Before I begin this post, I think it's necessary to say that much of what I'm about to disclose may sound a little vague, but that's because a big part of being a good doctor is maintaining confidentiality and dignity in all that you do...
One of the biggest surprises I had after arriving here was just how little introduction there was to be. If swimming lessons followed the same format as medical school then they would have kids attempting to swim butterfly across the serpentine within a week. As a science graduate with quite a sound grounding in physiology and anatomy, I had envisioned breezing through my first year doing little more than occasional revision... How wrong was I? In the three weeks I have been here so far we have had a fairly complete overview of the whole upper body. I have spent more time in the library than I did in my first 2 years of Biology and I have filled two notebooks with text and diagrams. Somehow, though, none of the work has seemed tedious. I have already formed what I know will flourish into close friendships and we do much of the work together in small groups. Many people told me that Medical School was like a bubble, and it certainly is, but it is one that I don't really want to burst. It was lovely to go home this weekend, I am blessed to be so close to my family and girlfriend. As a 22 year old lad I'm not ashamed to admit that I miss them up here and I look forward to seeing them, but I didn't get that feeling of dread on Sunday night that I used to get when going back to London. As much as I enjoy my weekends, I'm also enjoying being a student and an academic in a way that I never did before. However, the biggest shock I faced in the opening week was definitely the initial anatomy class. This med school is one of three in the country that allows first years to dissect full cadavers. Our cadavers are people that have chosen to donate their bodies to us, they are preserved in formaldehyde and there is one cadaver to 12 students. We get to work on the same body every week for the year and then a funeral service is held and the body is cremated. Each 12 students also has one anatomy tutor who talks them through the dissection procedures each week and ensures we are as neat and precise as possible. This is all I will say about what we actually do in our anatomy classes, as I have to be very careful about what I publish. The information I have provided here is readily available online, so if any of my year leads happen to stumble across this blog, I hope they won't take exception to what I've said. What I now want to talk about is how these classes made me feel. Learning anatomy in this way is an incredible privilege and it surfaced many emotions that I didn't necessarily expect. I am someone that thinks of myself as being quite mentally strong and not at all squeamish. Working as a healthcare assistant on a dementia ward in a nursing home I often faced scenarios that required a strong stomach. Working in these kind of healthcare jobs also necessitates a level of emotional resilience, as dealing with people who are at the end of their lives requires a degree of empathy and is sometimes a sad business, without sugar coating it. However, working with the bodies of those who had already passed presented a unique challenge for me. Seeing your first dead body in itself is quite a strange experience. Also, I find that somehow when caring for living people, it is easy to block everything out. When you have another human being in front of you who needs your help to perform their basic tasks, you just seem to find a way to get the job done in the most dignified way possible, but when working with cadavers that element of emotional connection is gone. I spent the majority of my first couple of sessions trying not to be sick. I anticipated a smell which wasn't actually present. I was expecting a scent of decay, but in all reality, everything just smells clinical. The clinical smell of the formaldehyde actually presented it's own challenges, as it gave me a near instant headache. Also, despite the lack of human connection one gets when working with living people, I still struggled to detach myself emotionally. I instinctively wanted to know more about this person who had left us the gift of their body. the rigidity of their limbs made me irrationally wince with pain. However, now three weeks in I am getting used to the weekly anatomy sessions. I am now actively able to take part in the dissections without too much trouble. I don't think I'll ever get over my desire to know what kind of lives the people once lived, but that's just me. As I'm sure is the case with many anatomy groups, the conversation has turned once or twice to whether we ourselves could donate our own bodies. I like to think that I could donate mine, as I'm not a massively a spiritual person and I don't perceive my body to hold any particular sanctity that will last after I die. As well as this, I am truly grateful to be able to learn anatomy in this way and it would be comforting to know that you could continue to be of use to someone after death. You really can't appreciate the intricate nature of the human body until you see it in the flesh. I guess it's quite odd at our age to think about the end of our lives, but these sessions have certainly made me appreciate the finite nature of life, especially as a couple of the cadavers died at a younger age than my father is now. So, with that said, I just want to extend a personal thank you to the people that once were, who made a decision to leave us their bodies and I also want to leave a message to my future self (as I am doing this mainly as a diary) to appreciate life. Right now I'm still in a honeymoon period with medicine, but I know the wider medical climate is challenging and will be trying at times. I hope I can always remember that this is my dream and I hope to find pleasure in every day on this journey, because life is too short not to.
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Back in 2011 when I was approaching my final A level year, very few of my mates would probably have imagined that 5 years later I'd be beginning the process of becoming a doctor. It's not that I wasn't bright, I achieved straight As at GCSE, but I was drifting through my last year of school. The truth is that I loved school too much to care about what was to come next. My primary concerns were securing the lead role of Danny Zuko in the school musical and ensuring I left a 'legacy' at the old place. In one sense I was lucky to love school so much, as many kids don't, but it made my blasé. I never imagined that those 300 days of the academic year would fly by and I would have to leave my beloved school behind and, like all the pupils that went before me, I would be largely forgotten. I did my A levels in the days when one could do multiple re-sits and after taking many more exams than any of my friends, due to my awful performance at AS Level, I finally graduated with As in Biology and Politics and a C in chemistry.
