Tomorrow is our last day with Bob. To tell you the truth, I don't know whether to break out the party hats or cry. I guess you could say I've had a hate/love realtionship with anatomy. There were things I loved about it (working with my group, wearing scrubs every day, learning cool clinical stuff), but there were also things I hated about it (mass of material taking the fun out of it, bisecting bob's head, and of course, head pies). To elaborate on head pies, let me just say that they are very old, very preserved, well, slices of heads for us to look at. There are about 120 0f them in our lab, and yes, I'm supposed to have examined them all by next wednesday. Hmmm.
So as I was saying, tomorrow is our last day of dissection. That's good, because there is really nothing left to dissect. Ever heard of that book "A Million Little Pieces"? Well, that's about the state that Bob is in right now. So we'll finish up tomorrow, and then study like mad until wednesday, the day we take the exams and officially finish the semester. I can't believe an entire semester has passed already. Only three and a half years to go now.....
What I really wanted to write about today is my Foundations of Clinical Medicine class. I really think VCU has a great program in this regard. It is a two year long program in which we alternate weeks between preceptor visits and small group sessions. Small group sessions (8 students) are led by a doctor and a 4th year medical student, and we learn all the things we need to learn to perform clinically, including medical history taking and physical exams. Sometimes we get standardized patients to practice on. Like today, for example, we practiced abdominal exams and head and neck exams on a standardized patient. It was really incredibly cool! It's definitely days like today that make me appreciate being a medical student. But back to the topic: My preceptor is a pediatrician and I visit her practice one day every other week. At first I simply shadowed her, but at this point I have progressed to seeing patients on my own. I interview the patient (or parent), by obtaining a chief complaint and history of the present illness. Depending on the circumstances, I may also obtain a past medical history, social history, or family history. Then I do whatever components of the physical exam I can do up to this point, including auscultation of the heart and lungs, head and neck, and abdomen. Then I present the case orally to her, after which she sees the patient and verifies (or not) my findings. Of course I don't know that I'm talking about half the time, but it is really great when I do. As an example: at one of my first sessions, she had me listen to a baby's chest who was presenting with wheezing. I didn't hear a damn thing, but of course I nodded my head that I had heard it. So you can imagine that a couple weeks ago, when I detected wheezing in a two year old all by myself, I was pretty proud. It's really amazing how you progress and improve with practice. It's not something you can follow sequentially, or in a stepwise fashion. For most of the semester I didn't feel like I was improving at all. I felt retarded and awkward most of the time. But I really was getting better all the time and just didn't see it in myself until it all clicked one day.
That being said, I will tell you that a received a near perfect score on my clinical skills exam. How awesome is that? I really really love this class. Too bad my scores are so crummy in anatomy. Can't be a shining star in everything I suppose. But perhaps if I spent less time watching TV, sleeping, and procrastinating in general, I would get better scores. Hmmm. Intriguing notion. I see a New Year's resolution in the works maybe....
But speaking of the holidays, I can't wait for next wednesday to be over so that I can start my vacation. And I'm sure you all feel the same way. Good luck on finals, and make sure you enjoy your time off!
Light at the end of the tunnel
Pictures from the AMA conference
Presenting Anshu's poster at the abstract competition (by the way, he won his division!)
Anshu, Jason, and me.
Life equals Anatomy
So it's almost one in the morning, and I have just returned from many confusing and smelly hours in the anatomy lab. We are trying (key word there is trying) to prepare for next week's exams. Unfortunately it seems like the more I learn the more I realize how much I still don't know..... sigh.
The first day of anatomy was the first day I truly felt like a medical student. Up until then I was still on familiar ground. But nothing could have prepared me for that first day. At the very least I thought we were going to get some kind of introduction, a sort of easing in process, but no, that's not the way it happened. One minute I was nervously changing into my scrubs, and then wham, the next minute we were raising our bodies, unzipping the bag, and making that first cut.
I had never seen a real cadaver before and truthfully it looked nothing like what I expected. I do not know exactly what the preservation process is, but it definitely changes the appearance rather dramatically. In some ways, it didn't even look human anymore. Yet human it is, and for some people that can be pretty hard to deal with. The whole process seems so wrong, so invasive and disrespectful, but unfortunately it is hands down the best way to learn. It is important to remember that these people donated their bodies for whatever personal reasons, and that it is a great honor and privilege to have the opportunity to learn from them. It is a privilege that few will ever have, and I think that is one of the reasons that anatomy is considered a right of passage in medical school.
