Positive attitude

So I should be going to sleep right now (yes, I have a self imposed curfew - when you're done laughing read on!), but I saw this xkcd comic and I just had to post it.

For anyone who knows me - I'm a fountain of positiveness (and hyperness).  I really loved the reverse psychology stick figure #2 uses in the comic.  If only it were this easy to instill positive attitudes in everyone.  There's also the slight issue that this method is probably not too ethical.

We are ramping up material in our Microbiology / Infections Diseases class.  Although all of our classes are useful - they tend to form a foundation that is probably not directly used.  Microbio's different - we actually learn about the various antibiotics used in hospitals and which microorganisms they work well against!  It's a lot to memorize - but it is definitely very cool.  I mean - this is the real stuff - the stuff we'll probably use most frequently!  And it'll probably help us save lives!

Bring on the tables upon tables of antibiotics crossed with microbes they work/don't work against!  Although, I'm told they already "brought it"; I'm just behind in keeping up with lectures.  Doh.

In other news: partying thursday night, friday night and saturday night.  I wonder why I'm behind?

Happy tofurkey day(s) and BABIES

Happy thanksgiving everyone!  Hope everyone's holiday was awesome and the travels weren't too painfully long.

Before I left for my holiday, I had the chance to watch some babies being born through the Watch-a-Birth program at HUP (Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania).  Of course, I did not actually help any of the health professionals - I just stood out of their way and watched.  But the first thing I did when I got home was to call my mom and say "Thanks for going through everything you went through mom, you are really amazing" - because damn was it amazing!  It's amazing to me that both the baby and mother can survive the whole ordeal!  Not only that... apparently it's a normal part of life.  Yowza.  I still don't think I want to go into gynecology/OB, but what they do is pretty freaking awesome!

For some reason, this experience reminded me of an old quote: "When you are born - you cry, and the world is happy.  When you die, you are happy, and the world cries".  

 On a tangent: the best way to survive medical school and learn all the insanely long names for various body parts is to rely on acronyms and mnemonics.  Historically, the raunchier / crazier the mnemonics, the easier they are to remember.  I was trying to figure out how to explain and convey the sillyness of some of these memory aids... and then a friend of mine showed me this comic:

Yup.  That's one of the ways we survive med school!

37 hours

I've got an Immunology exam Monday afternoon, and then an Epidemiology exam Tuesday morning.  I started studying early for these exams (well, one of these exams anyway).  The only problem with doing that?  I feel extremely unproductive the day before the exam (i.e. today)... since I don't really have much left to study.

Then again - if that's all I've got to complain about - that's a pretty good thing eh?

The stuff happening after the exams is going to be great though!  After the epi exam, I'll be at the hospital watching babies being born.  Partying later that evening, and then on a plane to Michigan Wednesday morning.

The rest of the week is going to be awesome!

Taking exams in monkey suits one day, and being a salesman on another day

Medical school is an... interesting experience.

Penn Med tradition dictates that for the second anatomy exam (a team exam) the teams have to dress up in various costumes.  Most tend to wear costumes somewhat related to the anatomy class.  My learning team dressed up as the League of Lesions - i.e. the symptoms of the most common nerve lesions in our limbs.

I dressed up as an ape (representing the ape / simian hand that happens due to median nerve / median & ulnar nerve lesions).

... and then I proceeded to take the exam.  On a side note - my Penn Med class now holds two records for our anatomy class: we had the lowest average in the history of the new Penn Med curriculum (which is ~ 12-14 years old) on an anatomy exam (the first anatomy exam)... but we also got the highest average ever on an anatomy exam (first time it was over 90).  Go Penn Med 2014ers!

This, oddly enough, is one of the reasons I chose Penn and boy am I happy I did.  You always have to remember that life is more than just "doing your job" - be it an actual job in a cubicle, or being a professional student and studying your ass off.  It's about enjoying what you do, and remembering to stop and do the other things you enjoy doing while not losing sight of your primary "job".  And this sense really permeates into Penn Med's philosophy - which is really nice!

Makes my life easier... and I don't seem like (as much of) a slacker.

Switching gears:


We go through Doctor-patient courses.  These are (usually) with actors who play patients, and we are put in... interesting situations so we can improve our interviewing skills.  One of my recent Dr-Pt interactions was pretty hilarious.  My "patient" was non-compliant with her diabetes medications (i.e. she wasn't taking them properly).  She was pursuing more homeopathic remedies (lots peanuts apparently) because she didn't like the side effects from the medication.  I guess this is when my corporate world training kicked in and I tried to convince her that it's in her best interest to continue her diabetes medication.  Of course I start off with "our main goal is to make you feel better - and if you are feeling side effects from the medication - we should definitely see what we can do about that!  We want you to want to take your medications because it genuinely makes you feel better."

But the kicker was "I really think we can work with your homeopathic remedies - I don't see why we can't try both at the same time, especially if you feel better on those remedies.  I don't see why western medicine needs to be at odds with homeopathic remedies Would you like to give it a try, and see how it goes?"

