Almost...

Almost done with my last exam of med school. Well, not technically the last since I do have an Ob/gyn shelf coming up in a few weekends. But, tomorrow is Step 2 CK, and the last exam of med school that I will study for or care about. I know I haven't blogged in a while (again), but I think that studying for step 2 is a good reason to not blog every day!

I really don't know how I feel about the exam and my readiness for it. I do know that my averages in USMLEWorld have been improving lately, but I'd probably always feel like I could do better, if I just had another week. Eventually though, I'd probably just get to the point where I'd be learning new things, but forgetting old things. I'm hoping that right now, I'm sitting in the sweet spot of knowing just the right amount without forgetting anything. Today, I'll probably do a few more questions, but spend most of the day reviewing what I hope will wind up being high yield little facts. Mostly, that will consist of the notes I've made from USMLEWorld, as I've gone along.

For now, time for me to get to it. Last day of studying for a very long time....

Dear Asian dude

Whoever you are, I do appreciate that you read my blog and comment regularly. However, you'll notice that all of my blogs are written in English. It's not because I don't care about other languages, but because I just don't know any. I know a little Spanish, but not enough to write a blog post. I can write my name in Japanese, but that's definitely not enough to write a blog post. So, if you'd like to continue commenting, that's great, but can you please do so in English?

Thanks!

preparing for the step 2 CK

Of course, I don't have the results for Step 2 CS yet, but I've really put that out of my mind for the time being. For now, i'm focusing most of my energy on CK (the 9-hour multiple choice exam). I've been studying almost exclusively with USMLEWorld, and then using StepUp to Medicine to go over the topics I'm not doing as well in. I think I'm on pace to complete the Q-bank in the next week or so, and then I'll have time to go through all the questions I get wrong again. I'm also taking notes as I go through the Q-bank, and I go through them pretty much every day. Everyone I talk to always says the most important thing you can do is questions, and I'm trying to do more than I've done for any exam in the past, so I'm really hoping this strategy pays off for me.

Yesterday, I took the day off to go out on a boat with the family, my mom's friend from college (I think), and her kids. Being out on the water was definitely a nice break from sitting at my desk doing questions. But, now I'm paying for it by sitting inside on a beautiful Saturday. The one thing getting me through it is knowing that this is the last exam sitting between me and graduating med school!

So, a few more hours of studying today, and then crabs for dinner tonight!

Post Step 2 CS

Well, I hope that I can say that this is post step 2. Unfortunately, scores don't come for about 6 weeks since our 12 patient encounters have to be read and graded by physicians. I'm very hesitant to give any impression of the exam before knowing that I passed, but I'd like to think that I did. And, if I do pass, then I'll be saying that it really wasn't that bad.

For now, I'll attempt to give as much info as I can, without breaking any USMLE rules. I took the test in Philly. If you stay the night, I'd highly recommend the Sheraton, which is about 2 blocks from the test site. The room was surprisingly nice, and very comfortable. I hardly slept, but that was not the hotel's fault. Of course, I was very nervous going into the test site in the morning, but the proctors were all very friendly, and did a great job keeping the mood as light as possible. Standing at the first patient door, waiting for the announcement to enter, I got even more nervous. But, the nervousness subsided fairly quickly. The standardized patients were very good at their job, and until you heard the announcement that 5 minutes remain in the encounter, you could almost forget that the encounter wasn't real.

I usually finished with about a minute to spare, although I did come very close to running out of time on two out of the twelve. The same was true for the patient note...I generally had a minute or so to spare. You have to move relatively quickly, but I didn't feel particularly rushed, or that I didn't have time to think.

Of course, I'm not allowed to give out any specifics about any of the scenarios that I got. However, I will say that if you've read all of First Aid, you should be very comfortable with the exam. It really is an excellent book to prepare, and covers just about everything you'll want/need to know. Everyone told me this, and it's true, so I'll repeat it...First Aid is all you need for the exam. Buy the book and read the whole thing. Practice with other people if you can. Once I know how I did, I'll write some detailed advice.

Step 2 CS time!

I'm about to get packed and head for Philly for Step 2 CS! I actually made it through all of First Aid last night, which was where I wanted to be. So today, I'm going to get to Philly, find a cheesesteak, and the try to go through as much of the book as possible again tonight. Hopefully, that will be enough to prepare me for tomorrow. It's gonna be a long day, but it's got to be better than sitting at a computer for 8 hrs, which is what I'll be doing in another couple of weeks.

mmmm...cheesesteak


food porn

Same old posts...new design

Blogger added some new choices to spruce up the blog, so I've taken advantage. The blog's appearance may be in a state of flux, but everything else should remain the same.

Shanny's Wedding pics!

