Shimmering Quotes
Medicine is a sacrifice. I knew this upon admittance into medical school. I did not know the sacrifice would be an erosion of my humanity.
Tag: burnout
Contributing Writer
Florida State University College of Medicine
Matthew is currently a fourth year medical student at FSU. His submitted content is narrative medicine describing the experiences of himself and his peers. Matthew continues to explore writing while hoping that his unbridled perspective will promote an internal sense of validity among his readers.
Compassion in Medicine: Looking Beyond the Patient’s Illness
While there is no way to choose our patients’ outcomes, we can certainly choose to be empathetic and compassionate regardless of their outcomes. Medicine without empathy and compassion is not medicine at all.
Fighting Physician Suicide Takes a Tribe
When I applied for medical school, I knew I was signing up for hard work. I knew I would have to spend countless hours studying, that my sleep cycle might never be the same. But I had not expected this.
Medical School Admission: Patience is a Virtue
While it is clear that the issue of depression and anxiety extends well beyond the medical school admissions process, it is important to ask whether it is the beginning of a long and slippery slope to a life of anxiety and depression.
The Grind Doesn’t Define You: Giving and Growing in a World of Negativity
It’s ironic that the medical field is arguably the most humane profession, yet we put our residents and physicians-in-training through such pain and suffering.
A Condition of the Heart
It’s 1 a.m., everyone’s running on three cups of coffee / When a man stumbles through the entrance / And I could hear whispers of / It’s him, the homeless man, back in the ER again
Differentials
“From now on,” our deans told us at orientation, “society will see you as a doctor. Sometimes you may not feel like one, but that is what you are becoming. This week marks the beginning of that transition, which will continue in the months and years to come.”
What Does It Mean Now?
And what does it mean now? To be accepted? To be initiated, congratulated and nudged toward a curriculum made jokingly infamous by well-meaning administrators and by a culture which treats such consuming endeavors as medical school like abstract forms of busyness?
One Tough Cookie
This path has been far from cookie cutter, / From being kneaded and rolled / By demanding needs to fulfill multiple roles, / I can’t help but wonder, will I make the cut?
Reflection Through Mask-Making
On a December night in a northern suburb of Chicago, the weather outside dipped into single digits with a sub-zero wind-chill. Safely situated indoors, a group of medical students wandered into a classroom where five tables were covered by plastic tarps with another laden with pipe cleaners, acrylic paint and brushes, and a stack of blank masks. Licking the emotional wounds left by a sleep-deprived exam week that ended only three days prior, the students eyed the art supplies. They were hopeful for a means for reconcile their psyche tattered by cold and a semester of school.
My Grandpa’s Socks
Whenever I go to the hospital, I wear my grandpa’s socks. They looked distinguished on an older man, but a little childish on a me, a 25-year-old medical student. I’m okay with that. Feeling like an overdressed kid on Easter helps to balance the overwhelming pressure of becoming a physician.
On Knowing When to Stop and Breathe
Mental health has been on my mind lately, but not only because of the “Physician Mental Health” and “Resiliency Training” lectures we’ve been receiving during this block. A few weeks ago, one of my best friends from home texted me to say one of her medical school classmates had committed suicide a few days ago.
Columnist
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Tiffany is a medical student at David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, class of 2019. She graduated with a BS in Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics from UCLA in 2015. Tiffany is passionate about breaking down barriers between patients and physicians and is an advocate of humanism in medicine. When possible, she loves to travel and experience the culture, landscapes, and food from different places.
The Patient | Physician Perspective
Lessons learned from both sides - A column exploring the qualities of a physician from the perspective of a physician in training, through the lens of a patient.