At the end of the session, first thing the actor says?  "Used car salesman!"  But I took that as a compliment!  Especially since she kinda caved and accepted my suggestion.

I've got a long way to go, a lot to learn, and quite a bit more growing up to do (although, I'm pretty sure that last part will never happen...); but I am really glad to see that my experiences in the corporate world aren't completely useless.

P.S. - I really do want to get into blogging now.  I feel like putting my thoughts down somewhere can a. help me sort them out and b. be awesome to look back on (and laugh at).  Also - Anna inspired me to get back into it.  So if my bad grammar and sentence structure hurts your head, blame her.

Medical school - it starts

So here I am in medical school.  Penn Med is awesome - mainly because my class (of 2014) are a really fun bunch to hang out with.  Life is more than just what you do for a living (which in our case is being professional students).  And there's also that whole thing about "Life is what happens when you are planning for the future". 

Definitely happy to be here; counting my blessings.  And partying hard.

(Don't worry mom, I'm studying hard too).

I'm back! And I'm going to medical school!

So apparently I missed my monthly blog posts... for May and June.  Go me.

And I'm surprised I didn't post this in my march update... but I'm off to med school!  It's been an extremely long road - I got into medical school back in Nov '09, but I hadn't quite decided where I was going till mid March (and I finalized it in mid May).  I'm off to the University of Pennsylvania! 

Go Penn Med!  I can't believe my luck... really didn't expect I'd get in.  When I started the Columbia Post Bacc program ~ 2.5 years ago, I definitely did not expect I'd get into PennMed, much less medical school at all.  Less than 48% of med school applicants get in - and I wasn't really that special or anything.  So going into the Post Bacc program, I had my sights set relatively low.  I wanted to link into my state school and be done with it.

Then I met a really good friend at my post bacc program.   Let's call her Callie.  Over time we became really close and best friends.  Eventually, she convinced me that aiming low (in her words) "is stupid, and you have to aim a lot higher".  My response to that being "wth? That's just going to be a waste of time I won't get in"; but her response was even better "Well too bad, you are doing it anyway".  She convinced me to not link to my state school and go through the normal application process.  This ended up being a really good thing... I will now be going to a school that is ranked #2 for research and #7 for primary care.  It's one of only 3 schools which is ranked in the top 10 for both categories.

The best part about all this?  Sure, Penn's a well ranked school and the prestige is there etc... but what really matters (and I guess I didn't realize this till after I interviewed @ Penn) is that I feel like Penn's the medical school for me.  The faculty, the opportunities, the teaching styles are all amazing.  But what really shines are the students.  They seem like a fun batch - extremely diverse backgrounds (and I'm not just talking about skin color).  And they actually genuinely appreciated my unique (aka odd) background. 

I guess the point of this post was to say - thanks Callie.  Life works in mysterious ways - people always come into your life for one reason or another; you usually never know why till much later.  I'm lucky enough to know it right now.  Wouldn't be starting at Penn if you didn't nudge me just a tad bit there.  Sure she's in my life for a variety of reasons, and has influenced my growth in a myriad of ways like many of my other close friends; but this is by far the biggest impact she's had on my life.  And boy, I'm pretty sure it's a doozy of an impact.  So - thank you.  You are awesome :)

Fidgeting

The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition has an article about fidgeting.  Apparently, it can have a massive effect on your metabolic rate.  Energy expenditure while sitting motionless --> fidgeting = ~50% increase... while standing motionless --> fidgeting = ~94% increase!  If you actually take a close look at the article though, you'll see it isn't a great way to actually try and lose weight, since the overall burn rate is nowhere close to actual weight loss activities (like exercise).  But what it does do though is to stabilize your weight and prevent gain.  Fidgeting is a simple enough activity to do (since it comes naturally to me anyway) - and if it helps stave off gaining weight - I'll take it!  It's not the magic bullet for weight loss (that's exercise), but still.

So... apparently now it's good to fidget?  Awesome!  I guess not listening to my parents/family when it came to fidgeting worked out for me!

Now if only they could prove that procrastinating is awesome too, I'll be all set!

Also - and this is a tangent - I get really annoyed at those stupid ads on the side that keep saying "lose 10000 pounds by just following this one simple/old/odd rule! OBEY!" and they show a picture of 2 women (usually) - one who's chunky and one who is really (really) skinny and expect us to believe they are the same person (even though an 8 year old could say they aren't actually the same person).  And they expect us to believe this mythical (and fake) tranformation happened by following this "1 rule".  Yea well I've got a rule of my own (that actually has a good chance of working):

Go exercise (for real - getting up to go to the bathroom and back doesn't count).  Regularly.


That's the only real rule that's going to work.  The others are probably hocus pocus (if it wasn't, wouldn't everybody be super hot, skinny and fit?)

Ok I'm done with the rant part of this blog.