First off, Congrats to Shannon and Jason Askinasi! Shannon asked me to take some pictures for them, so I was glad to do so. Unfortunately, since I hadn't taken pictures in a while, I forgot some pretty basic things. First off, I took a whole ton of pics at a VERY high ISO, which I forgot to change back after playing around earlier. This meant that I had to do a lot of noise reduction after the fact, and I didn't get quite the pictures I should have. I also took a bunch of pics in auto mode, which I always complain about when other people do it with an SLR. Fortunately, their photographer noticed this and set me straight quickly! Despite all that, I still think I got a bunch of decent pics. If you want to check them out, they're on my flickr site, as usual. Here are a few:

And so it begins...again

I take Step 2 CS this Friday, and then Step 2 CK on July 27. That means that until the 27th, I'll be doing basically nothing but studying...something I have been not looking forward to since I finished studying for Step 1! But, like everything else, this time will probably fly by way too quickly, and then I'll be on to electives. I don't know how much I'll be blogging for the next while, because really, who wants to read about my studying? It's not exciting for me, so probably less so for you. However, I'll try to update my progress anyway. But, for now, it's time to get started...

Big day tomorrow

For me, it's a big day because it's my last day of Ob/gyn, and after 6 weeks in NY, I'm finally going back home! I would like to thank Flushing for the broken window, stolen GPS, and parking ticket. Only one more day tomorrow in clinic, spending most of the time staring at the wall because I don't speak the right language. It's a little awkward doing a pap smear, vaginal exam, and breast exam on someone you can't talk to, but that's the life of an ob/gyn student in Flushing!

However, for thousands of brand new residents across the country, tomorrow is an even bigger day! Every year, July 1st is the day that every new intern starts residency, all across the country. If you think about it, it's a little scary. According to some reports, hospital death rates jump up to 10% in July! After 4 years in medical school, where every patient encounter is closely monitored and you're not really responsible for much, you're all of the sudden a doctor, and the patients are YOUR patients! It's a scary thought, and exactly a year away for me. So, best of luck to all of the new residents tomorrow!

Bored and on call

Currently, I'm sitting in the residents lounge, on one of the way-too-comfortable sofas, taking a short break from studying. There are very few patients here today, which leaves me with very little to do. At some point, I'll have to go record vitals (since there is no computer charting here), but I'm not feeling quite ready for that yet.

I had Indian for lunch today, and my stomach is not thanking me at all for that. The hardest thing to do today will likely be deciding what to do for dinner. I'm not complaining though...I have managed to get a decent amount of studying done, although the end is nowhere near in sight, and won't be for another month. Ok...i think I'll go find vitals now.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Hawthorne Ave,Flushing,United States

last 24 hr call for the next year?

Unfortunately, I've got another 24 hr weekend call tomorrow, but it's Sunday, which is much better than Saturday. At least with Sunday call, you get Monday off. However, even more exciting than only having Monday off from clinic is the fact that this is probably my last long call of med school! 4th year electives typically have better hours than 3rd year cores (unless you pick something like neurosurgery), so this should be it for me. I'll definitely be doing some nights throughout my two months of ER, but they'll just be regular night shifts...not this 24+ hr. call crap. And, other than the occasional night shift, it looks like I've got a pretty easy 7.5 months ahead of me, until I graduate (not counting the month of studying that's coming up).

I think that remembering this will put me in a decent mood tomorrow. To help make sure I'm in a good mood, I think it's time to get to bed and get a decent night sleep.

Saturday call sucks!

Title pretty much says it all...what a waste of a day. When you have Saturday overnight call, you basically lose your whole weekend. You work all day saturday, get off Sunday, and then have to either sleep or be tired. The worst part is that I did basically nothing all day yesterday. There's just no reason for students to ever have to do overnight call on Saturday. The only reason some places make you do it is because that's how it's always been. Well, to me, that's just not a good enough reason. Mark my words...when I'm a resident, unless I'm absolutely not allowed to, I will be sending my students home early on nights and weekend. So many places seem to forget that we're students, who are paying to be there to learn medicine....not little scut monkey slaves to just stand around and wait for menial tasks to be thrown our way.

Fortunately though, as I'm less than 2 weeks away from being done 3rd year, I'll hopefully not have to do another Saturday call until I'm a resident! I do have call next Sunday, but at least you get Monday off. If I haven't already mentioned it, being a third year students sucks. If you're just about to start it, be prepared for lots of scut work, and lots of watching other people do things.

I sound bitter...I should get some rest!

A short update, and congrats!

First off, congrats to Trixie (and many other people out there) who recently started their first day of residency!  I imagine it to be surreal, the first time you see your name as "Dr." on the schedule, and are given med students.  I'm definitely looking forward to a year from now, when I can see for myself.  It seems like just yesterday that I was stressing about getting into med school, and then starting, and then getting through first year, then through step one, and so on.  Now, the end is less than a year away.  Since I'm in OB right now, it may be appropriate to say that if you got pregnant today, by the time you have your baby, I'll be done med school!