When I was interviewing, I noticed that one of the most common questions applicants asked was "how many people to a body?". An answer of six or seven was generally met with a disapproving frown, while an answer of four was met with nods of approval. The bottom line is that this is a very "trendy" question, and the people who ask it have no concept of what it really means. I guarantee that if they found themselves in a group of only four people, they would be in a world of hurt. Dissecting an entire human body is a HUGE amount of work. My group has seven people, and trust me, there is more than enough for everyone to do. Generally, we have two people cutting, two navigating, two reviewing out loud for everyone, and one "floater" walking around to see if other tables have any particularly good structures to look at. It's also nice that we can switch positions frequently so that nobody gets tired or burnt out on what they're doing.
We are in the lab every morning, and more often than not, in the evenings too. The amount of material that gets thrown at you is absolutely ridiculous. As with the other courses, we are expected to memorize something the size of a phone book about every two weeks. Our written examinations deal with more with theory and clinical correlation, and practical examinations involve identifying things on the bodies. Practicals are pretty intimidating, and not many people have taken this type of test before. We have to walk around to different stations, to the sound of a buzzer that goes off every 75 seconds, and identify whatever it is at that station that has a pin in it or a string tied around it. That willl get your blood pumping, trust me. 75 seconds is not a lot of time when you're trying to identify some random cutaneous branch of some nerve that is itself a branch off of the lateral cord of one of the anterior divisions of the brachial plexus. Did I lose you? But I'm not joking, not even in the slightest.
You will live and breathe nothing but anatomy for what seems like a very long time. You will spend countless hours stuck in the lab with your body while others are out having a good time. You and your notes and books will reek of formaldehyde, and no matter how may showers you take or how much febreze you use, you will still smell it. You may even start to doubt your own sanity. But on the upside, you will learn more in a few short weeks than some people learn in a lifetime, and you will have a lot to be proud of. The useful clinical correlations you will learn are priceless. You will suddenly understand the significance of the different positions of auscultation, you will know why an epidural is usually given at the L4-L5 space, you will understand why a fracture of the surgical neck of the humerus is so dangerous, you will know why you need to follow the clavicle inferiorly and medially in order to put in a central line......and on and on. For me, as I mentioned before, it was the first time I really knew I was in medical school.
Now there is nothing wrong or disadvantageous about going into anatomy "green". I certainly did. Many schools do not offer full body dissection courses when you are an undergrad. However, if anatomy is really your passion or if you really just want to get some exposure, I do know of a couple options. First, I do believe that Mesa College offers a gross anatomy course, or at least they used to. Second, some universities offer summer intensive courses in anatomy that you can even receive academic credit for. One I know of is at Johns Hopkins and I've heard very good things about it. In fact, here's the link: http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/FAE/anatomyinstitute/
It's pricey, but I'm sure it would be a hell of an experience.
Anyways, I unfortunately must get back to the books. I need to pull off something of a miracle to be ready for the practical on tuesday. Sigh again...
Why being a member of the AMA is so great
Hey all! I just wanted to check in and say hello. The latest news is that I did pretty well on my first anatomy written and practical examinations. Yay! I survived!
The next entry regarding.......anatomy and stuff....will be posted early next week. If you have any specific questions you would like answered about anatomy, please leave a comment. For the moment, yours truly is heading to Las Vegas for the AMA conference. If that doesn't put me in a good mood I don't know what will. Well, that and the fact that it's paid for by my AMA chapter here at school.
Wish me luck for four aces!
All is not fair in life and medical school
"Our lives are not determined by what happens to us but by how we react to what happens, not by what life brings to us, but by the attitude we bring to life. A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events, and outcomes. It is a catalyst, a spark that creates extraordinary results."
-anonymous
Good advice, no?
Well here I am, ten weeks into my first year of medical school. Don't I just look so professional and serene in my fancy white coat???
But truth be told, it's been a rough ride so far. I left San Diego at the end of July, saying goodbye to all that has been my life for the last six years. I drove across the country with my cats, my rats, and my mom for five very very long days. Arriving in Richmond was like arriving in hell.....at first. It was so hot and humid I couldn't catch a breath for the first couple days. After that, I came home from my first orientation day to find that my kitchen had been flooded from a leaking pipe in the ceiling. I had a giant hole in my ceiling for four or five days. Then of course one of the cats got up onto the refrigerator, went into the ceiling and somehow ended up getting stuck between the wall of the bathroom and bedroom. We had to knock a hole in the bedroom wall to get him out. So yeah, life was not fun at that point. The high point of my orientation week was the white coat ceremony, during which I first recited the hippocratic oath. To finally be recognized as a medical student....well there is no way that I can describe how that felt. It was amazing. At long last I stood at the gateway to all that I had dreamt of for so long. The culmination of my application year, the joys, sorrows, and tears of the long battle had come to an end. I felt in that moment that my life, brimming with all the potential my imagination could conceive, was really just beginning.
