Investing in Medicine Abroad
Let’s face it: practicing medicine overseas is pretty sexy. Whether it’s images of Angelina Jolie and Clive Owen in Cambodia, young French physicians working with Doctors Without Borders, or Paul Farmer in Russian prisons that make you think of international medicine, it all seems pretty cool. Oh yeah, we all have an altruistic motive in...
Babies and Eggs
One of the things that I love about science is that you can be immersed in biochemistry and anatomy when suddenly you stumble into something very moving, and you realize that you are at the crux of life and death. Take this preface to a lecture on growth hormone, delivered by a very old man...
A Med Student’s Guide To The OR
The OR is exciting for some, scary for others, and boring for the rest. No matter what you think before going into the OR, there are a few things you need to know to enhance your experience. 1. Show up on time to the procedure. It’s awkward introducing yourself in the middle of the procedure...
The Mild, Existential Adventures Past and Present of Javier Fitzsimmons, Dollar Store Teddy Bear
Author’s note: This piece will be published in the University of Alabama School of Medicine’s upcoming Voices in Word Literary Journal, published by its Narrative Medicine Interest Group. Descended from Spanish-English lineage but made in China, Javier Fitzsimmons’s brown, burly, furry form lay squished against the basket grating by the weight of a multitude of stuffed animals....
A Cure for the Heart: Mushroom Swiss Grilled Cheese Sandwich
The year is winding down, and our classmates are getting ready to spend their time at home…studying. Unfortunately for us second-years, the next six weeks will be spent with our noses in First Aid, memorizing each and every word as we study for the most important exam of our careers: Step 1. While most of...
Happiness Within: Work-Life Imbalance
From the first day of medical school orientation, we have been advised to maintain a life outside of the walls of the hospital and to continue our own hobbies and interests. This often feels overwhelming among the endless classes, exams, clerkships and applications, not to mention extracurricular activities. We all want to be a model...
Medicine is About Teamwork
My most recent rotation on internal medicine emphasized the importance of working on a team, which is an integral part of residency. The team not only consists of you, the residents and the attending, but it also includes nurses, social workers, the pharmacist and other consulting teams. Ideally, team members should interact with each other...
Save NIH Funding!
Just this past month, the House of Representatives passed a new budget bill that would make permanent the sequestration cuts. Being a physician-scientist in training, one of my biggest concerns is the proposed 8.4% cut to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) funding of biomedical research. There are also cuts proposed to the National Science Foundation. Every...
Happy Birthday, in-Training! A One-Year Update from the Editors-in-Chief
As we traveled back to Albany from our presentation at the American Association for Medical Colleges (AAMC) regional meeting in foggy Atlantic City, we reflected on our past year with in-Training in this update, the ceremonial 100th article on in-training.org. Just two weeks ago, on April 5, we celebrated our first birthday. One year since our...
Skin: Our Identity
The skin is the boldest yet most bashful organ of the body. Parts of it will be exposed to the world’s eye with no problems at all. However, other areas are so timid that they are only exposed on the most embarrassing or intimate of occasions. The skin can tell a person’s life story —...
For Pappou: A Reflection on Loss During the Clinical Years
It was just a week into our third-year rotations and my class was eagerly awaiting our Step 1 scores while adjusting to the beginnings of our clinical responsibilities. When the day came that our scores were to be released, I received a phone call from my aunt who told me that my Pappou (grandfather), who...
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Emergency Management @The_Hospital: The Boston Marathon Bombings and the Tweets that Followed