There's really not much exciting to report about rotation though.  Today was a pretty easy day, with only one short surgery, leaving me some time to study.  My guess is there's going to make up for it tomorrow, but I can only hope that I don't wind up with my new least favorite OB surgeon...the one who doesn't think a student is his assistant.

Things with my electives seem to be falling into place nicely and if I can make one more thing work out, there's a chance that I'll actually finish med school at the end of February!  My two rotations at Hopkins are just about all figured out and unless something crazy happens, they should be settled (which is probably the most exciting part of my week).  Just over 2 weeks left in OB, then I'll be studying like mad for the USMLE all over again (step 2, obviously).  I'm going to keep myself sane during that month long period by reminding myself that I'm a 4th year med student!!

Safari Reader

I just want to take a second to highlight a new feature in Apple's Safari browser, which I've quickly become a big fan....Safari Reader.  If you haven't yet downloaded Safari 5, you should do it right away (available from software update, under the apple menu).  It has other big features, such as finally enabling browser extensions, but Reader is my favorite.  The best way to explain Reader is to illustrate it.  In short, it turns this mess:

into this:

 

When you click the reader button, Safari strips out the all the ads, headers, and other garbage, and presents you with the article, without any other distractions.  CNN is actually not too awful, but some other sites are far worse.  Ads may be necessary, but I hate them, and I love that I can now have them instantly stripped from whatever I'm reading.  So, once again, thanks Apple, for making my life just a little more pleasant.  Now, if you could just drop AT&T....

getting closer

...to being done 3rd year, and it really can't come to soon!  I am developing a sever case of 3rd year senioritis, and I am beginning to get a little bitter.  I am totally over the 3rd year student role in the OR, particularly!  I hate standing around watching for hours on end, doing nearly nothing but some suctioning, retracting, and cutting suture.  Today, it took everything I had to keep my mouth shut, and it's a good thing that I only have 1 week in the OR left, because that's about all I can stand.  I'm gonna tell you the story, because I need to vent!

The surgeon I was with today does things a little differently.  Actually, lots of surgeons do things different, because they're surgeons, and I think they just like that they can do things however they want.  But, back on topic....this guy likes to have two Bovies and two suctions set up (one for him, one for the resident).  Since attendings rarely pick up a suction (they prefer to point to things they want me to suction), his is essentially mine.  So anyway, he was tying something off, I had my suction tip right next to his instruments, and he said, "suction."  Being a good little med student, I tried to suction.  He then barked at me, "not you!  Him!  He's my assistant, not you!"  Well excuse me, I didn't know that after suctioning for half the case, only the resident was allowed to suction the tiny blood vessel you cut!  At this point, I wanted to just cross my arms and not do another damn thing, since the resident is his assistant...not me.  It's sad that I actually still get a little excited when they let me suture...something that most doctors don't even want to be in the room for.  I still am not sure how I managed to keep my mouth shut through 3 months of similar stories in my surgery core.  I guess I'm gaining a new skill.  But, like I said, I'm very glad that there's only one week of it left!

Now, I need to eat something.  Preferably meat.  I really would like to gnaw on a steak!

1/3 done OB

As I think I've mentioned before, I decided to take OB/gyn in 2 weeks blocks, since that's how it's split up for us (two weeks each of OB, gyn, and clinic).  So, I'm now 1/3 of the way done, and it already seems to be going by quickly!  Unfortunately, I have a feeling that I've finished the part that I'm going to like the most.

So far, although I dislike the area, the rotation has been pretty good.  Some of the attending do a great job of teaching and really care about the students.  I also may have just gotten lucky so far, but I've liked all of my residents to this point, and some of them will also teach a decent amount.  This is definitely one of those places though that if you want to sit around and do nothing all day, you could get away with it, but if you ask, they'll let you do a lot and teach.

So far, I've seen a bunch of vaginal deliveries, and depending on the attending, they may let you catch the baby, suture up an episiomoty, or you may just watch.  There are also plenty c-sections every day to scrub into, and the experience in there is also attending dependent.  Typically, you'll just retract, suction, and cut suture, but a couple attendings have really done a good job explaining everything, pointing out relevant anatomy, and let me get my hand inside and feel around.  One, who really loves to teach (and is good at it), even asked the resident to switch places with me and let me do most of the closing.  Although I probably won't go into surgery at this point, it was very nice when he told me that if I didn't go into surgery, it would be a waste of talent!

