Preparing for 1st Year

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Also, while I thoroughly encourage you to try to set up elective/shadowing experience with Doctors (not only is it the best way to learn, but it's usually pretty fun too!) the other issue to think of is malpractice insurance. Docs are usually eager to take students on partly because we have insurance coverage that is paid for by the school. If you haven't started med school, that coverage isn't in place yet - you can try to get a doctor to let you follow them around, but if they're reluctant to take you on that is why, and worse, if something happens. . . you may be named in a lawsuit.

[Guest mumfirst]

Mayflower,

 

I'm not a med student, clerk, or resident (yet :b ), but I'd like to reply to your questions.

 

While I know it is a very rare opportunity, I was very lucky to have been in a position to shadow a couple of physicians over the past few years.

 

I live in a rural community which probably makes a world of difference but I started shadowing an ER physician in our local hospital back in 1999. He is a GP but out here the GPs take ER shifts. He was my parent's doctor and when he heard that I was working towards applying to med school, he offered to "show me around". I shadowed him for a couple of years (he moved out of the area) and found it to be a truly amazing experience (as well as confirming my decision to change careers). Before I started I signed a confidentiality agreement with the hospital and prior to each patient contact, their permission was requested for me to enter the exam room. I was introduced as a premed student contemplating rural medicine. Out of hundreds of patients, not one person refused to let me observe. It truly was an amazing experience. While your question about the understanding of why a doctor would take a particular route is a good one, it really wasn't a problem. After every patient exam, Dr.X would explain to me what was running through his mind - symptoms, exams he had carried out, further tests, possible causes etc. etc. While I saw hundreds of patients, I simply observed - I never spoke to the patients (except of course to thank them) but learned a lot from the doctors and nurses.

 

Living in an underserviced area, we have a physician recruiter in our municipality. After Dr.X left the area, I spoke to the "doctor hunter" and he put me in touch with another family physician who was willing to let me shadow. This ended up being a totally awesome experience as well. As a family practice, Dr.Y knew her patients well and knew exactly which patients would be comfortable with what. Again, I was introduced to the patients in the same way and asked for permission to participate in the exams. This time I participated a little bit more - taking blood pressures, weighing patients, listening to chest sounds, etc. It realy was an amazing experience and I feely very, very lucky to have had the opportunity. Dr.Y only asked the patients whom she felt would be comfortable and as such I was able to be a lot more hands on. Again, just as Dr.X had done, Dr.Y explained to me why she was doing things and what she was looking for - some info shared while in the exam room, and other info shared in her office. At the end of each day we would sit down as she wrote up her charts and I was free to ask any questions. So, to anyone that has the opportunity, I would highly, highly recommend it!

[Guest Biochem10]

Wow mumfirst, sounds like an amazing an experience. I shadowed a very busy neurologist who barely had time to learn my name! Anyway, it was a good experience, but not anything like yours! I basically observed and she did go through the charts with me at the end of the day, but she was way too busy, not showing up when she said she would and constantly running behind schedule.

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Rural family doctors are a relatively untapped resource when it comes to medical education. In many ways, these are often the BEST teaching experiences. That chief of complicated surgery might sound like a good guy to do an elective with, but many times that kind of specialist is so busy that they don't have much time to show stuff to students.

 

Rural family docs, while also busy, on the whole I've found to be more willing to show a student the ropes. They're also less likely to have a fellow, resident, 4th year student, and 3rd year student competing for their time.

 

And there's the whole fact that specialists are often very very good at their one area, but as a nubile med student you're going to want to see a whole range of things as you know essentially nothing about nothing. Rural family doctors know quite a bit about EVERYTHING - the further you get away from teaching centers the less you can rely on specialists and equipment and the more you have to deal with everything on your own. As mumfirst pointed out, rural family docs often run a family practice, also cover the emerg (and they don't need the extra emerg year,) and even do some internal medicine. I worked in a rural hospital last June and entire medical staff was family docs.

[Guest McMastergirl]

Back to the textbook question again... I have a science background including human phys (no anatomy though) and I have found Tortora's Principles of Anatomy and Physiology REALLY useful in med school. Very basic, but still university level. Great illustrations, and an interesting read - not stuffy, boring and void of pictures like Guyton! (which I have, but never touch unless I have a really nit-picky question to answer). I would highly recommend it for anyone, especially if you have a low threshold for boredom!

[Guest misagh]

I'd like to concur with McMastergirl... Tortora and Grabowski's textbook is very useful for anatomy and physiology, and makes reference to numerous clinical conditions in each chapter. Interestingly, it also has sections on basic chemistry and biology (atoms, chemical bonds, mitosis, etc.) I know of at least one other medical student who finds this book useful after undergrad physiology class. I plan on keeping mine...

[Guest moose]

Hi Bearman,

 

I'm also interested in those pdf files. Do you have an ftp link?

