Columnist Emeritus and in-Training Staff Member
Loma Linda University Medical Center
A Taste Of Your Own Medicine is a column that gives you a taste of medicine. It focuses on important and interesting topics relating to medicine and being a medical student.
Dr. Valentina Bonev is a board certified fellowship trained breast surgical oncologist. She graduated from the University of California, Irvine and earned her medical doctorate at the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine. After general surgery residency, she completed a breast surgery fellowship at the Lynn Sage Comprehensive Breast Center at Northwestern University, Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. She is passionate about surgical education and community outreach on breast health. In her spare time, she enjoys writing and scrapbooking.
When I was a first-year medical student, the upperclassmen said that medical school would get better and better. I didn’t feel like that by the end of first year—or during second year. Third year started and it finally picked up. Now, as a fourth-year medical student, I can definitively say that medical school really does get better and better—you just have to be patient (but not a patient). Not everything in medical school is as …
Not too long ago, I was still in the world of “pre-clerkship”, the realm of lectures, teaching sessions, attendance and classrooms. That time seems so long ago now after entering the wards as a third-year student on clerkships. That world of preclerkship seems so much simpler, and safer, than being in the hospital right now, with its fluorescent lights, long hallways, and patient rooms. Classrooms were a world to which I had become accustomed and …
Are you the kind of person who, like me, dances around the pasta pot waiting for water the boil, munching on uncooked noodles? Sometimes I pretend that I am going to memorize flashcards during this waiting period, but instead I end up tiptoeing over to the pot every few minutes “just to check on it.” Well, tonight I learned that by being extra lazy, it is possible to make a delicious fresh tomato sauce during …
Walking down the hospital halls after neurology, every twitch, twist of the neck or odd posture appears a nail to my hammer. Neuro lectures are captivating yet depressing, largely because right now, we can treat the symptoms but not the underlying cause of several diseases. However, everything we can treat is breathtaking, and soon we will develop cures for more diseases—hopefully. In the land of food, it seems that fall in upstate New York is …
While the aphorism “what goes around comes around” is by no means original to my mother, she most certainly repurposed it.* Along with her emphasis on the importance of education, this is a phrase that I remember being one of her earliest and most frequent messages to me and my siblings. When I think of how this phrase is generally used in pop culture, it’s a thinly veiled reminder that, sooner or later, the universe …
An open letter appeared in the world’s most prominent medical journal a few weeks ago with the title “Let us treat patients in Syria.” Carrying the signatures of 55 esteemed physicians from around the world, including three Nobel laureates, the letter served as a condemnation of the collapsing medical infrastructure in the region due, in part, to the “deliberate targeting of medical facilities and personnel.” Saleyha Ahsan, an emergency medicine physician and signatory, subsequently published an op-ed in …
“Study snacks,” both high in fat and sugar, are an indispensable part of any medical student’s life during exam season. Putting on weight while cramming can be expected, as there exist evolutionary, genetic and neural bases underlying high caloric food cravings during times of stress. These factors fuel unhealthy weight gain despite scientific research into obesity and educational outreach by health professionals advocating this scientific approach to understanding obesity. Uncontrolled weight gain is often a …
It’s hard to say what motivates my fellow MD/PhD trainees to pursue the physician-scientist career track. In some ways, we’re a masochistic group, voluntarily choosing to spend seven to 10 years in the prime of our lives completing two doctoral degrees instead of one, then spending another four to eight years or more in residency, research residency, postdoctoral and possibly fellowship training before seeking a “real” job. Even for those of us who started our …
We had our white coat ceremony on the third day of medical school. Each student was given a rose to give to someone who helped during their journey to medical school. As soon as we started school, we had lectures to attend, books to read and frequent tests to study for. Everything started off with a bang! Before we knew it, we were nose deep in books, and we quickly forgot what life was like …
Here was a 45-year-old Type 1 diabetic who presented to the emergency department in a near coma with diabetic ketoacidosis. The diagnosis seemed clear as day, with some of the classic presenting signs: polyuria, polydipsia, hyperglycemia, high anion gap, low serum bicarbonate and presence of ketones in the urine. She was admitted and treated appropriately. Once she was stabilized, the human interaction and history-taking began, which proved to be far more convoluted. She thoroughly explained …
Medicine is rapidly evolving: new drugs, new devices and new techniques are constantly introduced to improve patient care. And yet, despite these many innovative advances, there are some mainstays of modern medicine that are thousands of years old and have withstood the test of time. Acupuncture is a form of alternative medicine that was developed in China approximately 4,000 years ago. Its intended purpose was to restore the body’s inner balance by placing needles at …
It is powerful timing that I write the first entry for this column—a tribute to my mother—on Sept. 1, 2013. Today, my Ammachi (my maternal grandmother) passed away. Seeing those words is still a fresh wound, forcing me to externalize a reality that my heart and my mind have yet to come to terms with. This is the woman who helped to raise my two siblings and me; who raised my mother and her two siblings as …
Columnist Emeritus
Albany Medical College
I'm Jency, a graduate of Siena College in New York where I received a BA in biology and a minor in Franciscan Service and Advocacy. I am currently in the Class of 2016 at Albany Medical College as part of the Siena/AMC combined-degree program in Science, Humanities, and Medicine. What you'll read from me will be an amalgamation of my life experiences and my non-academic thoughts--a mingling of the lighthearted and the thought-provoking. Though a laundry list could never truly encapsulate my (or anyone’s) deepest life’s passions, in a nutshell they are (in no particular order): travel, photography, film, literature, writing, graphic and interior design, comedy, real hip hop, onion rings, and--above all, and in all seriousness--this irresistible pull I feel towards society’s underserved, marginalized populations. They are those whom I fear we, as blossoming medical professionals, will be ill-equipped to care for unless we take positive steps to broaden our horizons and circles of inclusion.
My Mother's Pearls
My mother is a very simple woman. Though she may be a well-respected physician at Columbia University, you might never know it if you saw her. She dresses simply, she speaks kindly, and she cares endlessly. Her wealth lies not in her tangible possessions--she doesn't even own a pearl necklace. Her pearls are of wisdom, and it is those pearls that I hope to share with you.
