New First-year Resident Working Hours

It's almost a rite of passage for residents to be overworked and sleep deprived. Back in the days when my parents were residents, they spoke of the times they had to work 36 hour shifts. Nowadays residents find themselves working 24 hour shifts, but starting Friday, July 1st, first year residents will start working 16 hours shifts. Progress in the right direction. Although it's a small victory, it's a victory nonetheless. The American Medical Student Association (AMSA) is still working to reduce the working hours of ALL residents.

To read the full article, you can find it here: http://www.amsa.org/AMSA/Homepage/About/News/062911.aspx

A New Perspective on Medical School, and Good News: I've Honored my First Class!

I've officially Honored my first class in medical school! woo! I know it's just Biostats and a ton of people honor it as well, but it still feels good to say it. 

I set a goal for myself when I started second semester and I realize now that I never shared it with any of you reading my blog. Once receiving my final first semester grades back in April, my first emotion was relief that I passed all my classes (not that I was ever really in danger of failing anything), but as the weeks wore on, a new feeling crept up. I didn't notice it at first; I was too distracted with all the hoopla from my family and friends, but when things calmed down and I was left to quietly reflect on my lonesome thoughts, I felt it.  That feeling, captive readers, was disappointment. A little unhappiness too, but overwhelming disappointment. How did I let first semester get away from me? That's what I kept asking myself. Later on I just reasoned that fine, it was only the first semester of medical school; it was an adjustment period, anatomy blows, and now its done.  How about making up for that lackluster performance next semester? And then I set a goal for myself to make Dean's List.

In order to make Dean's List at AUC, your grades for that particular semester need to average to an 87% or above. To honor a course, you need to have a 90% or higher. I never really expected to honor all my courses, but I felt an 87% average was definitely a reachable goal for me.  So maybe some of you are asking now why does it even matter? Scores in med school is pretty much Honor, Pass, Fail. That school of thought also runs with the following joke I know you've all heard time and again:

Q:What do you call someone who graduated at the bottom of their med school class?

A: Doctor

Hardy-har-har. 

This belief only begs the question, what motivation is there to excel if it won’t matter? 

But it does matter. I've met some US med schools students who've asked this question and I've read a couple of blogs from people who pose it as well. They talk about the pass. They just want to pass, they are going to blow off the first few weeks and then spend that last one studying so they can just pass. To be honest, I was all about that pass first semester and then I realized...wait a sec.... I'm in the Caribbean... I'm not really allowed to "just pass". Damn stigma! Or Maybe it's more accurate when I say I'm not allowed to "just pass" to get to where I want to go and that is ultimately a Pediatric Neurology residency somewhere in the Boston/Providence area. People don't mess around up there. When I look at the AUC match list no one ever goes there, no one gets matched up there.....  I don't know if it's because they don't apply or if the competition is just that fierce in Boston in particular, but I know that "just passing" isn't going to be enough for me. 

What it all boils down to is this: I need to do well now, so I can do well on the USMLE Step 1. And also, I need to do well now, so I don't look like a driveling fool during clinical rotations. 

The way I see it (and probably not the best way to look at it), the first two years of medical school is pretty much a very long, overwhelming and extremely expensive Kaplan course that prepares you for one of the most important exams of your life-- the USMLE Step 1. If you aren't understanding the information now, when exactly are you going to learn it? Please don't say during breaks or the review month right before the exam. You have to learn the material when you are learning the material in class because there just is not enough time. Everyday you are learning something new, every block you are moving on to another part of the body, every semester you are tackling completely new subjects, and in med school you just keep trudging forward day after day for two years and it's very hard finding the time to look back.

Personally, I can't help but feel I missed the boat on a lot of the stuff in anatomy and embryology, and I will have to spend time looking back/actually learning about those subjects again, but I can't let that happen with anything else. I am putting every ounce of my resolve into everything this second semester and there hasn't been an instance yet where I felt like I've missed something. It is important to do all this work now because when the time comes where I have 4-6 weeks to review for Step 1, I want those weeks to be just that-- a review. I want to say, "oh yea, that's right I remember that" or, "oh yup, definitely familiar with this" when I study those few weeks. Not "oh my god, what is this, why do I feel like I've never seen this in my life???" or "Oh yea, I remember this, I failed this block." That would not be good. No one wants that. In conclusion, work your ass off now to get the best possible grades these first two years, and everything will payoff when the boards and clinicals roll around.

That is all for now,

Andrea

A Typical School Day at AUC

"Anonymous"  commented on my last post asking what the average day is like here, soooooo......

For the first four semesters at AUC, the schedule is pretty standard:

-Wake up around 7-7:30

-Get to the first class, which goes from 8:00 am to 9:20 (you get a 10 minute break in the middle)

-10 minute break

-Second class from 9:30 to 10:20

-10 minute break

-Third class from 10:30 to 11:20

And from here on out the schedule changes depending on which semester you're in. 