So life in medical school began. Our first block consisted of medical biochemistry and population medicine, along with the year long Foundations of Clinical Medicine course. I settled quickly into a routine: lecture every morning, periodic sessions in the afternoon, and of course studying in the evening. I spent what free time I had talking on the phone with people back home, or attending one of many school sponsored social events (How cool is an open bar tab paid for by the medical school?). But I did start to feel the homesickness. It took a while for it to kick in that I had really moved to Richmond and now resided there. I had trouble coming to grips with the fact that I had just moved three thousand miles away from everything and everyone that I loved. Yet despite my loneliness, I persisted in my studies, enough that I sailed through the first two exams with flying colors. Alpha Omega Alpha (top 16% of the medical school class) seemed like it would be a breeze for me.
Unfortunately, just when I least expected it, things got bad. Real bad. I experienced what you would call a life shattering event. It felt like someone had just dropped a nuclear bomb on my life to be more exact. I will spare you the sordid details of my personal life, but trust me, a worse thing couldn't have happened at a worse moment. I sunk into a depression that took me places so low that you couldn't even imagine unless you've been there yourself. I stopped attending class and stayed in bed for a long time, about a month to be exact. The population medicine course had ended after the second exam, and was replaced with a human genetics course that I didn't bother to attend even once. So what about the exams you say? Well, I managed to drag myself in there on the next two exam days, and believe it or not I passed both of them. Not with flying colors, but I passed. All I can say is that I must be either extremely brilliant or extremely lucky. Maybe a little of both. But truth be told, I fully expected to fail those exams, having studied maybe all of two minutes, and I know that unconsciously I wanted to use that as an excuse to drop out. I really did seriously consider taking a year off to get my head on straight. I knew I still wanted to be a doctor, but I wondered how on earth I was going to be able to concentrate on medical school when I felt so bad inside. So what did I do?
I finally reached out. I spoke to my professors, one of the deans, and some of my classmates and new friends. I let it all out. And you know what? Every last one of them was there for me, and offered more support and encouragement than I could have hoped for. How amazing is that? I realized that while I may be far from home, I am most definitely not alone.
Slowly but surely, I have begun to get back on track. I still have plenty of moments in which I feel the despair and the sting of life's betrayals, but fortunately they are becoming less as time goes by. We have started anatomy now, and I think the thing I enjoy most about it is the time my group spends in the lab together. The comraderie and the connections that are being forged feel as nourishing and as necessary to me as water is to a thirsty animal.
The studying is not going so well, but I really can't expect everything to fall back into place right away.
So maybe the Alpha Omega Alpha thing is off the horizon, but my potential and opportunities are not. I feel pretty ok about it right now, and to quote the second year students' favorite piece of advice: "P = MD baby. P=MD".
And one more thing...... thank you to everyone who has tuned in this last year. You were an unseen, but significant source of strength and support for me. Thank you.
Six weeks to go.....
Ok people, I've made up my mind. VCU it is. I've been agonizing over this whole thing for weeks now, but pretty much came to the conclusion that I have to trust my gut. From the get-go, I've always known that I would be happier in Virginia, as strange as that sounds.
Sorry to offend any of you from LA or Orange county, but LA in general makes me sick for a variety of reasons. It is not the type of environment that I can really see myself flourishing in.
I've had an extremely pleasurable experience with VCU from the beginning, and a lot of this also comes down to the way I felt and the way I was treated throughout the application process.
I've also realized that I'm the kind of person for whom nothing is ever going to be good enough, unless I change my patterns of thinking. Here I am agonizing over this decision because I'm worried that the med school that I really want to go to isn't good enough. Give me a break. I was just flipping through some med school book at Barnes and Noble the other day, and one particular passage caught my eye. It said that if you've been accepted to a U.S. med school, ANY U.S. med school, you're already in the upper echelon of all students entering graduate school. Isn't that great? I mean, really, where do you draw the line with this stuff? Shouldn't I be exceedingly proud that I have come this far, to have actually been accepted to any school at all? I tend to forget these things, and part of that comes from the brainwashing that can happen at UCSD. I start to obsess about nothing but the rankings, the numbers, the prestige, and start to forget why I'm doing what I do in the first place. I want to be a doctor, period. And you know what? I don't really care about doing groundbreaking research, winning the Nobel Prize, performing the first total body transplant, and all that stuff. I just want to be a good and respected doctor, that's it. I know I will receive an excellent medical education wherever I go, so I'm going to go where I know I'll be happy. I have to come to terms with the fact that there's always going to be bigger fish in some other pond somewhere. That's life. What matters is what I do in my own pond. Sorry for that weird analogy, but it just came to mind for some reason.
