Contributing Writer
Georgetown University School of Medicine
Sara Wierbowski is a forth-year medical student at Georgetown University School of Medicine in Washington, D.C. class of 2023. In 2019, she graduated from The University of Scranton with a Bachelor of Science in neuroscience and Bachelor of Arts in philosophy. She is currently a member of the Literature and Medicine Scholarly Track, which allows her to continue to enjoy the humanities while in medical school. After graduating medical school, Sara plans to pursue a psychiatry residency.
Before starting medical school, buried in a list of to-do tasks, I was asked to submit my Meyers-Briggs personality inventory. I was no stranger to this string of four letters, as I had performed the assessment many times in my life. I didn’t need to take the test again to know what I would get: INFJ.
A classmate of mine committed suicide a few weeks ago. Though I’ve heard the harrowing statistics about physician and trainee suicide rates, to be honest, I never expected to personally encounter such a tragedy. The small classes at my medical school allow for a strong sense of community in which we all know each other, celebrate important life milestones, and happily reconnect when we’re together after clinical rotations scatter us throughout the hospital.
The first thing I notice are his boots. He’s still in his street clothes, having just been admitted. He looks thin, emaciated — his clothes hang off him, shirt collar drooping down from his neck like peeling paint. His boots, however, seem to fit him properly. They look warm, well-worn but sturdy, like they have weathered a hundred bitter winters and could withstand a hundred more. For some reason, this comforts me.
In this episode we interview Dr. Tait Shanafelt. Dr. Shanafelt is a Jeanie and Stewart Ritchie Professor of Medicine, Chief Wellness Officer, and associate dean at Stanford University School of Medicine.
My medical school career was complicated by more than just complex cardiac physiology or biochemical pathways. Little did I know that at the end of my second year I would go from knocking on a patient’s door during a clinical session, to sitting in an exam room myself.
Upon arriving at the room, we learn that the nurse continued trying to speak to this patient in English despite the patient’s evident inability to speak the language. Following her half-hearted attempt at “patient education,” she proceeded to lift the patient’s gown and attempts to strap on the monitors. As a result, the woman is frightened by her nurse because she is unaware of what this foreign nurse is doing to her and her unborn child. One week out from detention. She is scared. Imagine.
When the start of M3 year came along, I was ready: ready to put my First Aid book to rest, ready to be involved with patient care, ready to observe physicians in their realm of expertise and ready to find my place in the broad field of medicine. Now, halfway through the twelve months of clerkships, I ask myself, was it all I imagined it would be as an inexperienced first-year student?
This feeling of loss and subsequent reflection revealed to me something fundamental about how I experience time in my own life. As I depart the anatomy lab, I stand on the shores of time’s river and gaze into the clear water’s surface. In it, I see a reflection of growth and of internal transformation — a reflection not of who I was but of who I have become. I emerge not only learned in anatomy but also with insight into the impact that individuals can have on one another.
I was patiently sitting in the lobby at Quest Diagnostics, waiting for the staff to slowly let people inside in adherence with the new social distancing guidelines. I waited for about ten minutes before a man in his mid-50s called my name and led me into a patient room.
In this episode, we interview Dr. Edward Barksdale. He is the newly elected American Pediatric Surgery Association president. He is also the division chief of pediatric general surgery and thoracic surgery at UH Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital.
“We are taking him to rehab,” she said. I could hear a faint sigh of relief and happiness permeating her voice, which had been distinctly absent for the last few months. I could also hear wind whooshing in the background and a distant trail of her voice, which meant they were already on the road.
I am sitting in school / but I am also thinking of you. / Yes, I do / wonder how consciousness / wraps round and round / this hunk of meat, / how chunks of flesh / sustain your metaphysical feat.
Contributing Writer
Emory University School of Medicine
John is a third-year medical student at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, GA class of 2022. In 2017, he graduated from the University of Georgia with a Bachelor of Science in microbiology. He enjoys playing soccer, going on runs around town, and reading/writing poems in his free time. After graduating medical school, John would like to pursue a career in either neuropathology or emergency medicine.
