The Thailand Summer Selective course I took through the university was an amazing experience. The first week of alternative medicine was kind of a bummer for me. The course material was not very good and then on top of that I got really sick with a bad case of infectious gastroenteritis. The scary part is that I had just finished physiology and understood what was happening to me. I was losing a lot of bicarbonate and was getting metabolic acidosis. My respiratory rate increased to compensate to dump the excess carbon dioxide. My legs started cramping and I knew that meant I was becoming hypokalemic. I drank sports drinks to replace the ions I was losing. With the help of some antibiotics I recovered just in time for the 2nd week of the course.

Week 2 at Siriraj Hospital in Bangkok was fantastic. In the day time I rotated through several specialties in the hospital and was able to apply what I had learned in the last year of medical school to understand what I was seeing. I really connected well with the hospital staff and local medical students there, they treated me like one of their own. I didn’t want it to end. At night I explored all the craziness that Bangkok has to offer. I definitely did my fair share of bar hopping and clubbing, but I couldn’t go too crazy because I had to be up early the next day for the hospital again.  When the course finally came to the end I was very sad to leave. I felt at home in Bangkok. I hope I will have the opportunity to visit again.

Next stop: South Korea! In undergrad I had many friends that either worked or studied at the international/foreign exchange section of my college. After we all graduated several of them had ended up work in or returning home to South Korea. I spent two weeks exploring and catching up with old friends. It was a dream come true to finally visit all the places I had heard about for so long, especially the Joint Security Area of the Demilitarized Zone separating the North and South.

Flying back to the US to prepare for my return to Grenada was the most depressing flight I have ever taken. I didn’t want to go back to the rock. I even thought about taking a leave of absence from the university so that I could avoid reality for just a little bit longer. But finally I bit the bullet and came back to start Term 3-4.

Unfortunately I’m in the middle of the infamous Term 4, which is known for its intense 8 hour lecture/lab days and failing the most students every semester.

The amount of material is intense. I have hundreds of power point slides to cover for the exam next week. But at least the material is more medically interesting. Second year curriculum is diseased based so it is more clinical and real world applicable.

I had also been hoping to post an update on my amazing summer and Term 3, but there simply is no time. Hopefully I’ll be able to pencil it in. sometime.

Why do they even call it a freakin “award” anyway? Is that some kinda sick joke? It’s a LOAN that puts you in DEBT, not some prize you win for the best tap dance routine at the community winter festival.

Saturday night I met up with classmates from SGU that were visiting Las Vegas (I already live there part time during school breaks). Together we blasted the night away clubbing on the strip. Easily the most fun I’ve had in a long time.

Fast forward 5 hours to Sunday morning and I’m on a plane headed to Tokyo to connect to Bangkok for the Thailand Medical Selective with SGU. 

On one hand I’m totally relieved; on the other I’m totally terrified about Term 4 Pathology: The Great Medical Student Killer.

That’s exactly how I feel right now.

Exams are finally over and there is an odd peace that has settled over the campus. The study halls and dorms are empty and the old sound breaking the silence is the airport as droves of planes evacuate medical students off the island.

I literally have no idea what to do with myself before my flight home in a few days. I’m writing this during my usual study time. Ironically I can’t even do my other favorite activity: Procrastinating.

I’m still waiting on the results from a few exams, but so far it’s looks as if I may have survived Term 2. Some how I just barely make it across the finish line every semester, hopping on one leg, bleeding profusely, with no shoes on.

Term 5 students finished their last final yesterday and are celebrating their permanent return to the US for USMLE STEP 1 and clinical rotations. Those of us left on the island always feel left behind when this time comes every term. But of course we’re just jealous. Good Luck guys! Hopefully we’ll make through and be reunited in New York!

Term 1 students are done with finals too and are currently running around campus wasted. Enjoy it while it lasts, MS1.

Term 2 on the other hand is still in the trenches; me included up to my knees in mud. We still have one more final left on Monday, Neuroscience. But seriously, we’ve been so drained by the previous 5 exams that the majority of us have nothing left to give. At least we’ve got Term 4 to share some misery with us since they are not finished either.

Thanks to everyone for their words of support lately!

On the surface, I look terrible. I look like I’ve aged a decade since I first arrived on the island.

In the middle, my personality has hardened. I used to be a very happy, upbeat, life of the party kinda guy. Now I am a much more angry, anhedonic, and hateful person.

And deep down at the very core I have completely changed my outlook on life and my goals for the future.  I have given up on ever going back and readjusting to a “normal life” after medical school. I don’t believe a pretty wife, 2 kids, a minivan, and a mortgage is a viable option for me anymore. New life plans have been formulated.

IF I graduate from medical school:

Join the Naval Medical Corps and volunteer for the most forward position available. I’m talking Battalion Aid Station or more. None of that MASH (which are now called CSH: Combat Support Hospitals) or “Green Zone” crap; that’s just to safe for me. If I’m really lucky I’ll prove I’m good enough to get embedded as emergency trauma/surgery with a Special Forces unit and deploy on all the gung-ho ops. (Yes, there are some doctors that go in on crazy secret combat operations. I have met military doctors who have.) I have no problem getting Killed In Action at a relatively young age. I just hope I don’t get shot on the first day. That would suck after having been through med school hell.

If I fail out of medical school:

Train up all my tactical skills at various training schools around the country and take a contract with a PMC (Private Military Company). Deploy, get paid a lot of money, then get KIA.

