Columnist Emeritus
Dubai Medical College
Tania Tabassum is student in the Class of 2015 at Dubai Medical College, UAE. She started medical school right after graduating high school. She loves finding lost books, music, cooking, Tumblr and watches an unhealthy amount of TV shows. She believes that life is all about balance and excess of anything really isn’t good.
The Making of a Medic
"The Making of a Medic" explores that which transforms the head of a high school graduate to that of a medic, shedding some light on what the life of a medic is really like, away from the myths and speculations. This column focuses on the reflections of personal experiences rather than the scholastics of medical school.
During our medical training, taking a proper history and doing a thorough clinical examination within a limited time period are the two skills that we are expected to master perfectly. Our teachers tell us that a good history gives you 75 percent of your diagnosis and the clinical examination gets you 90 to 100 percent of the diagnosis.
One of the most oft repeated complaints I heard from patients during my internal medicine rotation was, “I can’t sleep.” From early morning rounds to beeping lights to the health conditions that brought them to the hospital in the first place, it’s no wonder that a good night’s rest is hard to come by in the hospital.
“My rheumatologist was the one who told me I have cancer because for nine months we thought my back pain was due to a type of arthritis. He felt really bad about it and when he called me to tell me the diagnosis, he started crying on the phone.” A student in my second-year medical school class says this when we are in the big lecture hall for a class presentation on how to give …
One of the biggest challenges medical students face is finding their voice: with their medical team, with the hospital staff, with patients, and with their chosen specialty. As a medical student, you want to be proactive, to advocate for the patient, and to learn the best management techniques. But ‘proactive’ for one physician can easily be ‘annoying’ for another physician. Likewise, what can be viewed as ‘lack of initiative’ by one physician is ‘eager to …
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 …
Two interesting opinion pieces published a few months ago inspired me write this column: one from Tal Fortgang, a Princeton freshman defending his “white man privilege,” and another from Max Ritvo explaining what exactly that white man’s privilege is. To summarize their points, the former author laments that his academic success is shadowed by society attributing his successes to being genetically a white man. As a result, society believes he is able to attend an Ivy …
“You know, the globus pallidus.” My coaxing words ripened in the air between us. Josh admitted it sounded familiar, but couldn’t quite remember the time or the place. This concerned me, because my friend was a highly accomplished emergency physician, yet he wrinkled his nose at “globus pallidus” like it was a piece of decomposing fruit. “It’s in the brain,” I said helpfully. He smiled, “That’s probably why it sounds familiar.” A few hours before, …
When I told people I was going to medical school, the first thing I’d hear was, “Oh, you’ll be a good doctor.” As an idealistic and energetic first-year, I was flattered every time a standardized patient complimented me. But I wasn’t a good doctor — I don’t even have an MD. I was exposed to esoteric subjects like biochemistry and physiology, but I wasn’t much help to any person in distress. I believed, like my …
Medical training prides itself on being an art, never simply a black-and-white field where answers to increasingly complex health questions are merely algorithmically derived. It follows then that the only way for medical knowledge to transcend this rigid, computational process is through the accumulation of clinical experience, which over enough time should inform our intuition to the point where we become masters of navigating a sea of grays. This archetype is classically understood to be …
If your doctor and an algorithm arrived at two different diagnoses, which would you trust? Of course, it depends on the specific context but this question opens a much needed discussion about a transformative process occurring in medicine: computers are beginning to perform tasks of physicians. While modern medicine utilizes medical technology primarily as an aid for physicians, future technology may afford diagnostic capability that rivals that of humans. The question is, in what capacity …
I met a resident who advocated that all medical students should become patients and have the same procedures that they order for their patients performed on them à la the movie “The Doctor.” While I agree that being a patient offers perspective, I don’t agree that I need to have tertiary syphilis to understand how to interact with a patient facing the illness. We act as health care providers and now view the world in …
Medicine is difficult. It’s not that the road starts years in advance of medical school, taking difficult premedical courses, volunteering at hospitals or emergency services. It’s not the notorious competition and stress of simply being accepted to training. It’s not the life-consuming monster of training itself.
Contributing Writer
George Washington University School of Medicine
Navdeep is a member of the Class of 2015 at the George Washington University School of Medicine.
His interests include: Running, yoga, biking, and kiteboarding.