Bottom line, I just want to get back into school. I miss it. I'm excited, scared, nervous, elated, and a thousand other things right now. I'm going out to Richmond in two weeks to attend a financial aid workshop and to find an apartment. I can't believe this is real and actually happening already, but it is. Med school, here I come!
Anyways, I also have a couple of announcements for you guys. Number one, my job is going to be up for grabs very soon. See description below if interested. Number two, I'm selling my Princeton Review MCAT prep materials (all books and tests) for $150 or Best Offer. Contact me at ascheffman@sbcglobal.net if interested in either.
Here is the job description, and keep in mind that this is a position for someone who is looking for a full-time job and wants to commit to it semi long-term. If you're just graduating and taking the year off, like I did, it may be perfect for you. If you know you are interested and want to expedite the process, send me your resume and I can get starting arranging an interview for you right away.
Inventory Coordinator
Orthopedic Surgery Center of La Jolla
Full-Time, monday-friday, 6:30-3:00
Starts at about twelve an hour, full medical/dental benefits, quarterly bonuses, gym membership reimbursement, 25 paid days off a year, and catered lunch every day.
This is overall an awesome job, it can be mind numbing sometimes but what isn't....Duties include: receiving/stocking/ordering surgical supply, chart data entry, assisting with patient moving/positioning in the OR, room turnover, etc. Personally, I have enjoyed the job immensely, and it has been a tremendous learning experience for me.
Good Luck with Finals!!!!!
So I didn't decide by the fifteenth. I lost a hundred dollars but I just couldn't do it. I suppose it is very rude of me to continue hanging on to two spots, but given that I was only notified of my USC acceptance on May 1st, it just wasn't enough time.
I'm trying to take actions to get everything sorted out. My main problem with VCU was possible complications obtaining a satisfactory residency. So I wrote to them and requested the match list. After seeing it, I feel a lot better about this concern. Of course many VCU graduates stayed in Virginia but that makes sense considering that many were from Virginia in the first place. I did see (albeit sparingly) some great places on the list including Hopkins, UCSD, UCSF, Yale, Children's of Orange County, etc. I may be so bold as to guess that the people going to California may be the people who came from California in the first place. I know that I will probably want to return to SoCal if I leave. So anyways, it looks like good residency matches from VCU are definitely doable. So that's good......
As far as USC, one of my main concerns is the support network provided by faculty and administration. In my secondary to them, I had mentioned that I was excited about their new department head of psychiatry, Dr. Carlos Pato. He has done some amazing work with the genetics of neoropsychiatric disorders. So just to test the waters a little bit, I have written to Dr. Pato and indicated that I would be thrilled to work with him as a medical student there. So we'll see if even writes back and what he has to say.
That's about all I've done so far, but it's better than nothing. I may cruise up to L.A. some weekend soon and give it all a second look. I know I don't have too much more time to decide. There is a pre-orientation thing at VCU on the 23rd of June, and that would also be the only time I would have to get an apartment.
Meanwhile, I am so frustrated with all this financial aid paperwork. Not only is there the FAFSA, but individual applications for each school, and another horribly long application at needaccess.org that Rochester and Dartmouth use. I also have to send out copies of mine and my parent's tax returns, and even provide a freaking credit report. Uggg. Does this crap ever end? Seriously.......
Hey everyone!
Sorry I've gone AWOL on you. But if I have any readers left among you, here's the latest news from the front lines......
I got accepted to USC just a couple weeks ago ( I was soooooo about to kill them for taking so long), and a couple weeks before that I got placed on the alternate list at Dartmouth. So all the news is finally in, and I can stop checking my mail and e-mail obsessively. So what's the next step?
Well, I suppose I have to choose now between USC and VCU, but to tell you the truth my heart has already made its decision. I LOVE VCU! Unfortunately, my all too analytical, scheming mind is having some trouble with that decision. I obviously know that I'll be happy at VCU, but I have to wonder if choosing the much lower ranked school will affect my future in any adverse ways. For example, and probably most importantly, my ability to obtain the residency that I want. I know I don't want to go into family practice, and I'm seriously thinking along the lines of neurosurgery so........... hhhhmmmmmm. I don't know. This really sucks. I'm barely into medical school and I'm already plotting out how and what I'm going to tackle after that. Does it ever freakin end?
I guess I do have a lot of factors to consider, and this will be a very important decision that I must make soon (May 15th?). Plus what if Dartmouth comes through for me sometime during the summer? Could I honestly say no to Dartmouth?
arrgggghhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It hurts!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! All this spinning around in my head has got to stop. I really can't remember the last time I had to make a completely life-altering decision. What a bummer, yet a great blessing all at the same time, to even have any choice at all.