It’s gotten so bad that in one of my classes I may not even get to cover all the new material at least once before the exam. That’s gonna to be a first for me. My usual final exam ritual is to spend the prior day reviewing everything a second time.

It is not looking good.

Status: Busted.

Source: I asked the BSCE I coordinator myself and he says no changes have been made. The question break down list was posted a few days later proving this was true on paper.

For those of you who are not familiar, the Basic Science Cumulative Exam I is a test that covers all classes from the first year (Terms 1 and 2). The school cites it is for “internal purposes only”.

Term 2 this semester has been on an experimental schedule that reshuffled classes in an overlapping manner instead of the “block” type of schedule it used to be.

The new rumor circulating around is that the university has decided to switch back to the old schedule due to the fact that a large number of students have done terribly on exams and/or have had to drop at least one class.

It seems to have some thread of truth in it because I’ve heard it mentioned from several different groups of people on campus with different angles and levels of involvement.  Just exactly how many people have dropped a class is something I have yet to hear a clear figure on.

Maybe I’ll ask some academic advisors or administration directly…… after exams.

I had been sitting in the same chair for about 10 hours attempting to install cardiovascular physiology into my brain with what little hard drive space I had left in there, when suddenly I had this terrible pain in my left leg along with weakness. It wasn’t the usual sciatic nerve compression kinda pain you get once in a while either.

I immediately thought, “Oh great. I’ve been in stasis and I’ve got risk factors….. DVT!” I pretty much though I was going to die if this DVT embolized into a CVA.  I started to consider what my final facebook status update would say. Should I go with sad or funny. They say no one ever died from studying, but I was ready to become the exceptional anecdote.

Thank god I found a 5th term student who gave me some diagnostic test to d/dx. I guess I’ll live to study again…. *sigh*

I haven’t slept well in days and my colleagues look like the living dead. What a perfect Valentine’s Day gift: an exam on 50 Parasites to memorize that has been dumped on you in 2 weeks…

(The amount of humor in my posts is directly proportional to the amount of sleep I’ve had)

Looking forward to “Black Day” in 2 months, but no-one here celebrates it.

Grenada is actually quite beautiful when you’re not trying to hang yourself by your stethoscope in the library. These parts of the island remind me a lot of Asia and Hawaii.

So The Bamboo Telegraph says that the Charter Foundation Program’s days are numbed. Although a new class CFP class has just arrived on the island there are changes rumored in the near future.

CFP is to be eliminated and replaced by a post-bacc program. This program is actually a full year in length and will have a stiffer completion requirement of a 3.5 GPA.

Why this is bad: It will take longer to get into the School of Medicine and it will be more difficult with that increased GPA requirement.

Why this is good: Rumor is the program will qualify for Federal US Student loans. CFP was a lot of money to pay out of pocket. Students also have a 2nd semester to fix their GPA if they screwed up their first semester.

Why this makes sense for the University: Other than the obvious profit involved, it streamlines a lot of the pre-med programs into one cohesive unit. It was chaos, people were failing CFP and had to do it again and some applicants w/o degrees were admitted to the undergrad school as a 3rd year undergrad instead.

The only evidence I have seen personally of this change  is that CFP students from last term who failed were not allowed to comeback and repeat CFP.  In the past some were given a second chance. So far I feel this rumor to be plausible .

Academically

All classes we’re very slow to start especially having been an previous Foundations student.

BioEthics: any student will tell you this is the most unfair course ever made, your grade is practically determined by a roll of the dice, exam questions are unfair – good thing it’s only 1 unit otherwise people might riot

Histology: Deceivingly difficult. Most students ignore this course and put minimum effort into it because the lecture schedule is not heavy and you can scoot by lab with minimum effort if you do not feel like learning the material. However there is actually a lot of detail to memorize when you sit down and finally read everything. Exam time comes and people are panicking at the volume of stuff they ignored.  Bottom line: what should have been a “relatively” easy A turned out to be a disappointment for a lot of people. Although failing the course is not common.

Biochemistry: There are two ways to tackle this beast: 1 – actually understand what’s going on or 2 – memorize random facts without connecting the dots. I personally think method #1 is much easier but some people just hate Biochemistry so much they rather not think about it and just memorize facts.  Understanding concepts will get you a B, but there are some borderline unfair details they ask that you will need to know to get an A. Good thing about this course is that all the professors are good.

Anatomy: “The Beast” – it’s worth about 50% of your GPA in Term 1. Between the lectures, labs, and group discussions, this course takes up an ENORMOUS amount of time. I lost more sleep to this course than any other. The sheer volume of material is overwhelming. This is the course that students worry about failing. Even if your a former Foundations student the benefit is not that drastic.

Personally

The term started out very slowly, most foundations students were very bored the first few weeks. Then things went into overdrive out of nowhere. I usually say that the average medical student is allowed to have one emotional break down or crisis per semester. But I think I had couple including an episode where I was so stressed out I couldn’t sleep for 4 days. That’s surprising given the fact that I’m usually not one to stress out. I’m more of laugh or *sigh* as your plane is crashing into the ocean kinda guy.

As you can see from my absolute lack of updates, Term 1 is keeping me busy. Finals are in 2 weeks and I will get my butt kick if I don’t step it up a notch.

Planning a long over due comprehensive review of Term 1 once finals are over and I have room to breath.