There Are Worse Things...

I must say there are worse things than going to medical school on a tropical island, especially being from Montreal, where winter sucks much worse than for most major cities out there (see picture). We have actually been spoiled here with the weather this year as the temperature has hovered around 10C until just recently. Thats above freezing until the middle of December! Totally unheard of. But of course, winter had to rear its ugly head and ruin it for everyone, dumping a good foot of snow on us in a period of about 4 hours. Good times. I was actually really frustrated while driving during this particularly shitty storm, but one little thought put a smile right back on my face. It was when I thought of picture number 2 of this post, which I had seen a few days before. It is a picture of Batibou beach, which is where much of Pirates of the Caribbean 2 was filmed. I just pictured all the snow and slush and the crappy gray sky turning into crystal blue waters and sunshine, and all was well. Sure I'll be studying for most of the day and living in the 3rd world won't be a picnic, but at least I won't be freezing my ass off in 2 feet of snow during my free time. Oh hell no. I'll be drinking rum out of a fucking coconut on the beach. This beach RIGHT here.

Getting to Dominica...

Who knew that the hardest part about med school would be GETTING to the damn campus? SO much needs to get done, none of which is made any easier by the TWO airlines that go down there. See, I have dog that needs to get down there and apparently the planes are so tiny that he is literally too big to get on or he might (and this is a direct quote from the airline) "un-balance the whole airplane". The dog is 120 lbs people... thats what my girlfriend weighs. Are you telling me SHE can't come either because SHE's going to throw the balance of the plane off? What about me? I weigh like 220 lbs.. My plane is gonna be fucked!

In the end, I have to send him through a shipping company the day after I leave so that I can pick him up once he arrives. Now the really fun and expensive part is getting him an import permit from the vet in Dominica. I have to get ALL his shots boosted, a rabies titer even though he has a recent rabies vaccine, fecal tests, a physical, heart-worm tests + meds... All in all, it is actually costing me more to make sure HE is healthy than getting all my medical stuff taken care of!

THEN we need to talk about the weight restrictions on my luggage. The airline that I am taking down limits my baggage weight to 70 lbs, with no bag weighing more than 50 lbs. There is no paying extra to get more down, no exceptions. So now I have to figure out what I'm going to need the most on the island before I know much about it and decide what makes the cut and what doesn't. Its actually tougher than you would think! Should I save more space for food? Take less clothing down, and replace that with books? Bring my PS3? Have anything shipped down at HUGE personal cost? (Let's all remember I'm on loans for med school, I'd rather owe as little as possible after this...) Not to mention the book situation. I've been getting advice from everywhere as to what books I should/should not get and sometimes the advice is the complete opposite of what I had been hearing previously... Now I really don't want to get everything they "recommend" on the book list as that would cost me a fortune, not to mention way too much bag space... But now I'm also stuck trying to figure out how to optimize my book list. Meh.. if worse comes to worst, I guess I can just buy this stuff at a premium on the island!

Woo! Leaving December 28th by the way! See you in the Caribbean.

Vaccinations

This sort of relates to my post about listening to celebs when it comes to pretty much anything. They are generally used by partisans of one side or another of a debate to lend credibility to their side. Wow, Jim Carrey thinks they are right! They MUST be!

Right now we are being put in danger by misinformed celebrities and other public figures who are influencing families into not getting their children vaccinated against common childhood diseases.

Are you kidding me? What do comedians and playboy playmates know about ANYTHING, let alone how you should protect yourself from disease?

Vaccines have been blamed for everything from autism to diabetes. Well, the ingredient believed to cause autism has been removed from most childhood vaccines, yet the rates of autism continue to climb, and diabetes has been attributed to the growing obesity of the population, NOT being vaccinated against the measles.

They think that since the diseases in question are now quite rare that it is ok to stop vaccinating, but this silly fallacy in logic would result in a new spread of disease. This creates pockets of population that are completely susceptible to infection where the pathogens can spread unchecked.

This is a complete joke and the insane propagation of complete misinformation by people who are in no position to teach the public about health matters must stop. I'm all for debate on uncertain issues and for the public to hear all sides of said debate, but when celebs use their popularity to influence others into decisions, I am disgusted. This is especially true when they are merely flouting their opinions based on poor logic around and want us to treat it as gospel.

