Contributing Writer Emeritus
University of Kansas School of Medicine
I am currently a third year medical student at the University of Kansas School of Medicine. I am undecided as to my specialty of choice right now, but narrowing it down as we speak! I enjoy writing reflective pieces as I continue to navigate the waters of medical school. In my free time, I like to travel, run, bike, hike, anything outdoors! I also enjoy spending time with my family, friends, fluffy golden retriever, and my awesome F-15E airman!
The medical students, residents and Dr. G stood around the computer with backs hunched. With serious and emotionless faces, we stared directly into the screen. We were taken aback by the MRI results of his brain in front of us. Was this a primary tumor? An AVM? A dreaded metastasis from somewhere else in his body? How long has this mass been in his brain? Look at the size. Look at the calcifications. What did …
Confession One: I am an OR moron. Take me out of the OR, and I’m like any other third-year medical student. High achieving with at least some capacity for normal adult functioning. I study, I cook, I pay my bills. I attend medical school, for goodness sake. Most people in this world would consider that the pinnacle of young adult functioning. But in the OR, none of this matters. In the OR, I’m like half …
Kyle died early on a Sunday morning. His last meal was vanilla pudding, fed to him lovingly by his grandmother Shirley, while reruns of “Inspector Gadget” played in the background. When Kyle was born 25 years earlier, the family had been told he would not live more than a few weeks into infancy. But Kyle surprised everyone by surviving a quarter of a century with debilitating cerebral palsy. What surprised me most about Kyle was …
After arriving at the hospital, scrubbing in and warming up with a few anatomy questions with my attending, I was relaxed and ready to assist with the upcoming thyroidectomy. My patient, who will be referred to as “M,” was a 17-year-old girl who presented to the office with dizziness. After an extensive workup it was discovered that her symptoms were due to thyroid dysfunction. The surgery was meant to be a straightforward case, but the …
I read the latest progress note: ¨67-year-old male with metastatic lung cancer. Mildly agitated. Pain controlled with morphine.¨ I walk into a single room to see a frail man looking worn beyond his years. I introduce myself and ask if it is a good time to chat. He looks away and tells me that now is not a good time. I can see he has just received his lunch tray. Fair enough. I would not …
“Es un milagro, señora.” It was getting late, and the clinic waiting room was almost empty. It was OB/GYN day, and the patients—predominantly Spanish speaking migrant agricultural workers—had all finally been seen. All except Maria, who was still in the exam room. Her six-year-old son, Joaquin, skittered around the outside corridor, under the watchful eye of the nurses preparing to close up shop. I was in the exam room with the doctor and Maria, and …
Throughout my rotations, I often wondered what it must have been like to train under the tutelage of Michael Debakey, a pioneer in cardiac surgery, or Harvey Cushing, the father of modern neurosurgery. I imagined myself scrutinizing a CT scan (or a plain X-ray in Cushing’s time), having these masters of medicine critique my differential diagnosis or being in the operating theater learning a new operative technique. I tried to imagine the immense satisfaction one …
“Are you really prepared to see this?” the doctor asked staring intensely at me, his arm blocking my way to the patient’s room. “Yes,” I replied hesitantly. “You prepped me on the patient already.” “Kid, I didn’t ask if you were prepped. I asked if you were prepared.” I knew that a scheduled delivery for a miscarriage would be a traumatic experience. I knew that it required the utmost sensitivity and compassion. Dr. A had …
“This can be a depressing specialty at times; we laugh to stay sane,” my attending explained as I stared in dismay at the cackling residents and faculty after one of them made a rude comment about their patient. This was the first day of my rotation on this service and I was very disappointed. Still brimming with the ideals of professionalism taught in the first two years of medical school, the scenario I witnessed seemed …
Doing a sub-internship in the ICU is, well, intense. On the first day, I was completely overwhelmed by seeing so many sick patients, most of whom were sedated, ventilated, and on at least one pressor. In just a few weeks, this came to seem perfectly normal. However, what continued to stir me were the extreme emotions I saw patients and their families experiencing. I couldn’t help but feel those emotions myself. The most difficult day—thankfully …
Sunday, 8 p.m. What started as valiant efforts of creating new recipes turned out to be embarrassing failures in judgment and common sense. Initially, I thought mixing tofu, some greens and pasta would turn out to be an Asian delicacy, maybe something that I could proudly share with friends and family. But, after adding one spice to another, topping sauce over sauce, I realized that it was over. It was time to call it an …
May – Bright-eyed and fresh from the books, I start my first rotation on internal medicine. I stay at the hospital until 11 p.m. to get a good history of my first patient. It is three pages long. I come in on weekends to practice writing notes. I find out that a patient is witness to child abuse and file a mandatory report. I pat myself on the back. My intern pats me on the …
Editor Emeritus: Former Medical Student Editor (2013-2015)
Morsani College of Medicine at the University of South Florida
Sasha is thrilled for the opportunity to combine her interests in writing and medicine. She has been writing since she got her first journal in second grade, and editing since she ran her high school newspaper. Her interest in medicine evolved through travel, studying the brain through the lens of social science as undergraduate at Boston University, and together with her interest in yoga and dance. Sasha gets inspired on long runs and looks forward to few things more than hiking with her mom.
