not bring your pets to the hospital, do not bring your kids to the hospital, don’t put wet towels on the mattresses.”

Right,got it. so we learn the lay of the land, get our ID badges, and are given our schedules. Each one of us has different assignments for each day and the only constant is an 8am-9am lecture/seminar given by different residents or attendings each day. We are expected to be there for them every weekday. My schedule for the next 2 weeks is:

Tues- Labor and Delivery 12 hour call at AM. This means I will be at the hospital tomorrow from 5am to 5pm in the L&D ward with one other student.

Wed- Gyn notes/ Clinic. This means I will be at the hospital at 5am to see gynecology patients and write up history and physicals on them and then at 6:30am we will round on all the patients and I will present mine. Then from 8 to 9 I will attend the lecture and from 9am until around 6pm I will work in the women's health clinic on the first floor of the hospital.

Thurs and Friday- I will be in the clinic all day after 8am seminar

Monday-Labor and Delivery 12 hour call at AM

Tues- Clinic all day

Wed- Labor and Delivery 12 hour PM call but it is actually 16 hours at the hospital. THIS SHIFT SUCKS! I need to be at the hospital at 5pm on Wednesday, I stay there until rounds the next day at 6:30am and then have to stay for the lecture/seminar from 8-9am. At 9 I get to go home and then have the day to sleep and then

Fri- I have clinic

Sounds pretty fun, eh?

OK, back to our schedule today

8-9:45 we have more orientation, get our ID badges, and get a tour of the hospital.

10am- we get dropped off at the clinic and go to work... There are 9 of us total, all 3rd year students from Western. We are shown around a lil bit and then the next thing i know, I am in a clinic room. I saw 4 patients today, 2 of which spoke english. The other 2 did not...at all... God i wish i still remembered my spanish from high school. For those of us who cant communicate, there is a translator service.
There are 4 wireless phones and we use one to call up the serive using a code and then after a few rings we push what language we want and a translator will come on the line. We give them our name and the patients name and then you put the phone on speakerphone. From then on, you ask the translator to ask the patient a question and when they respond, the translator tells ya what they said. It is great! Very impersonal though, i really wish i didnt have to use it. The patients dont even look at you when they are talking, they talk to the phone. its kinda akward but very very useful. There are lots of nurses around that speak spanish but we are told not to ask them because they have enough work to do as it is.

12:10- you have 30 minutes to go to the cafeteria and get food. readyyyyy, go! [i have never eaten a chicken burger so fast]

the rest of the afternoon: patients patients patients. On the board that has all the staff names and doctors written on it that are working that day, it says how many patients are scheduled for the day. Today it said 66/46. That means 66 patients for the morning and 46 patients for the afternoon! This is going to be a loooooong month!

We got done around 6 and I got home around 7. I am tired, my feet hurt [note to self, why the hell did i wear new shoes???] and i have to be in bed pretty much right now in order to get a good nights sleep.

It was scary, intimidating, and thrilling. At some points I was so confused and felt very stupid and at others I felt great. I know I have the skills, now I just need to learn all the knowledge. I should already be reading some OB/ GYN books in preperation for the next couple weeks and to make myself sound smarter to the attending physicans but right now all i can think about is getting in bed and watching an episode of ER before I fall asleep.

1 day down, lots more to go :)

Oh and lastly, things i learned today:
1- nurses are a medical students saving grace. i love them. they are great.
2- an endometrial biopsy looks like the most painful thing a women has to go through and i refuse to ever have one done on me
3- i need to learn spanish
4- i need more nice dress clothes

thats all for now... im gonna get in bed soon and then wake up in the AM, put on my scrubs, and head to labor and delivery. eeeeee so freaking excited! :)

OMSIII

Not sure how, but I made it. I made it through what was quite possibly the hardest year of my life and the worst two months of my life. I have never been so mentally and emotionally challenged and although I broke at times and had to reach out for help along the way, I made it. I now know how strong of a person I am and that I can make it through anything, i’ve pretty much been through mental bootcamp and survived. After having multiple exams thrown at me at the end of the year and then given the task of studying for board exams, there is really nothing else I can imagine to be more difficult. I spent 37 days, approximately 11 hours a day, memorizing a book that was a culmination of information that was not just information for the last two years of medical school, it was a culmination of all of my years of science education. To understand and not just memorize but LEARN and conceptualize the vast amount of information that I was tested on, I had to pull from my years and years of schooling and to be honest, I believe my last 20 something years of schooling were preparing me for these two exams.