For more information, this article is well written on the subject.

Accepted

I had my medical school interview a while back and recently got word that I have been accepted to Ross University in Dominica. Wooooo!

This is a happy time for me because this has been the dream for quite a number of years. I know it isn't Harvard or even a Canadian or American school, but it's the opportunity offered to me so I will make the best of it!

You see, as I previously posted, University was an up and down experience that taught me a lot, however my academic record didn't show that the whole time. With the extremely limited number of medical school spots here in Canada, unfortunately there are many, many applicants ahead of me who have perfect academic records that will get considered first. It doesn't matter if I turn out to be much better suited for medicine or how good my MCAT or my GPA for the last two years was, they get the spot and I don't.

So now, it's up to me to get my shit together and make the best of what is offered. In the end, with Ross, I will be an MD, and if I work hard enough I'll get the residency spot I want and can practice anywhere in the USA or Canada. In the end the goal is the same and I will get there regardless.

Is he a FUCKING expert??

I don't get why people ever, EVER listen to celebrities about anything at all. I mean seriously... These people get their points of view from doing "research" for movies and TV shows. I'm sure many know about the Tom Cruise rant against psychology/psychiatry. His arguments all stem from the fact that he "knows the history of psychiatry" and that we don't. C'mon Tom...

Another gem from hollywood that I love is a clip from Backstreet Boy Nick Carter's show where he tells the world why he believes that brushing his teeth is bad. Actually, what he goes on to say is that since animals don't brush their teeth, why should he? So, in light of that brilliant observation that no doctor, dentist, nurse or dental hygienist has EVER come up with (probably because it is completely ridiculous) he declares that he only brushes his teeth every few days. Are you kidding me? I'm sure that a bunch of little fan girls then decided his wisdom was well founded and that they should heed the advice of the mighty BSB. Had he ever thought of looking at a dogs' teeth to see what happens when animals don't brush? My dogs' breath stinks. AND his teeth are yellow around the edges. Like real yellow. And the only reason they aren't worse is that he is constantly chewing on bones and the like which actually acts as a toothbrush. Not to mention animal physiology is just a little different than that of a human, and that they have probably evolved mechanisms to cope with tooth decay that we never did, or no longer have. Maybe because my pets all lick their own asses I should forget about toilet paper and save some trees by licking mine. OR maybe I could go all out and start drinking from puddles too. Oh wait... that would mean that I was ignoring the fact that dogs have stomach acid which is much lower in pH than our own, as well as much shorter digestive tracts which help them deal with pathogenic bacteria in the nasty, nasty crap they eat and drink. Shit. Back to the drawing board.

Seriously, moral of the story here, just because someone makes a million dollars a week doesn't mean they have the right answer for anything at all. Don't listen to Tom and Nick. Open a book or google it for god's sake.

Other things...

I've been reading this blog written by a South African surgeon. It is well written and he goes into really great detail about entertaining cases that keep you hooked. Its neat to see M.D. perspectives from completely different cultures than my own. It hit me as stories from a typical american hospital, but with odd twists every once in a while that made me think "wait that can't happen here". One example of this came in a story where he treated a woman who was attacked by a hippo. He describes entering a room and being confronted with a bloody mess at which point he notices the patient is severely overweight. He proceeds with the ever so tactful and politically correct comment (in front of the patient AND staff) that went something like this:

"If the hippo is hurt this bad, I don't even want to SEE my patient!"

Ouch.

On a much more serious note, one other post that hit me was this one, where he describes the emotions felt while telling a mother that her child had been killed by a drunk driver. Something I'd hate to have to do, but in all likelihood will if I pursue this career. I actively search for posts that deal with this situation, not out of morbid curiosity, but to see how people do it. I can't imagine having to tell a mother her baby died at birth or a husband that his wife died in surgery.

How to do well on the MCAT

The dreaded MCAT.

Seriously though, it's not that bad. When I was researching study tips and such for the MCAT, I always came across sites telling me to either "study real hard" or to spend a ridiculous amount of money taking an MCAT course, like Kaplan. There were no other ways to do well on the MCAT... Either take a few months off to study 24/7 or take a course.

Total Bullshit.

I didn't take any time off at ALL to study, and the whole process, from registration, to studying to test writing took about a month and a half.

