last day home, for a while

Tomorrow, I leave for Falcon to study for the USMLE! It's going to be 8 hours a day, 6 days a week, for 7 weeks of nearly constant studying! Sounds like a ton of time, but we're covering 20 months of basic sciences material, which is 20 months of as much information as you can possibly cram into each day. As I've said before, I definitely now know where the phrase "I've forgotten more than you'll ever know" comes from, because it does feel like I've forgotten more about medicine than I ever knew before. So, hopefully Falcon will help me to remember everything I've forgotten! Their average score improvement is around 20-40 points, and I'm hoping to be at the upper end (or hopefully above) that range. Fortunately, some of my favorite people from AUC will be in Dallas with me, so it will be nice to see them again for a few weeks.

For today, I've gotta make it to the gym again, stop at Staples for some supplies to cover the next few weeks, and get to Best Buy to buy a digital voice recorder. I'm not exactly sure what Falcon's "patented study method" is, but I do know it involves recording yourself and then listening to it later. More info on that to come later. I suppose that now is as good a time as any to start the day.

Holy News Media Hype Batman!

The news people are officially out of control with this swine flu business! Everyone is going crazy, screaming about how it's about to become a pandemic, when NO ONE HAS DIED outside of Mexico! Yes, that's right..not a single death in the United States. Sure, there was one kid who crossed the border from Mexico and technically died in the US, but I don't think he ought to count. However, that sure does make for a better news story, if you do count it!

Each year, about 5-20% of the population gets the plain old vanilla flu, with about 200,000 people hospitalized from flu-related complications, and about 36,000 people die from flu-related causes! That number is probably surprisingly high for most of you, because really, nobody cares that much about the flu! In the grand scheme of things, that's just not a high enough number to be concerned about (unless you're elderly, very young, or immune compromised).

Just the other day, I ran an ambulance call for trouble breathing. Turns out it was a 23 year old student with asthmatic bronchitis. However, the lack of flu symptoms (such as fever, tiredness, runny nose, aches and pains, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea) did not stop the police, who arrived on scene before us, from wearing surgical masks and attempting to get a full travel history. Would you wear a mask if you knew someone had the flu? No, you wouldn't! So why in the world are you wearing one for someone who likely does not have any flu at all, more or less one which would likely not be dangerous even if you did get it?

If you get swine flu, which you probably won't, you'll most likely have normal flu symptoms. Sure, it will suck for a while, but you'll probably just lay in bed, rest for a week, and go back about your business. Very few people are hospitalized because of it and if they are, surprise...we have treatment!

So please everyone, CALM DOWN! Unless you've been vaccinated this year, you're more likely to get the regular flu than swine flu. Heck, you're more likely to die of a heart attack, a car accident, or get cancer than die of swine flu! Can we please give this hysteria a rest?

Oh...and please stop bringing up the pandemic back in 1918 or whatever. This flu strain lacks the virulence factors that made that one so severe. Same name, different virus!


Note: As with anything I post on this blog, this is not meant to be medical advice. It's just the musings of a not-yet-doctor person.

R-rated post below

Fireman: find 'em hot, leave 'em wet

Stupidest looking dog ever?

Heather's dog, Mugsy, in a car seat. Actually, heather just reminded me that I'm wrong. He looks ever stupider in his raincoat and shoes!



-- Post From My iPhone

Mobile blogging

I just downloaded a new iPhone app so that I can do some mobile blogging. At least for the next couple days, i'm spending a lot less time at my computer. So, we'll see if this helps with blogging frequency, which I know has sucked lately. Although in a couple days, I'll be spending a lot of time studying by my computer again, so frequency will probably go back up.

In any case, still not much exciting going on. I have been back in the gym and back to tanning though, so I'll finally stop looking like a ghost. Seriously, it is not safe to look at me in direct sunlight right now, so I'm really just getting tan for your safety. It's also been very nice to be back at Federal Hill Fitness, which is easily my favorite gym in Baltimore. I have to drive 1/2 hr to get there, but I think it's worth it. Nothing exciting at the firehouse either. I've gotten a bunch of calls, but nothing exciting. I suppose nothing exciting for me is good for the community, but boring for me nonetheless. Ok, I'm up way too late, so time to go for now.


-- Post From My iPhone

USA update

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I probably won't be blogging every day over break, since there really just isn't that much interesting to say. But, I will keep blogging, so people don't think i've disappeared. Mostly, I've just been enjoying the delicious food that I've missed while in St. Maarten, the technology which is non-existent there, and the amazing roads which do not age your car 10 years in 2. When I see things like the brand new Whole Foods market and Bed Bath and Beyond which were just built by my house, along with all the additions to the already very nice Annapolis Mall and all the other construction that's been going on, I really don't know what I did with myself for nearly 2 years. It's very easy to take for granted how great things are here, until you see how things are somewhere else.