~First semester, you will have a break for 2.5 hours and then you will have anatomy lab from 2:00 till 4:00 pm. 

~For the first month of Second Semester, your classes just end at 11:20 and you have the rest of the day to do whatever you want. After the first block exams, however, you have Biostatistics class from 12:00 to 12:50 for one month. My class just took the final exam in biostats this past week, so we are now back on the schedule of free afternoons!!! Sadly, we will have those afternoons taken from us once we start Intro to Clinical Medicine (ICM2) at the beginning of block 4. 

~I'm not entirely sure what the schedule is like for the other semesters since I am only a first year medical student....

In the afternoons I just study, study, and study. And that's pretty much how it is with most people here. I'm sure if you are the health-conscious type, you will find time to incorporate a workout or run in the middle of your day, but I study in the afternoons so I can have the evenings off to watch TV shows/sports/movies and to video chat with my boyfriend. I'm pretty big on sleep so I'm almost always in bed by 11:00 p.m. 

Oh and I almost forgot to mention,

Everyday in the evenings from 5 pm and 7pm there are tutoring sessions to help you go over all the material  that has been covered in class and to stress what is high yield for the exams. The tutors are always students from the class ahead who excelled in the course. I feel like most people do go to the tutoring sessions, but I've only been once myself. I don't find the sessions helpful because I'm just more productive when I'm home reading the slides over myself. I like going at my own pace and concepts stick to me more when I'm reading rather than listening. Although I don't go to the sessions, I've recently started using the tutoring slides when writing out my notes. The MCB and Immuno slides have been very good this semester at highlighting the material most often tested in the exams. A+ with those.

Related articles

• AUC First Semester Classes (medschoolcarobstyle.com)

Medical School is a Balancing Act of Priorities

In decreasing priority:

1. Study
2. Stay in contact with BF/ family
3. Sleep
4. Spend time/ decompress with friends
5. Blog
6. Exercise
7. Get a tan

One factor is inversely proportional to all others meaning if I spend more time studying, I'll spend less time sleeping. On a good day I can get three or four of these things done above, but there just isn't enough time in the day for me. Usually my exercise and blogging habits take a pretty big hit in my daily routine, and tanning? Ha! I'm lighter here than I was back home.

Semester 2: Block II Results and my Newfound Study Method

Like I said in my last post, I didn't do poorly this block, I just didn't do as well as the first (I know I sounded like a whiny little bitch). But I guess I shouldn't have been surprised since Block I is the easiest of the semester. Since the end of March, my grades have been steadily improving.... until now. I regressed, but only slightly.

Immunology-

Average: 84%

Me: 88%

Physiology I-

Average: 81.5%

Me: 83%

MCB II-

Average: 82.5%

Me: 88% (I didn't initially do this well, he threw out three questions that everyone got wrong)

Biostatistics-
Quiz 1+ EC=

Average: 78%

Me: 114%

Quiz 2 + EC=

Average: 83%
Me: 90%

My Biostats final is next Wednesday. With the quiz grades and extra credit I'm going into the exam with a 102% average. I cannot wait to be done with this 1 credit course.


At least a "bad" block for me right now isn't me failing an exam like first semester. At least I have balance, which wasn't the case last semester when my grades were pretty much A, B, F.  If you guys remember from my earlier posts, the first 3 blocks, I failed three different exams. First Block I failed Anatomy, second block I failed Histo, third block it was MCB. To put it plainly, I was a disaster. Fourth block was the first time I didn't fail an exam. It was at this point I discovered my study technique....

I no longer listen in class. I doubt this will work for everyone, but the kind of learner I am... I need words. I need to physically write words. Over and over again. And to read them over and over again. I can't listen in class. I just can't do it. I don't have ADHD, I just get so overwhelmingly bored, time crawls. I  would day dream, doodle, even bring my computer to class just to surf the web. It was stupid. I tried very hard in the beginning to listen, but I can't learn when I'm listening. I was wasting 3.5 hours of my day in class so then I decided 4th block, forget this I'm just going to sit in the back of the room with my headphones on and study on my own while class is happening. And that's what I did and what I still do everyday. That's it. And it's been brilliant.  I write notes on the margins of the slides while I'm in class and once I'm home, I write those notes again in a notebook or I'll convert them into flashcards. When Block weekend rolls around, all I do is read from those notes and flashcards 3 or 4 times and then I'm set. And what's particularly nice about this method is that I save time and don't need to spend as many hours studying at home like most of the other students in my class. After classes, I probably study for four more hours and then take the evenings off.

I think I may tinker with the method I've been using and start writing the actual notes into my study notebook (or flashcards) while I'm in class from now on, and then when I'm home I can just read over my notes again and again and memorize them for that day. I'll let you know how it goes for me. I hope this is helpful to everyone!


Related articles

• Semester 2: Block I Results (medschoolcaribstyle.com)