The Whatever--Random Medical School Stuff

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
601

<p>LOL curm. You have such a way with words. There were a lot of tears on my D’s part. But yes, she is resilient and mature. She had to work really hard to even get into med school and to stay in too her first year. She likes working with people of all ages and she is really good at dealing with people, so maybe this is where she is meant to end up. </p>

<p>Hmm, scheming and plotting and retaliation… The story of her not matching at her “home” hospital is one that could make you bitter. Two students from her med school matched into the program: one was a stellar guy, top 10 in class, president of class, etc., and was expected to match. But the other one was a big surprise, a guy that the residents didn’t want (the surgeons and residents vote). Oh…and his dad used to be the program director there. </p>

<p>There is no recourse if you don’t match into a competitive specialty. (She should have had a 2nd choice specialty with four additional letters for that and another personal statement for that specialty.) You can try to scramble (she did with no luck, very few surgery openings) or you can do a transitional year or traditional intern year and go through this whole thing again next year. She chose to move on.</p>

<p>WOWmom: D has lived far from us for both undergrad and med school. This is just the next state over from where she is now. Harder and more expensive to fly to, though. The good news is that family medicine residency is only three years instead of five and there are tons of family medicine openings in our area. Some with loan repayment!</p>

602

<p>^^^Is the loan repayment a nightmare?</p>

<p>Son and some other posters have sent helpful links but it just seems so very difficult.</p>

<p>Kat
and CONGRATS on the graduation!!</p>

603

<p>Yes, it is very difficult to understand the whole loan repayment world. There are helpful sections on the AAMC (American Assn. of Medical Colleges) website, including a 30+ page booklet. There is also a Financial Aid section on SDN with a lot of helpful threads and questions and answers. It took me a whole evening of reading to understand it. My D doesn’t understand it yet, but I will be able to explain it to her. </p>

<p>Should I summarize and make a little list of the links for other parents here? Really, it is very complex for someone who has never arranged loans or bought houses to understand. The new grads WILL be able to understand the issues, but most who aren’t into business will need help.</p>

604

<p>BookieMom, why don’t you start a new thread. Many of the participants here are close to finishing school, or as DD put it, “nearly done digging the hole” with loans. I am sure it would be beneficial for us to discuss all the loan info, too.</p>

605

<p>OK, I’ll do that. Then the CC collective wisdom will prevail, and then we can explain it to the young drs.</p>

606

<p>Thank you!! I have never purchased a home or done anything along that line. Most of my bigger purchases are done through Craig’s List so cash or trades only. Son understands much better than I do and it would be nice not having to ask him, I will not seem so ignorant to him. He does ask for my opinions but sometimes I think it is just to include me and done to be nice.</p>

<p>30+ pages, oh wow.</p>

<p>Kat</p>

607

<p>Because we need a chuckle every now and then—</p>

<p>Two approaches to choosing a medical specialty</p>

<p>1) the flowchart (from the British Medical Journal)</p>

<p><a href=“http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/wp-content/blogs.dir/428/files/2012/04/i-edbcd560d6996b5e5b969f2deb9aeb99-Medicalspecialty.gif[/url]”>http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/wp-content/blogs.dir/428/files/2012/04/i-edbcd560d6996b5e5b969f2deb9aeb99-Medicalspecialty.gif&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>If I could figure out how to post the image, I would…</p>

<p>2) The Goo Tolerance Index (from the Canadian Medical Assoc Journal)</p>

<p>

</p>

608

<p>Recently, a surgeon removed the tube to a JP box from my tummy.- actually several times, but two times were put in by intrrventional radiologists.</p>

<p>Everyone he removed it, he had tried to convince me we could proceed without local anaesthetic. Each time I said I needed one.</p>

<p>Is it a norm for a doctor to pull tubes that have been inserted deep in the body for draining purpose for weeks or even months without numbing it first? For me, it hurt a lot. For the very last procedure, even numbing it first did not help . The doctor pull it from my right / back side where the draining opening is, but the acute pain came from almost the front of my tommy. Apparently, the tub went there, which is far away from the opening of the drain. Also, I was appalled by by the “state of the art” of removing the tube no matter how long and winded it is in your body - just pull as fast as you can - the same we did a long time ago.</p>

609

<p>*Everyone he removed it, he had tried to convince me we could proceed without local anaesthetic. *</p>

