RE: Is any of this true???

Nontraditional Premed Discussion
1

Just some funny nonsense to break up the monotony of everyone’s day: Med School Regrets!


Enjoy!

2

In answer to the question: yes, an awful lot of it is true. I sure am glad that you only have to go through med school and residency once. I’m glad I did it and even gladder that I’m DONE with it.

3

As a brand new Med 3, I have to say that I too feel a lot of them are true.



4

Ok, so I’ve gotta ask, in particular… what are your thoughts?


71. Not participating in tons of ECs doesn’t hurt your chances for residency. Forget the weekend free clinic and play some Frisbee golf instead.


83. If an attending or resident treats you badly, call them out on it. You can get away with far more than you think.


90. The best time of your entire medical school career is between the times when you first get your acceptance letter and when you start school.


94. Despite what the faculty tell you, you don’t need all of the fancy equipment that they suggest for you to buy. All you need is a stethoscope. The other equipment they say you “need” is standard in all clinic and hospital exam rooms. If it’s not standard, your training hospital and clinics suck.


and most of all

  1. If I had known what it was going to be like, I would never have done it.


    Thanks
5

Yeah, to be brutally frank I am not sure that “jokes and other fun nonsense” is the right place to post this but there ya go. I’ve taken the first 20:

  1. If I had known what it was going to be like, I would never have done it. FALSE

  2. You’ll study more than you ever have in your life. TRUE

  3. Only half of your class will be in the top 50%. You have a 50% chance of being in the top half of your class. Get used to it now. TRUE

  4. You don’t need to know anatomy before school starts. Or pathology. Or physiology. TRUE

  5. Third year rotations will suck the life out you. TRUE and FALSE.


    (fortunately some will be life-restoring; others will suck)




  6. Several people from your class will have sex with each other. You might be one of the lucky participants. Uh, for me personally: FALSE. For the class as a whole: TRUE I am sure.

  7. You may discover early on that medicine isn’t for you. TRUE although I did not personally know anyone who discerned this.

  8. You don’t have to be AOA or have impeccable board scores to match somewhere - only if you’re matching into radiology. Probably TRUE. More networking is involved than people appreciate.

  9. Your social life may suffer some. TRUE but you don’t disappear altogether.

  10. Pelvic exams are the suck.


    OK I will say that I enjoy doing a pelvic exam well but learning them by doing them on real live people definitely did suck.

  11. You won’t be a medical student on the surgery service. You’ll be the retractor bitch.


    TRUE although in return for being a primo retractor bitch, I did have an attending who taught a lot.

  12. Residents will probably ask you to retrieve some type of nourishment for them. TRUE TRUE TRUE

  13. Most of your time on rotations will be wasted. Thrown away. Down the drain. TRUE more of the time than you want to admit

  14. You’ll work with at least one attending physician who you’ll want to beat the shit out of. FALSE for me personally but some of my fellow students had horrific experiences.

  15. You’ll work with at least three residents who you’ll want to beat the shit out of. TRUE

  16. You’ll ask a stranger about the quality of their stools. TRUE




  17. You’ll ask post-op patients if they’ve farted within the last 24 hours. TRUE

  18. At some point during your stay, a stranger’s bodily fluids will most likely come into contact with your exposed skin. TRUE

  19. Somebody in your class will flunk out of medical school. TRUE

  20. You’ll work 14 days straight without a single day off. Probably multiple times. TRUE


    The 80-hours rule came into effect right after my third year, and so during the spring of my third year a lot of my rotations were starting to implement it for their residents’ schedules. If I heard it once, I heard it 100 times on my OB/GYN rotation in May/June of that year: “Those rules don’t apply to medical students.” I understand that since then, many programs HAVE put 80-hours “rules” into place for the med students but I also know they’re widely ignored. It’s not like it’s a law or anything.


    Unnnnhhhhhhhhh this makes me tired to contemplate. Today I saw 25 people in my clinic, dealt with a bunch of phone calls, and brought home a pile of work which I am not going to get to (because I am fooling around on the internet, obviously). I usually come home so, so tired – but reading this list makes me REALLY GLAD that I am no longer a med student or resident! So it’s all in your perspective I guess!


    Mary
6

Adam, I think you and I were responding at the same time. I’ll take a stab:

  • pi1304 Said:
71. Not participating in tons of ECs doesn’t hurt your chances for residency. Forget the weekend free clinic and play some Frisbee golf instead.



Probably TRUE. Research and stuff directly linked to your specialty choice will be helpful but the free clinic - not so much.

  • In reply to:
83. If an attending or resident treats you badly, call them out on it. You can get away with far more than you think.



Probably TRUE but I do not have any direct experience with this.

  • In reply to:
90. The best time of your entire medical school career is between the times when you first get your acceptance letter and when you start school.



Nah, except that you know you ARE going to med school and yet you are NOT working at all! So it's fun and there's no reality to get in the way. So sure, it's great, but it wouldn't be fun for long.

  • In reply to:
94. Despite what the faculty tell you, you don’t need all of the fancy equipment that they suggest for you to buy. All you need is a stethoscope. The other equipment they say you “need” is standard in all clinic and hospital exam rooms. If it’s not standard, your training hospital and clinics suck.



TRUE, you really do not need a diagnostic kit.

  • In reply to:
and most of all

1. If I had known what it was going to be like, I would never have done it.

Thanks



FALSE. I have no regrets. But it WAS awfully hard.

Mary
7

I didn’t realize how much truth there was in that blog… otherwise I wouldn’t have posted it here! lol But it is reassuring that after all the hard-work, MOST who make it through will agree that #1 on the list is false. Thanks Mary for bringing some of those myths to light - on the true or false basis!