I had always thought about doing medicine, but because of my mediocre academic performance I convinced myself that it wasn't for me. I made excuses in my head that I wanted a nicer lifestyle where I could spend more time with my family than my own father had done with us. You see, my dad is a GP and has worked pretty much every weekend I can remember, but he only did that to provide my sister and I with an amazing childhood. When he had time off we would travel the globe together and I never wanted for anything. I told myself that I resented the amount dad worked, but in all reality that was just a lie, an excuse. I ended up applying for Society Culture and Media at the University of East Anglia on a whim, mostly because I was an opinionated little shite and I thought it sounded hipster. I always fancied myself as one of those academic sorts that would go to protests and wear thick framed turtle shelled glasses, but I soon realised that wasn't me (I don't even wear glasses). I dropped out after three weeks, got a job at Waitrose driving around in a van, (which I actually quite enjoyed), and I did some real soul searching. By now my self esteem was at it's lowest point. All my pals were off having a great time at their respected universities and I was no longer a big fish, I was more like a plankton, just hoping for a whale to swallow me up. Fast forward one year and I applied for a Biology degree at Queen Mary University. I thought that was a good way to keep my options open. Doing a core science meant I could easily get a job working with people, maybe as a lecturer or teacher. Over the course of the next three years I did lots of work experience in different fields, I'd convinced myself by now that I definitely did want to be a teacher. I kept doing medical work experience as well, but I just never thought I'd get in anywhere. In the UK 12 people on average apply for every place at medical school and I didn't fancy myself as someone who could ever beat 11 people. In my final year of Biology I applied to do teaching and also applied for medicine, just on the off chance that I might get an interview somewhere. I was swiftly snapped up by 'Teach First' - a charitable organisation that throws graduates in at the deep end by training them to teach in some of the most deprived schools. At the same time I had three rejections for medicine and wasn't confident about my 4th choice. over the next couple of months I tried to forget about my medical applications. I had become genuinely excited about this teaching programme, I saw it as a great way of making a difference. One of the more serious reasons I initially chose to do a political degree three years before was because I thought I could change the world and now I really could do that, (well I thought I could transform the lives of a few of the nations most needy young people and that is as good as.) Then came the most unexpected day of my life. I received the email 'something has changed on your UCAS application, please log in and check.' I was 99% sure it was going to be my final rejection, but to my amazement I had secured an interview at Keele University. I had been told to apply to Keele because they are far less reliant on aptitude tests as a means of selection. Instead they ask all applicants to submit a 3000-ish word document in which you try and convince them you understand the role of a doctor and you can fulfil that role. Obviously I must have done a reasonable job. The night before my interview I drove up to Stoke with my dad and we stayed in a hotel so I could be as refreshed as possible. I was so nervous I didn't sleep at all and it made me realise how much I wanted this. Before my teaching interview i was relaxed, I thought I wanted it, but I didn't feel massively nervous. I wasn't overly scared of failing and if I had failed that interview I would have dismissed it as 'not the right job for me'. But now I didn't see failure as an option, for the first time in my life I experienced a burning passion inside me, I needed this. Finally i could see that the right profession for me was the one I had constantly dismissed as a child. The interview itself is a blur to me now. I remember having an emotional conservation at one station about the rights and wrongs of euthanasia, but I left feeling totally drained. I really did try to bring every ounce of my character to the fore and now all I could do was wait... The news came a week or so later. I was to be put on a waiting list, but I wasn't guaranteed a place. At this point in my life I was studying for my final Biology exams and now I had an incentive to work like I never had before. I didn't really enjoy my Biology degree, I often felt very depressed in London and I spent a lot of time out drinking with my rugby boys. However, now I started doing 18+ hour days in the library, much to the shock of my housemates, who had rarely seen me open a book before. I think, in all honesty, that they thought it was too little too late, but I was determined to get a good mark and ensure that if i didn't get in this year, I had the grades to do it next year. We know how the story ends. I made it. I missed out on a first class honours in my Bio degree by 0.5%, but i didn't care one ounce, as I got what I needed to get here and now I'm here it feels like home. Finally, I've found where I belong. It's cost me a lot more time, effort and money than it could have, but those are all old worries now. The only worry I currently have is that the next 5 years are going to fly past and one day I'm going to have to leave this place. However this time I will leave knowing that, provided I can avoid getting a criminal record, I will get to do the career of my dreams. |
AuthorMy name is Stephan. I'm a 23 year old medical student. I like to travel, play the odd game of rugby and I'm very vocal on formula 1 fan forums (yes I am a bit of a sports nerd). Archives
April 2021
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