Tag: medical education

Claire McDaniel (2 Posts)

Contributing Writer

Georgetown University School of Medicine

Claire is a member of Georgetown University School of Medicine's Class of 2018. A thorough third culture kid (don't ask her where she's from unless you have a few hours), she enjoys running, coffee, and medieval French literature. Follow her on Twitter for pithy M1 musings and funny medical jokes.

But Where Are the Snows of Yesteryear?

Published by Claire McDaniel

“Mais où sont les neiges d’antan? But where are the snows of yesteryear?” Not many people are experts in medieval French poetry. It’s a tiny corner of academia, filled with people whose passions and imaginations lie a millennium in the past. And so many of those academics, and I do use that term in the most tweed-wearing, bookish, kindly way possible, have their classes relegated to the far corners of campus, to buildings who are themselves of a different century. Or at the very least, of an era before air conditioning.

What Medical Training Teaches Us About Acceptance

Published by Eric Donahue

Physicians in-training are granted a privilege unparalleled in society. Human beings generously donate their bodies for our learning. They lay naked, exposed on cold stainless steel tables while strangers, who will never know their name, study them intimately. Like a grandfather telling stories to the next generation, their organs reveal to us a story of life.

From Flexner to Future: My Plan to Reform Medical Education

Published by Trevor Mooney

A few weeks ago, I was unhinging my jaw to swallow the proverbial firehose of information that is musculoskeletal medicine. At some stage between prying my mouth open and forcibly dislocating my temporomandibular joint (really the highest-yield medical procedure for medical students in the information age … I highly recommend it if you want to have at least a fighting chance at Step 1), the following scenario blossomed into my mind: A medical student from 1910 time travels to the present day to document out how medical training has changed, and he quickly takes note of a few other things.

Checking Boxes

Published by Kevin Dueck, MD

Such was the start of clerkship, lost in a sea of paperwork and bureaucracy. A mountain of bookkeeping distributed to each student: due dates, boxes to check, requirements to fulfill and all with the threat of expulsion if any part was deemed incomplete. I understand the need to track what we experience for assessment, but the framing and focus of this introduction emphasized what should be a secondary to our learning.

Match Day Spotlight 2015: Family Medicine

Published by Christopher Deans

Melissa Palma, a recent fourth-year matcher out of the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine in Iowa City, IA, graces us with her expert advice on succeeding in medical school and beyond.

Let Food Be Thy Medicine: Student-Run Nutrition Education Programs for Medical Students

Published by Kelly Aminian

Hippocrates, the ‘father of medicine’ said, “let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.” The role of nutrition in health has been recognized since the beginning of medicine, yet somehow nutrition education has fallen by the wayside in most medical curricula. Given that 34.9 percent of Americans are obese and obesity has been linked to diabetes, heart disease, stroke and certain types of cancer, nutrition should be a focal point of medical education.

The Most Common Disease Among Physicians, and How to Fight It

Published by Kathryn Rachel Morrison

As medical students, we have the unique experience of jumping from service to service or specialty to specialty. The good students will embrace the opportunity to be constantly challenged to evolve in their thinking and their doing. However, often times, the experience of one week here, two weeks there, four weeks somewhere else can be a bit awkward.

Where Does Your Cadaver Come From?

Published by Karishma Bhatt

“Hello there,” I thought upon meeting my first patient in medical school. I did not get a response. Not that I was expecting one; my first patient was, as are most medical students’ first patients, a cadaver. She was draped with a bed sheet. Even when we began making the first cuts on her back, we kept her covered from the waist down.

Overthink It!

Published by Eric Donahue

My classmates and professors tell me I overthink it. “You overanalyzed the problem.” “Stop mulling it over.” “Just focus on the buzzwords and you’ll rock the exam.” “Jump through the hoops and move on.”

A Case for Inclusive Language

Published by Ria Pal, MD

“And do you have a husband at home?” “A wife, actually.” “Oh, excuse me. And how long have you been with your mate?” the physician answered. He was unflustered and looked expectantly at the female standardized patient sitting across from him. For the remainder of the interview, when it came up again briefly, the physician referred to the patient’s wife as her mate.

The Truth About Medical Education: Corrupted Seeds with Far-Reaching Roots

Published by Nita Chen, MD

The continuation and progress of the human condition has been founded on the inheritance of knowledge. With each generation, the lessons learnt are passed on as another valuable brick in the pyramid towards the pinnacle of human success. However, just as progress necessitates the study of the phenomenon in question, the educational system itself has become a topic of scrutiny.

Nita Chen, MD (39 Posts)

Medical Student Editor and in-Training Staff Member Emeritus

University of Florida Fixel Movement and Neurorestoration Institute

Nita Chen is a current movement disorders fellow at University of Florida Movement and Neurorestoration program. She is Class of 2017 medical student at Albany Medical College. To become cultural, she spent her early educational years in Taiwan and thoroughly enjoyed wonderful Taiwanese food and milk tea, thus ruining her appetite for the rest of her life in the United States. Aside from her neuroscience and cognitive science majors during her undergraduate career, she holed herself up in her room writing silly fictional stories, doodling, and playing the piano. Or she could be found spazzing out like a gigantic science nerd in various laboratories. Now she just holes up in her room to study most of the time.