My first step was to buy a study guide. I wanted to know what the high yield material on the test would be so I could improve my chances of doing well. I got a Kaplan book (cost me something like 130$ CND) and it included access to online tests, review material on all subjects covered by the test and random tips and tricks to organize yourself, for timing questions etc.

I started with my WORST subject (Physics... ugh) so as not to discourage myself near the end of my studying. I took about 1 week per science subject, doing all the reading from the book and review questions after each chapter. I'd occasionally take breaks and practice the written part of the MCAT and do verbal questions. Once my review was done (and it IS review because these courses are generally pre-reqs for medical school admission, so you should have already done this stuff) I started on practice tests (this was about a week and a half before the real test). I started by just doing a section at a time to work on the pace. Trust me, this is key! Many people don't practice under time constraints and all of a sudden find themselves half way through a section and out of time on the REAL test. Not a good feeling I'm sure. TIME YOURSELF FROM THE BEGINNING!!!

So, once I had managed to complete a 70 minute section or two for each subject (don't worry too much if these don't go well right away, my first ones sucked), reviewed mistakes, researched them and understood where I went wrong, I moved on to full length, timed tests (I wrote official AAMC ones). I did two of these, a few days before the real exam. Both times were long and painful processes, but I'm glad I did it as it prepared me mentally for the real MCAT and taught me what to expect.

The night before I reviewed NOTHING. I actually ordered chicken wings, had a beer and watched a couple of funny movies (I fully credit Will Ferrell and Step Brothers for my strong MCAT score). The day of the exam, I got to the test center nice and early, again did no review as it would just stress me out, and listened to my iPod. I smiled to myself as the other test-takers with panicked looks on their faces read and re-read their notes as fast as they could. I was the first allowed into the room, where the Prometric people took my thumbprint and a digital picture of me, gave me a few pencils sent me on my way to begin writing.

My advice would be to relax, study smart (forget about the nitty gritty details, you won't be asked anyways) and don't worry too much if you are a bit hazy on some minor aspect of the science stuff. I had a lot of trouble with certain aspects of electrostatics, and there wasn't even a single question about that on my test. The MCAT test makers WANT you to freak out. The more you panic, the more easy questions you'll miss and the lower your score. The test is designed to rate your ability to not only think critically and solve problems, but also to keep a cool head and manage your time in a stressful situation which this test most definitely is.

Good luck!

The First Steps

I've known for a long time that I wanted to be a doctor.

It might have started earlier, maybe with my mother's incessant "Oh, you're going to be a doctor when you grow up, you'll see!", but if I had to pinpoint a specific day, it would be in grade 9 when we had a university counselor came to speak to my class for the first time. She had a whole spiel about how it would make life easier in the long run to start thinking about goals and career aspirations, and to aid us in this difficult task, she produced a 200 multiple choice question personality test. Great.

An hour and a half later, we had to match our answers to an answer sheet which told us how high we scored on 4 or 5 facets of our personalities (sort of like one of those quizzes in Cosmo that girls like to make their boyfriends take, that once completed tell them how insensitive and what an all around shitty boyfriend you are). Once we had our scores, we could go through this booklet that would tell us what careers we were best suited for. Now, two of the most interesting careers I matched into were (I'm not making this up, I swear) Professional Wrestler and Neurosurgeon. This resulted in me trying out powerbombs and pile-drivers on my brother for about 3 weeks in our basement, but once he decided against playing with me EVER again, I had to pursue other interests...

It dawned on me that the more I thought about medicine as a career (not necessarily neurosurgery), the more I saw myself doing it for the rest of my life. As I neared the end of high school, I of course began thinking about University and what programs to apply to. I knew science was what interested me, but when you take out research positions or academia (both of which I think would bore me to no end) there isn't much else. All I could see myself doing, and loving it, was medicine.

Now, here is where things get tricky. I was a talented football player through most of my elementary and high school years. I was captain of the varsity squad in Senior year and ended up being recruited by quite a few schools, including two NCAA Division I teams. I'm not saying I was NFL material here, or that they even thought I'd be one of the better players in their programs, but thats still a big deal for a high school football player in Canada. I ended up signing with the (at the time) #1 program in Canadian university football. This lead to my first falling out with the idea of being a doctor.

