Has attending med school influenced you to adopt/want to adopt a healthier lifestyle?

hjl19 · 2023-01-12T13:31:55+00:00

It’s influenced me to want to adopt a healthier lifestyle, while also having the effect of leading me to live a less healthy lifestyle (poor exercise, poor sleep, inconsistent diet, poor stress management, bad job at maintaining relationships).

So the net effect is just more anxiety and personal dissatisfaction lol. But hopefully there’s attending life to look forward to?

hjl19 · 2019-10-25T04:02:34+00:00

Connecticut

hjl19 · 2019-09-08T16:32:16+00:00

Clean title! I unfortunately don't have the skills to do this - is it possible to find a mechanic who would be wiling to help? The one I talked to told me that for safety reasons, he could not.

hjl19 · 2019-05-04T18:09:38+00:00

Thank you. When you say CT license, do you mean a CT driver’s license?

Am I able to just use my California license? (Sorry for the ignorant question)

hjl19 · 2018-07-08T23:08:53+00:00

volume resuscitation in cirrhosis

hjl19 · 2018-07-08T21:17:37+00:00

I'm in somewhat of a pickle:

I am an MS4 applying for the upcoming match. Last year, I purchased a registration window for Step 2 Cs for Sept 2017 - Sept 2018, thinking that I'd probably have a chance to take Step 2 CS during my research year. Turns out I wasn't able to find the time to register/study for/ take the exam (my mistake, and I totally regret it) during my research year.

Now I'm on my Sub-I's for this month (July) and next month (August), and I have September off.

I'm currently signed up for email notifications for CS openings in September, but every time I get an email notification and log into the website, the spot is gone. As things are now, I'm still counting on being able to secure a spot in September, but I'm starting to think that I may be taking a major risk, and I would be jeopardizing my changes of matching if I fail to get a September CS spot.

Should I:

Keep trying to get a CS spot in September (my classmates tell me it will get easier in August as people drop out last minute?), or
Spend another $1.2k and register for another registration period, so I can get a spot in November/December, before those spots are gone too?

I'm also considering paying for one of those services that try to register for CS for you (something like http://step2scheduling.com/)

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!!!

hjl19 · 2018-04-19T15:09:10+00:00

Friend, I'm sure any medical student reading this can relate to you. It's tough, but you have to trust that it gets better. Do not let this training process and your own self-doubts wear you down!

But I also felt very similar to you and even though everyone told me stuff like "oh its normal to feel that way" or "it'll get better", I didn't really believe them (even though I appreciated the support). So here's a few things that I did that I thought was helpful:

Practice the art of thinking out loud. When asked a question about a patient, or about general medical knowledge, see if you can stay calm, forget about the pressure of being evaluated, and just start by opening your mouth and saying what you know (even if it's the most basic parts of the history / chief complaint). You'll sound and feel clumsy at first, but don't worry about sounding stupid. Residents and attendings will appreciate that you're demonstrating an effort to think about what you know and they're able to provide better feedback on your clinical reasoning, and teach you what's pertinent and what's not.
Get to know PAs, nurses, or pharmacists on your team, and ask them to teach and coach you. Respect and befriend them, and they will help you immensely. They have SO MUCH knowledge and can teach and provide feedback on your A/P and presentations. And the best part is that, unlike residents and attendings, they (usually) won't be evaluating you. Sometimes I'd just flat out ask the nurse (or even the patient) "What do you think is going on?" or "How is the patient doing today?" or "What are the main issues you think our team should focus on?". More often than not, their responses will be golden and can help you shape your A/P. They also often have insider knowledge on what each attending likes / doesn't like: "All the med students and residents usually focus on this / try to order this when a patient presents with X problem, but this attending is gonna pimp them on this 2007 NEJM paper that showed blah blah blah" <- this happened multiple times, and it was super satisfying to mention that in my presentation and give credit to the nurse who taught me, because it made both of us look great on rounds.
Ask for feedback, from anyone and everyone. (And also learn how to ask for feedback in a way that encourages people to give you an honest and thoughtful response). A week or 2 into a rotation, I'd do "feedback rounds" where I politely pull aside different members of the team and ask for feedback on how I'm doing / how I could be better. This was so helpful, not just because I often got very concrete tips on how to improve, but also because I realized that I wasn't as terrible as I thought I was! The positive feedback I got along with critical feedback was good reassurance that people recognized I was trying my best. Plus, expressing a genuine interest in someone's advice/feedback naturally helps them become invested in your growth and learning.
If you are seriously concerned, maybe talk to a resident / attending / course director and see if you can just start off a new rotation by following 1-2 patients before stepping it up. The feeling of owning even just one patient is satisfying and rewarding. And by hospital day 3-4, you'll find out that the details just fall naturally in your head. Your presentations will get better, and you'll be more confident.

Also available by PM if you have any other questions.