In any case, I spent the other day (and night) back at the firehouse. I'm trying to remember what calls I ran, but there really wasn't anything that exciting. I did treat one rather intoxicated man with chest pain. The alcoholics are always tricky because it's sometimes difficult to tell if they actually have something going on, or if they're just suffering the side effects of being an alcoholic, or both. This particular guy had a normal 12-lead EKG and seemed in a much better mood than most people having an MI, but he also had anywhere from 2 to 6 stents put in anywhere from many years ago to a month ago. I know that sounds awfully vague, but he was a pretty lousy historian. He was also taking some medications which led me to believe that he had more of a history than he was aware of. So, I just did the safest thing I could and treated him as though he were having an MI. If he was, then I may have saved his life. If he wasn't, then he still had improved blood flow to his heart, which is rarely a bad thing.

Oh...and my luggage finally came, at some ungodly hour of the morning. It actually did make it on a flight the day after I left, which is what they said would happen. But, since flights from St. Maarten typically don't get in to Baltimore until late at night, it seemed like it took 2 days to get here. After a very long day yesterday of emptying 5 overstuffed bags of luggage, my room is finally back together and actually is looking like a decent place to live.

Home!!

Well, I am back home, for good! Of course, it wouldn't have been a complete trip home if St. Maarten didn't give me one final screw you before I left the island. This time, in came in the form of not having my luggage...still. This was definitely partially USAir's fault, but St. Maarten contributed. USAir sent the wrong plane; it was supposed to be a 757, but they sent a much smaller Airbus. According to the flight attendant, that plane cannot handle the load and has no business in the caribbean. Well, she was right...the plane, not even full, was 7,000 lbs. overweight! But, here's where St. Maarten comes in!

Usually, they would just remove some fuel from the plane and get a more direct route from air traffic control. But, naturally, St. Maarten either lacks the desire or the technical capabilities (maybe both) to remove fuel from the plane. I would think that it would be a fairly easy procedure, and it's apparently routine at pretty much any other airport, but not in St. Maarten. So, instead, they removed EVERY bag from the plane and said they'd ship them out the next day. Again, not surprisingly, they apparently didn't ship them yesterday. So, I got to spend my first night home in Philly, which honestly wasn't that bad since I got home early the next morning, but I still don't have my bags! Oh well...I'm home now, so I don't have to worry about any of that anymore. Hopefully the bags will show up today.

In other news, I took care of some very non-St. Maarten things yesterday. Namely, I got my new TV installed in my room with Verizon FIOS HDTV, got our internet speed upgraded to 20/5 for free (which is insanely fast), and got the iPhone 3G, with a real AT&T rate plan. Today, I need to pick up some stuff for my car, and then it's off to the firehouse to save some lives (or more likely, taxi some people to the hospital).

New (far more accurate) Microsoft commercial

A much more accurate version of what a MIcrosoft commercial would be, if they weren't paying actors to do them.

Goodbye, St. Maarten!!!! Basic Sciences....DONE

Today, I passed the Kaplan comp, which was the final exam we had to pass to leave the island. I use the term "pass" loosely, since a 45% was passing, and I really didn't do much better than that. For those who have not taken the Kaplan exam yet, it's HARD, like twice as hard as the NBME comp. Fortunately, as long as you pass, it counts as nothing. So, having passed that exam, I am out of here at 2:15 tomorrow afternoon!

It feels like yesterday, that I visited the school and the island for a week with my dad to check the place out. I was even jealous of the first semesters, because they had at least been accepted and were on their way. When I got here, I couldn't believe I was finally in med school, but still jealous of just about every semester ahead of me. I could not imagine the day that I'd actually finish basic sciences and leave the island for clinicals.

Well, I'm done basic sciences, and tomorrow, I leave the island for clinicals (after a much needed break and lots of studying for the step). At times, it seemed like a very long 20 months, which I thought would never end. But really, time here does go by very quickly. When I look back through my notes, or take comp exams, I really can't believe how much information I've managed to pack into my head in the relatively small amount of time. I still have lots to learn, but when family or friends have a medical question, I know the answer way more often than not. And, not only do I usually know the answer, but I could usually go on for a couple minutes about why that's the answer.

For now though, i have yet to pack anything. Since I'm leaving the island pretty soon, I should probably get on that! I will likely not blog tomorrow, but I'll try to get back to it as soon as I can. Unfortunately, i probably won't have much interesting to write over break, unless you're interested in ambulance and fire calls.

oh yeah...

3 days left!!!