Correction, I spent 36 days studying. On Wednesday June 8th, after not taking one day off, my brain went on strike. I woke up in the morning and just could not get out of bed. I decided to let myself sleep in until 10am. Then after pressing the snooze button a bunch of times, I got out of bed around 11am. I made some breakfast, watched a bit of TV [first time in a month] and then decided I was not ready to study...so I went back to bed. Then, I went to sleep from 12 to 5pm. I woke up and my brain had re-set. So I went to school, put in about 5 hours of studying and then called it a day. Needless to say, my brain went back to working order the next day...

I still dont know how i did, i wont get my scores for about a month. But it really doesnt matter at this point as long as I passed both of them. There is nothing more i could have done, i could not have given more of myself to this subject and however I did i will be happy because i made it. I am here, a 3rd year medical student, having been taught as much as school could cram into my head, and I am now being ‘set free’ into the real world of medicine.

Tomorrow I start my first rotation...it is my first day of 2 years of clerkships in which I will trade in my books and powerpoints for patients. I will be learning from individuals who are kind enough to let a student learn on them. I will be supervised thoroughly and will never be completely responsible for someone’s help...so im not too scared. But, i will have input on their care and my opinions will be taken into account.

My first rotation is at Riverside County Regional Medical Center in the department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and it is 6 weeks long. Apparently it is one of the best hospitals to rotate at in the area because it is so big. I have to be there at 7am and it is about a 45min commute as the hospital is 40 miles away so I will be leaving at 5:45am to make sure I am there on time and where I am supposed to be. The best part about the whole situation is that my good friend Nicole is working at the same hospital, in the same department. Nicole and I studied for boards together for weeks and are very comfortable working alongside each other so knowing that support will be there is making this whole new transition much easier. We will be carpooling to the hospital tomorrow and will experience all these brand new situations together.

I am so excited for the USMLE and COMLEX to be behind me. I feel like a brand new world is opening up...a door has been opened to the next chapter of my life. I have been preparing for this day for so long....it is here. Student Doctor Dorothy is ready to soak up as much information as she can!

I cant wait to document all the new experiences!!! Should be some damn funny stories. Well, they may not be funny now but I know they will be funny years to come when I read this again...



"we're all set. 3rd year starts tomorrow. setting us free into the wild. now we just have to try not to look like idiots. IM SO EXCITED!!! :)"

Sooooo....i decided 100 hours was not enough and changed my date. It cost me $50 but i'm pretty sure its the best 50 bucks i've ever spent [or at least the best career decision i have made]. Now I will be taking the COMLEX on the 13th [as planned] and the USMLE on the 15th. Best part is I get to take the USMLE down in San Diego [where i took my MCAT] so i'll feel right at home AND get to go to the beach soon after :)

6 more days to study for the United States Medical Licensing Exam [USMLE]...thats about 100 more hours to study......

so much studying making us CRAZYYYYYYYY:


"dude...I was laying in bed the other night trying to turn on my light for a while....that is until I realized I was just pushing a pringles container.
gotta remove the snacks from the night stand" -Sophia

from a GREAT professor to the Class of 2013

Three weeks in… half way there
I know you are feeling pretty overwhelmed right now.
It is normal to feel like you will never know enough and that you can’t possibly be ready.
The first board exam is always the scariest.
I believe in you. You can do this and you can do it well.
Take a deep breath.
Believe.
On the other side of those 8 hours you will begin the greatest adventure of your life.

You’re doing better than you know.
-Dr.White

i think i have eaten more hot pockets in the last 3 weeks than i have in my entire life.....

and in other news, still studying for boards. 14 full study days until USMLE and then COMLEX a couple days after that

fun fact of the day: there is a condition called Hemochromatosis in which your body stores way to much Iron. total body iron may reach 50grams which can be enough to set off metal detectors at airports. cooooool.