Columns

Alison Trainor (3 Posts)

Columnist

Sidney Kimmel Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University

Alison is a class of 2016 student at Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson university, and graduated from Providence College with her BS in Biochemistry. In her time outside of medical school she enjoys running, reading, and traveling.

Mind Vitamins

Just like your multivitamin provides your body with the vitamins that may be missing from your diet, Mind Vitamins provides you with resources that may help fill in gaps in your med school curriculum. In med school we learn the scientific aspect of medicine that is necessary to treat diseases, but there are intangible and personal aspects that are necessary to treat the whole patient. This column will enrich your education so that you may be able to better understand your patients' perspectives and treat them not just as a disease, but as a person.




Empathy, Refugees and Fad Diets

Published by Alison Trainor

Medical school does a great job of teaching students about anatomy, biochemistry, differential diagnoses, diseases, medications, lab tests and imaging studies. Although science is a critical and indispensable part of being a doctor, understanding patients as unique individuals can be crucial to providing the best care. Knowing a patient’s story and being able to empathize can improve patient outcomes and adherence. While it is more difficult to quantify the effect of empathy than the effect …

Wounded Healers

Published by Ajay Koti

Kaitlyn Elkins was a medical student at the Wake Forest School of Medicine in North Carolina and a member of the Class of 2015. She excelled academically, named the valedictorian of her high school class and graduating summa cum laude from Campbell University. She wrote poetry in her free time. She had a cat, lovingly named Gatito. On April 11, 2013, just weeks before beginning her clinical rotations, Kaitlyn Elkins took her own life. She left …

Falling Down the Rabbit Hole

Published by Valerie Efros

how quickly one turns on oneself  inner demons circling overhead like opportunistic infections ready to invade predator and prey so vulnerable unprotected and unarmed.  survival of the fittest  I wrote this poem just a few weeks ago during a moment of overwhelming emotions that felt all too familiar. I’ve been writing poetry since middle school; it has always been a source of refuge for me, an outlet for my deepest fears and anxieties. Letting my …

Ebola-Fueled Racism and the Brain

Published by Mariam Bonyadi

When a Guinean woman was riding the bus in Italy, she was verbally harassed by a young Italian girl who was also a passenger on the bus. The girl was screaming and accusing the Guinean woman of having the Ebola virus. Then, the young girl’s relatives proceeded to assault and beat the woman. Although the victim was taken to the hospital, she sustained injuries from the attack. Race alone, rather than symptom presentation or travel …

Work In the Time to Work Out

Published by Jimmy Yan

We all know it’s important to stay fit and healthy during medical school, especially as ward duties, call nights, electives and residency applications add more stress into our lives. These responsibilities whittle away at our energy and spare time, making it harder to maintain a regular workout regime in a busy schedule. Despite our best efforts, the priority to work out can slip as we struggle to find time. I mean, let’s face it: after …

Kenyan Life: Soundings from a Slemenda

Published by Bryce McKee

Between my first and second years of medical school, I was fortunate to receive the AMPATH Slemenda Scholarship. This scholarship allowed me to experience medicine firsthand in the global health arena as I worked in Eldoret, Kenya. AMPATH (Academic Model Providing Access to Healthcare) is a consortium of North American and Kenyan academic institutions working together to improve health care delivery to a catchment area of 3.5 million people.

Comfort Food for the Med Student: Collard Greens and Black-Eyed Pea Soup

Published by Haritha Sishtla

“Nothing is more needed than nourishment for the imagination.” This quote from an article in The Atlantic entitled “For the Young Doctor About to Burn Out” is one that is profoundly meaningful as we start the last year of medical school. While most of our mind is occupied with the thoughts of where we will match and spend the next chapter in residency training, we can’t help but also reflect on how far we’ve come, what our career means to …

Transitions: The Reflections of a Fourth-Year Medical Student

Published by Sarab Sodhi

I walked into the medical school this morning, happy to back in a place I’d not seen much of in a year and a half. I stopped midstride as I saw a sea of new faces sitting in the common area. The faces I saw were young and eager, full of promise, hope, and fear — clearly new first-years. It struck me then, as I began to walk more slowly through the hallowed halls that …

For You Bike Commuters: Six Things I Learned From Two Wheels

Published by Jimmy Yan

Let me start off by saying that I don’t think of myself as a hardcore cyclist: I don’t own multiple bikes, I am not on Strava, and I don’t own a single cycling kit or jersey. In fact, outside of my commute to the hospitals, errand runs and trips to friends’ places, I don’t really ride my bike. I started cycling to work during my clerkship year in medical school, partly as a way to …

Run, Walk, or Diet? Insights into Exercise Science

Published by Mariam Bonyadi

During the respiration unit of my undergraduate anatomy class, one of my students asked about differences in lung volume, and the effects of “being a runner” versus someone who does not exercise as regularly. While it is widely accepted that regular exercise can improve inspiratory capacity, the diverse impact of exercise on hormone levels and neurogenesis is not discussed as frequently. Exercise science is currently being heavily researched, and an understanding of recent findings can …

The Exam Room Cloud

Published by T. N. Diem Vu, MD

Last spring, I saw my first real patient. The plan was to go into an exam room and take the history and physical of a real patient who had graciously offered to sacrifice half of his day. A doctor would watch everything and give feedback. The intimidating fact that I was being monitored made me feel like I was about to go on stage in front of an audience. If you had followed me into my …

T. N. Diem Vu, MD T. N. Diem Vu, MD (8 Posts)

Columnist Emeritus

Mayo Clinic

Dr. T. N. Diem Vu, MD is a surgical critical care fellow in the Mayo Clinic Department of General Surgery. She graduated from Mayo Medical School in the Class of 2016. She completed a BS in molecular & cellular biology with a minor in writing seminars at Johns Hopkins University in 2012. Her interests outside of medicine include illustration, writing, singing and playing ukulele, photography, film, food, books, and spending time with loved ones.

Med Student Shadows

As medical students, we shadow physicians to learn about the nature of medicine from them and their patients. In this column, Diem traces her own shadow, preserving and illustrating her experiences--in class, in the hospital, and in between--as a medical student.