I will try to write more often, not that I will have much news to report, but at least for my own sake. However, if you are interested in the twisted inner-workings of my mind as I struggle to come to an endpoint on this, then stop by anytime.
Why don't I get a spring break?
Hey everyone!
So I got a last minute interview invitation from Drexel, and that makes six out of eighteen, or a respectable 30% return on my secondary investments. I scheduled it for April 12th, but guess what? I won't be going to it, or to New York Med for that matter, because yours truly has gotten an acceptance to medical school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I got one of the last ten out-of-state spots at Virginia Commonwealth. I also got waitlisted at U of Rochester, which isn't too disheartning. How exciting is this people? I can officially cross the bridge and call myself a med student. How awesome! Of course I'm still hoping for USC or Dartmouth, but that news won't come for a few weeks I suppose.
I really did like Virginia Commonwealth a lot, much more than I ever expected, and that makes me completely comfortable with the idea of going there if that's what happens. I am so happy, nervous, excited, and scared, all at the same time. I am excited about the prospects of this new adventure, at the same time I am crushed to be leaving San Diego in a few months. I actually have started to get teary-eyed when I drive around seeing all the places that I have loved for the last six years. Yet.......I can't be afraid of change and what it will bring to my life. It's med school for gods sake!
But don't be surprised if you see me around campus the next quarter. I plan on taking a couple of classes after work, via UCSD extension (gotta keep the brain from liquidating you know). You may see me standing wistfully in front of Geisel, where I loved my eighth floor studying nook. Or maybe sitting cross-legged, a tear running down my cheek, in the Muir courtyard, where I did all of my serious thinking. Or even standing in front of Peterson Hall, looking a little traumatized, as I reminisce trudging through that damn O-chem sequence. Who knows? But I'll be out there.
Stay tuned for news of USC and Dartmouth. It won't be long now.........
USC interview and the onslaught of rejections...
So I had what will hopefully be my final interview last friday at USC. I have one more, at New York Med, scheduled late march, but with any luck I will have gotten an acceptance by then and I won't have to go. But USC was pretty cool actually, I liked it way better than I ever thought I would. The Health Sciences campus is about four miles away from the main campus, and it is right across the street from L.A. County Hospital. So, no, it is not technically in the ghetto per se. (Compton, Long beach, Inglewooood.......Dr. Dre anyone?) The medical school is really quite attractive and well laid out. It is also right next to the USC University Hospital, the Women's and Children's Hospital, and the Norris Cancer Center. So right there, within a three block radius, is an extremely broad range of environment, patient base, and specialty for a medical student to gain experience in. And just to mention the obvious, anyone who is interested in emergency medicine and trauma would be in absolute heaven.
But anyways, I showed up about nine (after staying in Chinatown the night before) and had my faculty interview at ten. This was the first instance in which I have not interviewed with an M.D., but rather an R.N./M.S. from the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences. Kinda wierd, huh? But she was really great, and told me that she helps teach 3rd year clerkships in psychiatry. The interview itself went pretty flawlessly. A lot of the same old questions, which at this point my answers to are very smoothed out and clearly articulated. I had a hunch the night before that I was going to get the managed care question (I knew I couldn't escape four interviews without it coming up at least once), and of course it did come up. Luckily, she left it pretty open, and at the very least I was able to show that I'd given the issue some thought and that I'd considered the practical implications and impact it would have on my practice as a physician. Yay! So no big surprises there at least.
The tour and lunch were a nice change from what I had been experiencing at other schools. The tour wasn't too long and my feet weren't killing me at the end. A brief walk-through of LA county medical center proved a little disturbing (metal detectors and all that), but what do you expect? Even more disturbing was the fact that our 2nd year tour guides showed us the gross anatomy lab (I'm pretty sure that's illegal), complete with about forty cadavres covered in white sheets. We all stood in there, amidst these cold metal tables and buckets containing saws, retractors and god knows what else, for about five minutes while our guides blabbed on about something. I actually felt myself getting all warm and my heart speeding up! I was pretty creeped out. I'm glad to know that USC is a school that has a memorial service following completion of you-know-what. Anyways, much nicer to mention is the lunch we had, at the ooh la la "faculty club" complete with nicely dressed servers, menus, and actual silverware. So much better than the hospital cafeteria...... Too bad if I went there I'd probably never see it again.
Finally, I had my med student interview. I can't believe it , but they had me interview with a first year! It was a little awkward at first, given that this guy had no clue how to interview anybody, but we both relaxed and had a pretty smooth conversation for over an hour. I can't believe though, that a first year's opinion would have much impact on my admissions decision. But who knows I guess? It went well, so no worries. After that, I hopped in my car and went through three hours of stop and go traffic (good old interstate five never lets you down as far as that's concerned.......sigh.)