I was consumed by football. It was literally a full time job that ate into study time like you wouldn't believe. We're talking 3 hour practices every night except for sundays, meetings before and after practice, hitting the gym (and thats only the mandatory sessions) and the occasional physio appointments. I was a football machine which didn't leave much time or energy for me to be an efficient science nerd as well.

My 93% high school average quickly fell to a well below mediocre C average in my freshman year. Yikes. How the hell was I supposed to get into medical school with a C average? Wasn't gonna happen. So, in second year, I forgot about having a social life and studied as hard as I played. I managed a 3.8 GPA that year, but this still left me with a horrible cumulative score due to my dismal first year. I started to lose hope and direction, and let me tell you that when you aren't sure what you are putting yourself through hell for, its difficult to work hard. I mean, why should I work my ass off just to end my degree with a 3.3 and never be considered for admission ANYWHERE? Football also took a turn for the worst, and I realized that even my long-shot dream of going pro wasn't going to happen either. I began to think that sometimes things aren't meant to be, but I didn't think that it was fair that NOTHING was meant to be for me!

I worked less and less, got more and more sedentary and rarely saw friends. I slept a lot too. I skipped a lot of class because I just couldn't be bothered to wake up. I got to know daytime TV (especially the food network) very well. And, to make things worse, my grandpa passed away completely out of the blue. Now I had to deal with upset family, upset me, and a very sad funeral which made it all much worse. And then my girlfriend of 3 years left. All was not well in Coxy M.D. land. I stopped going to class completely and studied half-heartedly for my final round of finals. Actually, to my eternal embarrassment , I even slept through one of them. Not because my alarm didn't go off; I was actually awake about 20 minutes before it was set to ring. No, I just decided that I'd rather just sleep than walk 5 minutes to school and write my test. Needless to say, I failed that course. I got fired too.

Now how do I find myself with two medical school interviews after all that? My transcript wasn't fit to line a litterbox, I was clearly not in the state of mind to do any work whatsoever and my life was in shambles. Oh, I had also decided to become a cook btw.

The answer is I decided that I was being an ass and I got my shit together. I researched schools, got my pre-requisites done (I was only missing 2 courses for one of the schools) and finished in the top of my classes for both. I got a job and started getting myself out of debt. I also found myself a nice girl who I love and who helps me get through the crazy bits (when she's not crazy herself after reading the previously mentioned Cosmo articles). My latest feats were studying for my MCATs over the summer and earning a 34Q (which put me in the top 5% of test takers... more on that later) and getting all my applications done in a timely manner. Life was great! I had goals and aspirations again. I had direction. I was me again.

This "getting my shit together" phase has taken up the last year of my life, and now here I am, anxiously awaiting October 16th at noon for my first medical school interview. Yeah, its not Harvard Med, but its a great school and it will get me to my ultimate goal.

Anything is possible. You just have to be willing to take those first steps. They are the hardest, but they get easier and soon enough you are running.

So about that M.D. thing...

I'm going to start this one with a little tiny confession...

I'm not exactly an M.D. as the blog title might imply. I'm actually not even in medical school yet! Currently, I'm stuck in the limbo that is medical school applications but I really couldn't wait to get this thing started, and the name sounded so damn cool! So I apologize if I'm getting ahead of myself, but then again this is my blog so... I'll call myself whatever the hell I want!

I will however start with the disclaimer that not only am I not a doctor, but anything I say on this page should not be taken as medical advice in any way, shape or form. Even when I've completed medical school, I STILL won't know what I'm talking about, so again please do not take anything I write on this blog as even remotely correct. I may be making most of it up anyways.

Now, with all that out of the way, let's get this started!

This blog will chronicle my journey from university to medical school and beyond, starting right now with the application process and hopefully culminating with me obtaining a neurosurgery residency. And yeah, if anyone out there is actually reading this, then I'll likely continue through that too (I'm sure that right now, neurosurg residents everywhere are laughing, thinking of their hectic lives and how little time I'll actually have. Or not since they probably have better things to do. Like sleep.)

I'll likely pepper this with the occasional social and political commentary, as well as some of the completely random thoughts that (all too often) pass through my head.

For now, posts to come about my application process, MCAT's, my upcoming interview and all sorts of fun stuff.

Enjoy!

Coxy M.D.