Next is gyn, which is primarily surgery.  Unfortunately, it's probably just going to be more retracting and suctioning.  I'm really over the student role in surgery, and I wish they let us do more.  I've heard that some places, there are few residents and the students actually get to first assist a lot.  And, I love when I get to do that.  Sometimes I worry that I'm not going into surgery because I just didn't have a good enough experience, in the student role, to really fall in love with surgery like I thought I would.  But, if I really had gotten the chance to first assist once in a while and see what it's like to be a surgeon, I may have had different thoughts.   Because, when the one attending let me switch with the resident, I really didn't want to leave the OR.  But, I'm keeping an open mind, so we'll see how it goes in gyn.

The only thing I'm REALLY not looking forward to is clinic.  Mostly because the patients are almost entirely Spanish, and almost none of them speak English!  I do not have a problem with Spanish patients, and I'm all for diversity, but I do have a big problem with none of them speaking English!  It kind of pisses me off that they live here for years, are getting basically free care in the clinic, and then they can't even learn the language to communicate.  Fortunately for them, many of the residents are fluent in Spanish.  Actually, I don't think any of the residents natively speak English.  So, we'll see how that goes....at least it has the easiest hours.

Flushing pics

I decided to put up some pics of the hospital and the area.  Here's the hospital:

And here is one I took on the street, on my way to the metro.  I know, it's hard to believe that this is in the US (and outside of Chinatown), but this really is just another street in Flushing...

Happy Memorial Day!

To celebrate Memorial Day, the hospital has graciously given us the day off!  Unfortunately, being in Flushing, that leaves me with very little to do.  However, I did spend the weekend in the city with Lauren, which was a lot of fun!  On Saturday, we walked around Times Square, and got tickets to see Fela!  Very good true story, very good show (up for about 11 Tony awards).

After the show was over, Lauren's friend, who is the show's stage manager, got us backstage.  It was pretty neat to be backstage of a broadway show, but surprising how little room there was back there.  Afterwards, we went to dinner with the stage manager, learned a lot about the show, and saw Kelsey Grammer, who's starring in Le Cage next door, walk by.

Sunday, we spent most of the day hanging out on one of Lauren's friend's roof deck.  It was a beautiful day in the city, so a good time.  After some sushi (the food all weekend was much better than what I'm used to in Flushing), I headed back here, only to wait about 40 minutes for a bus to finally show up.  Had I known the bus was going to take so long, I would have just walked!  Have I mentioned that I don't like Flushing?

Thanks to Lauren for a good weekend!

Restaurants near me

These are the top results for restaurants near me, presented in the same order that Yelp provided them.  See any trends?

1. Southern Spice
2. Bownie Restaurant
3. Hahm Ji Bach
4. Sam Wok Gak
5. Kum Gang San Restaurant
6. Mapo
7. Main St. Imperial Taiwanese
8. Phobang
9. Tong Sam Gyup Goo Ee
10. A Fan Ti
11. Ah Rhee Soo
12. Happy Garden Restaurant

Going down to number 20 is much of the same.  Awesome!!  Or not....

OB....almost one week down

For my first two weeks, I'm working in the OB department, which means I spend much of the day either helping to cut out or catch babies. There is enough down time to study, but there is also plenty to do, and lots of opportunity to learn. Already, I've been in a few c-sections (enough that I don't particularly feel the desire to do anymore), seen a bunch of vaginal deliveries, and caught a couple babies. Those things are slippery!

So far, the rotation is going fairly well. The residents have been pretty cool so far, which can make or break a rotation. I've already had my first overnight call, last night, and the resident was awesome! Between delivering babies, which came extremely fast last night for some reason (apparently nobody wanted to be in labor for long), I spent time sticking my fingers into foam holes, learning how to judge cervix dilation just by feel. However, I was not able to try out my new skills, since after I was comfortable with it, the patients were muslims, and they don't allow males in the room. I am not particularly taken with this practice of their's, but there's nothing I can do about it. Much to the husband's disappointment, they did wind up having a male deliver their baby, since he happened to be the attending on-call. Overall, the residents were cool, the nurses were friendly, the deliveries were pretty exciting, and I even got some sleep...not too much to complain about.

Today, I'm post call, but I'm at a loss for what to do! I woke up at around noon, but I really don't have anywhere to go. Although the actual rotation is going well, I do not, at all, enjoy being in Flushing. There doesn't seem to be anything at all to do within walking distance, the restaurants are mostly Asian, and driving anywhere is a pain in the ass due to horrible drivers, traffic, and complete lack of parking. I probably could go into the city, but it's more of a hassle than it's worth since I'd either drive and not find parking, or have to take the subway, which takes far longer than it ought to. This weekend, I'm going into the city to hang out with Lauren (my sister who I suppose I've never mentioned), so that should break up the monotony. It's supposed to be a beautiful weekend, and I have a three day weekend, so looking forward to that!

How dilated are you?