Other than that, I've had a lot of bad news. But it's to be expected at this point. I pretty much knew I wasn't going to get any more interviews this late in the game, so.......
Rejections from Stanford, UPenn, and GW came in. Also UCSD and UCSF both let me off the "hold for interview status". I guess my letters didn't work, damn it. But I know they work sometimes. I know a doctor at Scripps La Jolla who got rejected from UCSD pre-secondary, wrote an appeal, got the secondary, got rejected again post secondary, wrote an appeal, got the interview, got waitlisted, and ultimately accepted off the waitlist. So it happens, just not to me I guess. It really does hurt more to have gotten that close (i.e. hold for interview) only to ultimately get let down. Sigh. So close I could almost taste the in-state tuition. I guess it's looking like private school for me, and a hell of a lot of debt. But in the end, I have nothing to complain about. I still will (barring any disaster) most likey be attending a great medical school come fall. Either Rochester, Dartmouth, USC, or VCU. When I think about the depressing statistics of medical school acceptance, and compare that to my irresponsible behavior during much of the application season, I am so thankful that my prospects are as fruitful as they are.
So nope, nothing to complain about at all.
VCU and Dartmouth
Greetings everyone!
I am back, safe and sound, in San Diego once again. This last week has been stressful and exhausting, but everything went really well. I flew into D.C. last weekend to spend a couple days with my uncle and cousin who live in Arlington, VA. They showed me all around D.C., and Sarah (my cousin) took me to NIH with her where she is doing an internship in a pediatric oncology lab. She too starts med school this fall. I got to meet several of the doctors she works with, and even went down into the NIH vivarium with her (the mouse house). Monday I took an amtrak down to Richmond, and settled in to get ready for the interview tuesday. Tuesday morning I found myself in a special "applicant waiting room" with about ten others. Some had interviews scheduled in the morning, some had them scheduled in the afternoon after the tour/luncheon part of the day. I felt so lucky to have had mine in the morning, so that I could relax and really enjoy the tour later. So about fifteen minutes prior to scheduled interview time, I was given a piece of paper with directions to find my interviewer's office. Despite being really crappy directions, I finally made my way to where I was supposed to be, right on time. My interviewer was a radiation oncologist and I interviewed right in the middle of his lab at the Massey Cancer Center. Once again, it turned into a totally non-stressful interview and really more of a casual conversation. This guy said some really wonderful things that I'm still not sure how seriously to take. He said that my file reviewer (the person who was responsible for getting me the interview) really really liked me, and at this point he felt that it was more of a recruiting thing on their part. So he spent a lot of time "selling" the school to me, and we even talked about my various housing options, including whether or not I should think about trying to buy a house there. At the end, he said if he were me he would be very confident. So......all that sounds great, but I have to wonder if the rest of the 30+ person admissions committee sees it the same way. Anways, it was very interesting. I really loved the school though. Absolutely gorgeous medical center, and the people were so warm and sincere. The first years have lecture in something called the egyptian building, which is the very same building that medical students had classes in one hundred and sixty-three years ago. The confederate white house (i.e. Jefferson Davis) just also happens to be on the campus, right behind the ambulance bay in fact. The school is really such an intriguing combination of history and tradition with modernization and 21st century medicine. It amazes me that VCU doen't even hit the rankings in most cases. That's where the problem comes in for me. People see this in different ways, but I tend to side with the people who say that it does indeed matter where you get your degree from. As much as I think I would be very very happy for four years at VCU, in the end I don't think I could choose it if I had multiple acceptances. So we'll see I guess. I would appreciate any insight on this matter if anyone is dealing with the same issue or has any ideas about it.
