by Christopher BayneI still remember the first time I entered the anatomy lab. Heck, I remember the first time I entered the hallway leading to the anatomy lab.I wouldn't say an anatomy lab "smells." That is, an anatomy lab doesn't smell "bad": the odor can't be defined as good or bad. Really, it's neither. But the scent is distinctive. If you've been ...
Education
Real life example of medical school debt
by Pierce HibmaWant to really understand the reality of US medical education debt? Then allow me to pull back the curtains to expose the financial monster that awaits me after I earn my MD.I am a third medical student at a private medical school in the Midwest. Fortunately, I was able to graduate from college without any financial debt ...
Why medical education needs to evolve away from memorization
Skeptical Scalpel writing at KevinMD.com in a post giving some advice to second year medical students nails the problem with medical education on the head:
Rather than forcing [medical students] to memorize information, we should be teaching you how analyze and synthesize it as it relates to your patient.Our increasingly sophisticated and robust understanding of the pathophysiology of human disease processes coupled with the growth in diagnostic testing power ...
Why medical education needs to be more affordable
I was talking to a young man who is starting medical school this fall. His tuition at one of South Carolina’s newer schools will be $40,000 per year. That’s admittedly on the high end. On the low end, it runs a paltry $33,000 per year.And this is all after college, of course. He and others like him are taking out loans to the tune of $240,000 to pay for their ...
3 resident interviews for family medicine
I interview approximately 60 prospective physicians for medical school over the course of the year and 40 physicians who are applying for the residency program. The pre-med students (almost all of whom are the age of my children) tend to have pretty good interview skills and are trying very hard to get into medical school ("I've wanted to be a doctor for as long ...
Rules to help you during medical school
Medical school is a wonderful, but at times difficult experience. As you start this fantastic journey, there are a few "rules" I think might help.1. You can drink from a fire hydrant, but you’ll need to learn how. The amount of information you are going to be exposed to in medical school is logarithmically more than you had to learn in ...
Humility in medicine and our academic training environments
I sometimes wonder if we spend too much time talking about professionalism.It is not that I don't think we should promote professionalism. Of course we should. But many discussions of professionalism descend into overly academic and scholarly treatises that end up obscuring rather than clarifying the values such discussions hope to promote. It may be a mistake to overly ...
ABIM: Maintenance of Certification (MOC) exams assess clinical judgment
A guest column by the American Board of Internal Medicine, exclusive to KevinMD.com.by Christine Cassel, MD, MACP
KevinMD.com recently posted a blog noting that Watson, the IBM super computer who successfully beat two contestants on Jeopardy, would eventually make board certification exams obsolete. He argues that exams that rely on “memory-based curriculum” focused on recall of facts will become ...
Learning to love primary care via an emergency department rotation
by Stella SafoIt is Saturday night at an Emergency Department (ED) in Boston, MA and I am faced with a medical student’s dream dilemma: which one of the many interesting cases should I observe? Should I watch trauma surgeons operate on the 17-year-old gunshot victim or work with the ED docs to assess whether a 59-year-old woman is having an acute stroke?That is exactly what ...
Social medicine and its role in medical school curriculum
This semester is coming to an end and we are almost halfway done with first year. I say semester, but technically we use the block system. What’s the block system? Here, it refers to dividing the academic school year into single subject blocks. Instead of taking concurrent, year-long courses, we spend several weeks on one course. For instance, we started off with 5 weeks of only biochemistry, then 8 weeks ...
US medical education is in moral crisis
We recently discussed the plight of young medical faculty. It appears that their plight is even worse than we imagined.Recently, an abstract was presented at the Annual Conference on Research in Medical Education at the Annual Meeting of the Association of American Medical Colleges, in a session entitled, "Your Career is More than Your Specialty."The authors described a large survey, of over 5000 faculty at 26 US ...
How medical students should present patients to their attendings
I just finished another inpatient service stretch at our community hospital with some great cases and lots of good medicine. While attending rounds may have changed a lot in the last 40 years as highlighted in a recent Annals of Internal Medicine article, some things have not changed – the focus on medical student presentations during attending rounds.Students spend hours through their call nights preparing for the visit ...
Smart money tips for young doctors and medical students
Adapted from Generation Earn: The Young Professional’s Guide to Spending, Investing, and Giving Back.by Kimberly PalmerYoung professionals today aren’t exactly known for our financial expertise. Dubbed "generation debt," we’re stereotyped as over-spending shopaholics, easily enticed by credit cards, lattes, and the latest smartphone. But that reputation, it turns out, isn’t fair.Yes, we have more student loan debt than previous generations, and average credit card debt among twenty-five- to thirty-four-year-olds ...
Why your doctor’s education is unique
What makes your doctor’s education unique from that of other health care providers?Recently, I was sitting in on a lecture by one of my favorite physician-teachers (certainly my favorite neurologist). I’ll call him Dr. Deeds (for his resemblance to a character from the movie, Mr. Deeds). He was giving a sort of broad, generalized lecture to prepare us for a series of lectures on neurodegenerative diseases ...
Pelvic exam by a medical student for the first time
by Paul B. KubinThey say you never forget your first "real" patient. Mine was a woman who didn't need a pelvic exam, but who got one anyway.Next door, minutes later, my second patient provided another personal first: a male genital and rectal exam, also, without need. Medical students like me begin training by practicing the basics on one another–listening to heart sounds, and looking into each other’s ears and eyes—but eventually, every ...
How to check your scientific paper for plagiarism
We were taught in grammar school that plagiarism is wrong. It is stealing someone else's property.Imagine in high school asking your mother to buy you "Cliff Notes" so you can copy it word for word. Mother would not have liked that, and it wouldn't have been right.To write an essay today, you'll probably start with a search engine. Instantly, Mr. Google delivers many intelligent commentaries on anything, probably better than ...
If you’re in medicine, you’re in politics
by Nicholas J. RohrhoffEach generation of physicians has no choice but to take on the responsibility of learning the science of medicine - how best to care for patients. But current circumstances dictate that we must also bear the burden of developing policy that creates the best system in which to provide that care.Creation of a 21st century American healthcare system will require engagement and ...
Confidence in a student’s ability to become a competent physician
by Timothy DempseyLooking in the mirror before heading out the door for my first patient encounter, I slouched. Something looked off. I had on my new, absurdly short white coat complemented nicely by the equally as new black stethoscope draped around my neck; yet the way I looked wasn’t the problem. It was the way I felt. No matter how well I dressed the part ...
Useful things to buy during medical school
The following is a brief list of some of the things I think have been useful and worth their money in my first two years of med school:1. Large, widescreen computer monitor. The volume of information required to internalize during the preclinical years of medical school can’t be compiled and organized on paper. You would end up with bookshelves filled with those gigantic 4″ binders. Therefore, almost everything happens on ...
Alternative medicine and osteopathic medical education
by Tayson DeLengocky, DOThere has been a growing public interest in complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in recent years. Osteopathic manipulative therapy, a form of physical manipulation of the body for improvement of health and body function, has been designated as complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).According to data reported in 2007 by the National Institutes of Health’s ...