<p>Each time I said: After you.</p>

610

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<p>Dh has had chest tubes pulled a week or so after surgery several times. He’s never ever benn offered a local. A bunch of folks just come in, lean on his chest and pull. (It’s 4 handed procedure otherwise he might get air into his pleural cavity and recollapse his lung.)</p>

611

<p>Well, I asked for a local, not offered as an option.</p>

<p>So I am likely the one who is the most intolerant of the pain.</p>

<p>For some reason, I can for example hear much better than my wife.</p>

<p>My sergeon appears to be thinking the use of a local may be an overkill. But the last time, when he saw that I almost faint (actually my eyes blacked out for a couple of seconds during the extreme pain period of 6 or 8 seconds, he was surprised by my reaction. And this was done with a local.</p>

<p>I got it: modern medicine still expects the patients to have their share of pain. </p>

<p>Thanks.9</p>

612

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<p>DH is having his mitral valve repaired in two weeks and we have been told that one of the obnoxious parts immediately post-surgery are the drainage tubes. OMG, is this how they remove them?! Poor, poor DH…he probably already knows but I am certainly not going to bring up that little fact.</p>

613

<p>Chest tubes and drainage tubes are different, thankfully. I’m not familiar with chest-tube-pulling procedures, but fortunately drains can be pulled by one person. They’re also usually much smaller.</p>

<p>The key thing is to move steadily, so that you don’t rip the tube – so snip the stitch, steady pressure, and pull. Oh, and keep a piece of gauze adjacent so that blood doesn’t splatter everywhere when the elastic tubing snaps out.</p>

614

<p>Bleccch! Gag! I hate this stuff. I wish there was a profession of people to do all this for us. ;)</p>

615

<p>For my limited experiences with my stay in hospital and my visit to clinics, i i found the physician is not necessarily more skill than the most of the nurses to use the needle (in terms of inflicting pain to the patirnts in the process.) But the former rarely needs to do it, but the latter have to do it quite regularly, depending on what kind of nurse he/she is of course.</p>

<p>They installed PICC lines on me, saving me a lot of pains. But boy, they could easily draw two bottles (tubes?) in a short time while I am still sleeping like a baby without feeling any pain.</p>

<p>Back to the topic of drain tube, it appears physicians rely on CT scan to tell them where to place the beginning end of the tube to get out of the puss or undesirable fluid. But what if these troubled spots “move around” from this week to the next week and never settle down at a few fixed spots? It is like chasing a moving target by a lot iteration of CT scan and insertion of drain tube guided by CT scan result. (Done by a interventional radiologist )</p>

<p>The radialogist inserts a tube from my front and another from my back. Does he expect me to sleep “in the air”, without touching the bed? Geez!</p>

<p>Although I think I am in the process of recovery, the modern medicine seems to be a lot of trial and error process. Sometimes interpret the whatever evidence they painfully collected quite subjectively. Also, each specialist is special in his area. Outside of his/her area, he has very little clue. They rely on each others to get things done.</p>

616

<p>Mcat2,. sounds like quite a medical adventure. I wish you a speedy, tubeless recovery for the rest of the time!</p>

617

<p>Somemom, thanks.</p>

<p>All my suffering started from delayed gallbladder removal (my fault).</p>

618

<p>Ouch, I know people who have had gall bladder removal, the pain of one going bad sounds like nothing I ever want to experience.</p>

619

<p>Just logged into DS’s financial aids site and noticed the FA award letter is available :)</p>

<p>All the efforts of fighting with the tricky part of turbo tax, FAFSA, Data Retrieval Tool, and NeedAcccess do not go in vain.</p>

<p>A “constant” (unchanged year after year) or the rule of thumb adopted by this particular FA office seems to be: The debt level of most non-full-pay students at their graduation shall be about the same (my educated guess here.) It is however not shy about asking the bank of mom and dad to pay their fair share depending on how deep their parents’ pocket are, somewhat like UG’s case (less generous though.) Those Alumni thingy is nice.</p>

620

<p>Dear daughter is officially a doctor! Graduation was on Saturday. Wonderful ceremony, perfectly organized with all the pomp and circumstance: academic attire, professors marching in before the graduates, gleeful grads in their caps and gowns, the hooding ceremony with many grads hooded by parents or siblings. Excellent speaker, the first female White House physician. Nice picnic for everyone the day before. The whole family there, special dinners, amazing gifts. What a milestone in all our lives, but especially hers.</p>

<p>And on to residency…</p>