That's where Dartmouth comes in. I flew into New Haven, CT on wednesday afternoon and rented a car. I will not bore you with the details right now of why I flew into New Haven. Starting the journey to Hanover, I passed alongside the Yale campus, where I promptly flashed my middle finger in their direction. Three hours later, I settled into my room in West Lebanon, NH, where Hanover would be a quick six mile drive in the morning. Oh my gosh, this place is rural. I mean I grew up in a little rat hole called Sierra Vista, but even Sierra Vista looked like a big city compared to rural New Hampshire. Still, it was very beautiful. It snowed all day the day of my interview, and I was really excited about it because I've more or less never even seen snow. I was kinda scared driving in it though. But anyways, back to the interview. Dartmouth has less interview days, so understandably it was a larger group, about twenty-five. For the first time, I noticed that everyone was really really well dressed. Also, the general aura was much more tense, and it took a lot longer for people to start warming up to each other. I was absolutely blown away by the snootiness of some. This chick from Harvard had her cell phone go off, very loudly, in the middle of the dean's presentation, and she didn't even blink an eye but rather answered it and left the room. Wow. I don't care if she is from Harvard, that was beyond rude. So we had the usual presentation and then were shuttled off to have a tour of the medical center, which was very impressive. Despite its rural location, it is one of the largest and busiest medical centers in New England, drawing a patient base from a multi-state region. The Dartmouth campus itself, is also very impressive and beautiful. Everyone had two half hour interviews in the afternoon, and mine luckily, were both in the admissions office. Even now, I am still not quite sure what to think about my first one. It was with the chair of the admissions committee, this really really old guy who seemed to be in something of a coma. He basically went down a list, kinda reading out loud all the major points of my application as I sat there. He only asked me one major question (why dartmouth) and didn't really seem interested in my answer at all. He kept blabbing on and on about totally random things and basically repeated everything I had heard in the dean's presentation that morning. If he gave me the chance to say something, I tried to spin it into something I thought we should talk about, but he just kept blabbing on about how great dartmouth was and how much I would love it. So after much thought this is what I think: The fact that he has been doing admissions at Dartmouth for over twenty years means that within two seconds of meeting me, he has most likely already made up his mind. Maybe even before that. He has probably gotten somewhat bored and burned out after meeting and interviewing thousands of pre-med hopefuls over the years. But even if this is the case, I cannot be sure whether to interpret his behavior in a positive or negative light. Luckily, even if he is the chair of admissions, his vote still only counts as one. My second interview was absolutely wonderful, and I felt like I got some really powerful points across. It was my first interview with a woman, which I had been a little worried about (I'm used to interviewing with men). But it was definitely, to date, the best experience I've had. She had a lot of challenging questions to ask me, but I felt like I really nailed everything. So I left Dartmouth that day feeling pretty damn good about my prospects. I also felt like I would really love going there. Even the rural setting appeals to me in many ways. Unfortunately, they are filling a class of only eighty students, so maybe my prospects aren't so great after all. Who knows I guess....
So, I should be hearing from Rochester in about 3 or 4 weeks, same for VCU. Dartmouth said don't even bother checking the mailbox for six weeks. But I've waited this long, I can wait a little longer. Can you believe we started this whole thing last June? Wow. But I do hope that I will hear something before my New York Med interview rolls around, because I would really like to save the time, effort, and money by not having to go to that one.
I will be driving up to L.A. this thursday to have my USC interview on friday the 3rd. So stay tuned......
University of Rochester
Well I guess a lot of you are wondering how my first interview went. At least I hope you're still interested. Sorry about the delay, but....
Hmmm, I don't really have a good excuse. Oh well
So we left San Diego on a red-eye saturday night, arriving in chicago at four thirty in the morning. Why so early you ask? Cause I just knew that there was going to be trouble, and there sure was. Due to heavy fog in chicago, our flight to Rochester was canceled, and then the one we were rebooked on was also canceled. The flight we were finally confirmed on wouldn't have gotten us into Rochester until near midnight sunday night. So I whipped out my charm, did some smooth talking, and got us rebooked on a flight to philadelphia, and a subsequent flight to Rochester arriving at seven pm. whew......... and only ten hours after we were originally supposed to arrive.
So then we get there, but no luggage of course. I had carried on my garment bag containg all clothing items needed for the interview (smart thinking, eh?), so the worst case scenario would have been no makeup and bad hair. Luckily, however, our bags showed up and were delivered to the hotel sometime during the night. I got up at five, got dressed, had some coffee, went over my primary and secondary apps, and chilled out.
I arrived at the medical center at quarter to seven, and was the second person there. As people began trickling in, we must have done the "introduction circle" half a dozen times. Of eleven people interviewing that day, I was the only one from the west. A good portion of them turned out to be ivy league, and one girl was about seven months pregnant. It was a good group though, and we all got along very well during our extensive periods of waiting. We had a welcome and introduction session with the dean of admissions, and then were left to wait for our first interviews. In this case, we had to go find our interviewer's office, which was no easy task. The whole medical center and the school of medicine are housed in one giant complex, with seemingly endless hallways and color-coded elevators. Luckily for me, despite some wrong turns, I made it to my first interview on time. It was with the department head of anesthesiology (oh yeah), and everything went very smoothly. Turns out he wanted to talk about himself more than he wanted to talk about me, but whatever. Mostly the whole thing flowed like a conversation, which I take to be a good sign. He actually gave me direct feedback after the interview, which was totally cool. He said that I interviewed very well, and that he didn't make the final decisions but.......
So I take that to mean that if he was making the decisions that I would be in. Yay! When he left me, he patted me on the shoulder and told me to be a good doc.
