Heaven and Hell

Survived third year!! A brief montage and summary of the past week. 

Monday was the long answer written exam (3h, 10 questions) and the extended matching exam (150 questions). I know some people run marathons without food, and most people write exams without food. I could not imagine either. When my blood sugar gets low (i.e. below 6) I get hangry and my brain function ceases. I was certainly not taking chances with finals. Photo below was taken with my sweaty pre-exam hands before we were strip searched for electronics.

 

After the incredulous feelings of did they really have an immunization schedule long answer question? along with seriously? gynecology emergencies? dissipated, Margaret and I noted that the sun was shining outside and we had two days of studying still ahead of us. 

So we took something beautiful (her parent's backyard)...and made it ugly.

 

We spent Tuesday and Thursday hammering for the clinical exams. 

 It has been so long since I've had to use sunscreen I thought I ought to take a photo. 

One of the really stressful things about the clinical exams is that they were a different format than the previous 2 years, where we had OSCE's. This year our long case was a patient with real pathology who we had 30 mins to examine and take a history from (the cases ranged from things like a post-op orthopedics case to diabetes). Then the examiners questioned us for 20 mins. 

My patient was a good historian and had a very straightforward presentation which I had prepared well for. I am usually rubbish at presenting (you have to be detail oriented and well-organized) but somehow the planets aligned and I actually did my best case presentation ever! What are the odds? 

There were no questions that stumped me and the absolute best part was after the examiners walked out I turned to the patient and she said to me I hope I am never in the hospital again, but if I am I really hope you are my doctor! I was completely bowled over and honored. 

The short cases went quite well too. They were all very barn-door spot diagnoses and exams. Though I did manage to stutter out some random statements and completely forget basic things (which I would never forget in an actual hospital, i.e taking a blood pressure from a patient in atrial fibrillation). Yeesh. The highlight was one of my surgical case patients yelling to the examiners as they left the room GIVE HER AN A.  

Awesome and awkward. 

So there you have it. Third year, done and dusted. I also just received some rather big news. But that deserves its own post. Heh. A little suspense to keep all of you coming back. In the meantime, it is sleep time. Sweet, sweet sleep.