 

Please email me at marlys@sympatico.ca.

 

Thanks!

[Guest UofCMeds2005]

My advice - don't do any. You will be living and breathing medicine from your first day of med school through to the day you die. Enjoy life and your summer. My advice - don't even think about med school. Unless of course you are beaming from ear to ear that you got in. Seriously though you will have a million opportunities to shadow and read text books over the next few years. Give your mind a break so that you are eager to go when you get there.

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Yeah, I just realized while out with the boyz tonight this could be my last night out in a while. I'm about to start studying for the exams finishing my 2nd year, and after that I'm planning on doing a clerkshipesque elective for the summer, so including 4th year electives and interviews, I could be going all out until February two thousand and five (2005). By then I might just be a little old to be enjoying the things (aka Jim Bob Ray's, the Ceeps, Chez Dagobert, JJ Rossy's, Minglewoods, the Cabin, playing sports like rugby and hockey without experiencing career ending injuries) I did when I started this degree. You're only in your early 20s once. If you do decide to medicine you won't be when you finish. Enjoy your free time while you have it, premed keeners.

[Guest macMDstudent]

Couldn't have said it better myself, UWOMED2005, except for the fact that not everybody in medical school is in their early twenties. Some may be at least a decade (or two) older than you! I think I have socks in my drawer that are older than you! :rollin

 

Seriously though, you must keep life in balance whatever age you are, whether you are in school, residency or practice. I thought this whole thread was bizaare from the beginning. Free time becomes more and more valuable as you progress through the system (not to mention if you have a family of your own). It would be a shame to look back on a summer wasted when in few years time you'll be on call for 30 hours , and you can't remember when the last time you were outside was! You'll look as bad in July as clerk or junior resident as we all do in January because you'll never see the sun.

 

Let's face it: what you learn in first year is important stuff but it's not the be all and end all of medicine. I think that by the time you're in 4th year and getting ready for the LMCC you'll still have to study just as much no matter if you read a whole anatomy or physiology book in the summer before year 1. As far as passing the year goes, everybody passes anyway. The good news is, it's almost impossible to get kicked out of med school. You have to really work at it and do something really stupid for that to happen. Once you're in, you're in. May as well find a place on the wall for your degree right now!

 

Before med school (even back to the ancient days of my Undergrad) I was always working in the summers anyway, which never seemed to leave enough time for anything else as it was. I'd would have like to have figured out a way to not have to bother with having a job!

 

I still stand by my previous post that if someone feels like they just have to do something medical, spend some time in a clinic. Yes, you may experience difficulty setting it up because of SARS or liability concerns but you will never know unless you pick up the phone and try calling some. The fact that you are now "in the club" by being accepted should help.

[Guest UWOMED2005]

Good point on the fact some might not be in there mid-twenties bid. Sufficed to say, when you get out of med school you'll probably find you're in a different lifestage than when you applied!

[Guest k8termd]

Just wanted to comment on the idea of getting clinical experience before starting medical school.

I am also from a small town/rural area. Last summer before I started medical school I did a 6 week "elective" in the hospital. The point of the elective was to just get an idea of everyday hospital procedures.( For example how is a CT done or a barium enema. What happens when you send blood to the lab for a CBC.)

I actually rotated through some of the major specialties (Surgery, Obs/Gyn, Radiology, Pathology, ER etc...) I found it to be an amazing experience. I mostly just shadowed the docs but some of them let me do things (put in IVs, suture, dictate notes etc...). What I found really helpful was that I became more comfortable with the "world that is medicine".

I think if you are strong in the health sciences already and can find a hospital to take you (rural areas are great resources!) this is the best way to get comfortable with the hospital, how it runs, who runs it and see some real medicine at the same time!

 

Anyways I know that this disscussion is moving elsewhere but I did want to add my thoughts!

K

[Guest brandonite]

I guess I'm a bit late to this discussion, but....

 

I had nothing but the pre-req's when I started last August, and I'm doing fine now. I did a Physics/Math double major degree. I'll give you the standard advice to take some time to enjoy life while you can (not that I'm not loving med school, but I don't have the free time that I used to...).

 

But if I had to study, I'd just do some basic anatomy and physiology. I wouldn't do clinical skills. At least here, there is a specific way we need to learn clinical skills for OSCE's, and I wouldn't like the idea of picking up a bad habit that I would need to un-learn to do it the stupid Bates way. But that's just me.

 

If you could find a simple (3 or 4 page) dictionary, you might want to learn a lot of the med language. They do throw terms at you pretty quickly. I know that I used my dictionary every other day back in September to figure out what they meant when they talked about things like 'tachycardia' and 'dyspnea'. Don't laugh - those words don't come up all that often in a senior physics course.

 

 

Good luck!

[Guest Ian Wong]

Floating back to the top.

 

Ian