But would my second interview go as well as the first? Well, the second guy really wanted to talk about me and not himself, so I did a hell of a lot more talking. Unfortunately, I was getting kind of exhausted at that point, and lost my train of thought not once but twice. This was in response to ten-part questions, so I don't really feel that bad about it. I just apologized and told him I was in a food coma, and we had a good laugh about that. So bottom line, I don't think it went as well as the first, but I still felt pretty good about it. Until later......
Later the doubt started to creep in. I realized that my part was completely over, and that the entire thing was out of my hands at that point. I kept thinking that sure I felt good about the interviews, but what if it wasn't good enough??? At this stage in the game, I realized, the rejection would be personal. Not based on numbers or essays, but purely personal. That kind of rejection is bound to hurt a lot more. So my initial elation started to melt away into a kind of despair. It's entirely out of my hands!!!
Yet the only thing I can do is move on, and try to put it out of my head. I have four more interviews to go, and it can only get better. It's not like the first interview really went badly, quite the contrary in fact. I guess I'm just being silly, but it is to be expected given the madness of this whole process. I head out for VCU and Dartmouth on the 18th, so keep crossing your fingers for me.
And I'm leaving.......on a jet plane
Well, I'll make this short and sweet since I am sooooooo busy getting ready to leave on saturday. In answer to people's questions: 1) Yes I am taking a year off, I graduated last June. 2) Yes, I had to take a lot of courses that were not required for my major (med school prerequisites and for the MCAT). I ended up with minors in biology and chemistry. 3) An update letter is a good thing to do if you are either waitlisted for an interview or for acceptance. You tell them what you have been doing since they last heard from you, and let them know that you are still very interested in their program, etc.
Anyways, so here is the big news of the week: I got an interview at Dartmouth!
So hell yeah, I'm really excited now. That just practically blows my mind.......
The great thing about it is that they want to interview me the third week of february, and I'll already be in virginia doing Virginia Commonwealth that week. So instead of making two seperate trips I can combine it, and also Virginia will be a great warm-up for Dartmouth. Yay!!!
So I pick my mom up at the airport tomorrow (she's coming from Arizona), and we leave for Rochester on a red-eye Saturday night. Don't laugh at me cause I'm taking my mom please......
I just thought it would be nice to have a little company and also some moral support.
Well, wish me luck people. Not that I need it. (sorry, another one of my little jokes)
Well I hope everybody had a good break. Ready to start winter quarter?
I still kind of miss school, so I'm sad that I don't get to start with you guys. Oh well.
So the med school stuff is really quite a roller coaster. One minute you're confident, the next you think you're doomed. The last couple months were real downers for me, but at the moment all is well. Despite all odds (i.e. MCAT score), and doing pretty much everything wrong during the application process (i.e. night before the deadline), I, the HMP3 Guru, have four interviews and three holds for interviews. Interviews are: U of Rochester, New York Med, Virginia Commonwealth, and USC. Holds are: UCSD, UCSF, and Yale.
Pretty good stats, only one rejection out of the eight schools I've heard back from post-secondary. I'm feeling very encouraged at this point. I also composed a very nice update letter, regarding my new line of work, for UCSD and UCSF. I really think it will kick things into gear for getting the interview. In fact, I'm almost sure of it. Not a whole lot of people take the time to do things like that. It shows real sincerity about wanting to get into their program, and shows that you're willing to actively pursue it rather than just sit around and hope for an e-mail or letter. That's what I think anyways. Sometimes I'm wrong, but usually not :)
I'm actually kind of overwhelmed all of the sudden. I'm thinking about all the days I have to request off work, and all the arrangements I have to make. Med schools sure aren't very considerate of people who have to work for a living. I mean my boss knows that I'm an applicant and would probably have to take a few days off here and there, but now I feel like the flood gates have opened. What happens if I get more interviews? I guess I just need to be upfront about it, and make sure they know that I will try my best to minimize the time off that I need. If that means fly in the night before and come back directly after the interview, then so be it. Stressful, but doable.
So it looks like I'm probably getting into med school, one way or another. I think this because I am very confident about interviewing. It's getting the interviews that is the hard part, getting them to look past my MCAT score. A very wise person once told me that at the interview stage numbers don't matter anymore. At that point, you and the five hundred other people that they're interviewing are on an equal playing field, all deemed highly qualified. It is then that your personality either makes you or breaks you, along with how well they think you would actually fit with their school. That's why schools often conduct blind interviews, where the faculty member interviewing you has not seen and does not have access to your file.
So there's some food for thought anyways. I know January is going to be a huge month for many of us applying, and I wish everyone luck on getting those interviews and acceptances. Till next time.....