Columnist Emeritus
Albany Medical College
Hey guys, I'm Haritha Sishtla, a Class of 2015 medical student at Albany Medical College. I went to undergrad not too far away at Union College and majored in biology and economics. Anyone who knows me knows that I love to talk and share my experiences, and that I spend a lot of time taking pictures and Instagramming and/or PicStitching them. I also spend a lot of time on Pinterest, which may cut into my study time...
eom. [existing outside medical school]
As medical students, we often find ourselves attending countless hours of lecture, studying late at night in the library, and eating junk from the hospital cafeteria. We forget that there is a life outside of the bubble that is medical school! Read our column to take a break from the work and exist outside of medical school.
We’ve always been on a healthy eating craze and want to send the message that eating healthy does not mean eating boring and expensive foods. We’re all about eating tasty foods that are easy to make, especially when time is so tight. A classmate of ours recently talked about buying frozen taquitos for a get-together because they were easy finger foods that most people enjoy. Taquitos are a great party food item but we wanted …
Coming from a family consisting almost exclusively of engineers, the world of medics had always been somewhat a mystery to me. All the family friends who my parents hung out with were engineers. None of my friends in school had parents who were doctors. The only doctors I met were the ones I saw for the little cold or flu that didn’t happen very often. The only idea I had about doctors came from what I …
Over the past year, I’ve had a great experience getting involved with Students for a National Health Program (SNaHP), a national and on-campus advocacy group. The organization’s long-term goal is to reform health care financing in favor of a single, public insurance offering for all Americans (the “single-payer” movement). Its short-term goal is to increase grassroots support among physicians and health professional students in conjunction with Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP). One thing …
Including athletic agility, intelligence and social behavior, many human traits are thought to exist along a continuum. Often, dynamics in skills and personality are used to distinguish one individual from the next. But when aspects of social behavior exist in such a range, it challenges scientists and behavioral specialists to identify the presence of a cognitive impairment or deficit. What factors should be used to identify a mental illness among the cohort of traits that …
The world of nutrition has become an increasingly hot topic over the past few years. It is emerging as a thriving field of research, clinical practice, and delicious recipes! Nutrition is more than just vitamin supplementation or eating a balanced diet. Within the many medical specialties, nutritional support plays an integral role in the care of patients at different stages of health and their life cycle. In cardiology, nutrition plays a major role in managing …
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 …
Columnist and in-Training Staff Member
University of Illinois College of Medicine
Mariam graduated with a BS in microbiology, immunology, and molecular genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she conducted undergraduate research in B-cell development and lymphomagenesis as well as the neurobiology of stress. In high school, Mariam spent several years studying mechanisms of induced pluripotency in an embryonic stem cell research lab at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla. She now studies computational neuroscience and medicine as part of the Medical Scholars Program (MD/PhD) and the Neuroscience Program (NSP) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Outside of research and clinical experiences, Mariam has earned a black belt in Taekwondo and enjoys yoga and San Diego beaches.
Bridging the Gap
Bridging the Gap focuses on the relationship between basic research and medicine, in order to develop an appreciation for the science that underlies the foundations of modern medicine.