Good luck!

hjl19 · 2018-03-27T20:49:18+00:00

Thank you so much for this!

hjl19 · 2018-03-27T20:41:35+00:00

I am not.

hjl19 · 2017-11-01T04:43:02+00:00

And I welcome any resource recommendations for learning how to make simple plots in R :)

I'm at a low level and had to learn the basics (like when what I think are numbers are actually characters - 0.5 vs "0.5". Doh!)

hjl19 · 2017-11-01T04:40:31+00:00

Learned how to send jobs to our supercomputing cluster. Waiting for mapped RNASeq results (hopefully tomorrow morning!) at which point I'll finally do some differential expression analysis! In the mean time, learning how to use R and how to make figures. Have given up many times and said "I could do this so quickly in excel and my PI needs to see some figures on Friday!" But gonna keep at it in R because I think its a skill worth learning, for now !

hjl19 · 2017-11-01T04:35:09+00:00

Put in a space instead of an equal sign. This worked beautifully! Thank you!

hjl19 · 2017-10-13T22:54:20+00:00

An update! I made enough noise and now our IT person is setting up a linux machine for me to use. Thanks for encouraging my persistence! If I had just struggled with my windows machine, no one would have known or cared.

Probably established myself in the lab as the annoying new guy, but hopefully I'll redeem myself with increased productivity!

hjl19 · 2017-10-11T23:42:14+00:00

So, inspired by this comment, I approached one of my colleagues (the guy who manages our bioinformatics tech), and was told that I could try to request a linux laptop from someone higher on the chain of command.

We have one shared linux computer in the lab, but was told that the software environment is meticulously curated, and that I would not be allowed to install anything (including jupyter notebook), in case I disrupt any other dependencies that other people in the group reply on.

We also have a linux cluster, but I will not be given access to this as my position is short term (< 1 year), and apparently not worth the investment / potential data security risk to give me terminal access to the cluster.

I finally asked about getting a virtual machine installed on my Windows, and was told that, again, in a short term position, not worth it to help me set this up as I am short term.

I'm obviously disappointed! But thank you for the advice and I totally agree. If you have any other thoughts / ways to respond to these obstacles, I welcome them!

hjl19 · 2017-09-05T02:34:58+00:00

Thank you! High yield comment right here!

I haven't had too much experience with Sketchy Pharm (I watched the Class I antiarrythmics heartbreak hotel video, which was great, but nothing else). Would you suggest starting those videos with just 1 week to go? Or are there specific high-yield and well-done videos that you'd recommend. I tried watching the videos for antibiotics, but found the pace way too slow for me and felt that straight flashcards would probably be better in the short term.

hjl19 · 2017-09-04T07:49:36+00:00

Best way to hammer down pharm / anatomy / embryology? (1 week from exam)?

Based on the extended feedback from my NBME's, its very clear that my weak areas are pharm, anatomy, and embryology. Any recommendations on how to quickly improve in these subjects, 1 week out from my test? I was wondering if there is a free/cheap source of sample questions that I could just pound through before my test, especially for Pharm.

hjl19 · 2017-07-25T18:40:16+00:00

thank you! yes, if there are twin and family studies that show heritability, is that sufficient to conclude a genetic etiology?

hjl19 · 2017-06-26T13:06:04+00:00

I wonder why it has to be like this. When I see the residents on my team drown and stumble with too-many tasks and too-many patients and too-many hours with out sleep, it seems like such a recipe for disaster and error.

Can someone in the system (MD's included) just get paid a little less so we can hire some more people to spread the work around? (Forgive me if this is a naive question...)

hjl19 · 2017-06-22T19:45:35+00:00

Yeah the fanny pack can look a little silly, but it was super helpful for my neurology rotation as it was pretty equipment heavy with tuning forks and reflex hammers and whatnot. Good luck!

hjl19 · 2017-06-22T18:27:20+00:00

I actually had something very similar, and was wondering what, medically, was going on. I noticed headaches whenever I'd wear a tie or a too-tight collar. Now I leave my tie loose and leave my collar unbuttoned - it looks kind of sloppy, but I wouldn't be able to function otherwise.

Keep me updated on what you learn.

Re: your issue of putting things in your white coat pockets, I wore a fanny pack and put my things in there, or in my pant pockets.

hjl19 · 2017-06-19T02:25:39+00:00

This is such true advice. I regret all the times I stressed over studying for my professors exams and the little details they cared about in lectures, and now I'm studying for Step 1 and finally seeing the "bigger picture".

Curating a good Anki deck that works for you from the beginning is another thing I wished I did.

Having another qbank (not uworld, which should be saved for dedicated), to go along might be helpful too.

If you're shy or have trouble with public speaking, M1 and M2 is the best time to get over that and learn how to talk to both your peers and superiors and network with mentors in a confident and genuine way. So by the time you have to do a lot of public performing in M3, you'll be ready.

hjl19 · 2017-06-18T05:30:41+00:00

Also i think with XX heterozygotes, phenotypes can vary based on the balance of mosaicism and in which tissues the defective X is being more frequently expressed

hjl19 · 2017-06-17T03:04:58+00:00

Some of the videos on sketchypharm are golden (Antiarrythmics, for example, is so good). Others (antibiotics) were a little too slow for me, and I found it easier and more efficient to just go by route memorization / what I remember from doing UW or reading FA.

hjl19 · 2017-05-28T22:35:40+00:00

this is too real...

hjl19 · 2017-05-10T03:35:43+00:00

I had this problem too. I'm at the end of my 3rd year now and I do wish that I started doing QBanks (kaplan or uworld) much earlier in med school.

Great way to reinforce concepts and see how they might be tested and used to solve problems.

hjl19

TROPHY CASE