Change in Reception...

Well, this was certainly a little different than the previous places I went to. Today's interview day went okay. It was mostly negative, though. First off, none of the residents who were showing us around seemed to know what they were doing. The day started off with a tour, instead of an orientation like all my previous days had started, so we didn't even have an agenda. The person giving the tour was an intern resident, who has only been with the program since July and hasn't even worked in all the hospital departments yet. Usually it's a 2nd or 3rd year resident who does the tours. They also were frank about telling us some of the negatives about the program. When we got back, first I was with a faculty member and she seemed to start off a little colder but she warmed up gradually. Went over my application, I got a bit of a skeptical vibe from her, but I kinda shrugged it off, it didn't seem to be a big deal. After that interview, I was with a current resident who was pretty nice and seemed to like me fine. He even told me a little about the criteria for ranking people, which he probably shouldn't have, and said that being a Spanish speaker, interested in OB/GYN, underserved and rural medicine, etc. are all part of their checklist for whether to rank someone or not. 

After that came the program director (PD). I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt at first, but he didn't seem particularly warm or excited about me. Certainly not like the Sutter had. Sutter probably knew I had genuine interest in them based on me doing the sub-internship, and I had spent a month with them being nothing but nice and pleasant and enthusiastic. I basically felt like the PD here started the interview with the assumption that I was a lying game-player trying to dupe them into thinking I wanted to be in their program so they would rank me highly. For one, he didn't seem enthusiastic or happy at all when I said (TRUE) stuff that matched their mission goals. I DO want to work with Spanish speaking patients, I DO want to have full-spectrum experience and know what resources are available to uninsured patients in California. I don't want to do nothing but OB/GYN but I'd like to be able to handle my primary patients when they get pregnant instead of sending them off to a "specialist".  He basically told me not to rank them unless I really wanted the program, and whenever I said what I liked about the program he seemed entirely nonplussed and just reiterated his previous statements. He even went so far as to say that it's "better to scramble for a residency than match at a place that is just a backup." 

Also, mid-interview, he asked about my Spanish experience and then proceeded to say (in MEXICAN Spanish) "How about we chat in Spanish for a bit?" At first I was thrown off because he used the Mexican-Spanish word for chat instead of the more common verbs like hablar or charlar. I never use the word he used, but based on the context of the rest of the sentence I figured it out after a second of confusion. I asked what he would like to discuss and he said tell me about a patient I saw in the past year. So I start telling him about a patient, and I wanted go on, since I was starting to get going better, and he basically cut me off and played it off like he just likes hearing peoples' accents. First off, part of me feels like he intentionally used the Mexican parlance to make it more challenging. Second, he didn't even let me talk long enough to hear much of an accent, OR let me get in the rhythm of it. He knows it's not my native language, and interviews are somewhat stressful even when you're a competitive semi-confident applicant. Obviously he was checking to make sure I didn't just lie all over my application.  I was expecting to run into someone who would want to speak Spanish with me as a subtle 'test', after all, they always say never to overestimate your language skills unless you can conduct the interview in Spanish.  It wasn't the fact that he tested me, but his skeptical expression and tone. I kind of wonder if it was because my personal statement seemed overly-tailored for their program - I only tailored the very last short paragraph, but the rest of the personal statement (the generic family medicine part) just so happens to perfectly suit their mission statement over the other programs a bit. My scores are also pretty competitive.  Maybe on paper it looks a little too good to be true for their program.

Either way, I had been starting to consider that the place might be nice to be at, if it came to it - it would definitely give me my Spanish experience, the residents all seemed pretty chill and nice, and the earlier faculty member I was interviewed by seemed nice and interesting.  Plus its location is pretty nice is near some nice places.  Ultimately, this program director's attitude was a complete turnoff, and the PD plays a pretty significant role in your residency training over the next three years.  I don't want to have to be around someone like him who treats me in such a judgmental manner and isn't even open to hear what I have to say. One of the other faculty members also attacked a 3rd year student from UCSF who was giving a talk about a global non-profit organization she started before medical school that was reducing maternal morbidity and mortality worldwide.  After we finished clapping and it was opened up for comments and questions, the first guy who raised his hand was this faculty member who essentially told her that some of their efforts were a waste of resources and time, and that they were going about it wrong.  Not a single word of encouragement.  A couple other people commended her after that initial commenter, and of course she took the initial criticisms in stride, but...I was upset because her accomplishments were honestly quite impressive.  

Applying for Residency

Well, some of you may see this around the time it is posted, others may not see it until far later - why?  Residency applications.  It is a well-known fact in this world of technology and the internet that potential employers and programs "google" their applicants to see if they have any unsavory activities.  Not that this blog or any of my other interests are unsavory, because honestly they are not, but I don't know that I want any program directors perusing my blog entries and overanalyzing any hints of cynicism or detachment I may portray in them.  As always, this blog is an outlet for my medical experiences, and lets me take a step back from the nitty gritty of everything.  

I shall now continue.

A few days ago, I finished tailoring all my personal statements for the family medicine programs I have decided to apply for.  In total, I have selected 11.  I was originally only choosing 10, but my adviser encouraged me to go higher, so I added on a program in Reno, NV.  We are encouraged to send tailored applications, according to a book I have about "Acing the Match."  Supposedly, programs do not expect it, but when they see a tailored personal statement, they pay much closer attention to you.  Combine that with the fact that my personal statement pretty much screams "Amazing Family Medicine resident," and I have a decent application.  Board scores are about average for those applying, but for super clinical medicine, numbers aren't really the most important thing, and the interview is their number one criteria for ranking applicants.

That said, I sent out all my applications, each with their tailored application, on Monday.  Our Dean's letter is another major criteria they use to determine who they invite for interviews, as most programs only interview 100-250 students for about 8-16 spots, so I wasn't expecting to get much as far as responses for another couple weeks.  Much to my surprise, today I got not one, but TWO interview invites.  Super exciting!  Kind of a "This is happening too fast!" feeling.  Two other programs notified me that the received my application and will be reviewing it over the next couple weeks - one had me list my interview date preferences in case they choose to invite me for an interview after reviewing my completed application, including the Dean's letter.  Dean's letter should go out around the beginning of October, so I should start hearing from a lot more programs then.  Having two interviews already in the works is really exciting, especially when one is a program I thought would be more difficult to get an interview at, and one of the programs is in my top 4 choices.  Things are looking good.

On the other hand, next week I start my sub-internship at Sutter Sacramento, which is my tentative first choice residency program.  I am not sure whether it will still be my first choice after interviewing at a bunch of places, but we shall see.  It is the most compatible and geographically convenient of the programs I have looked at.  If I get interviews at the 10 California programs, I may just withdraw my application to the Nevada program, since they mostly accept MD students from the Caribbean, Nevada students, and DO students, suggesting their program is not of very high caliber.  I also didn't get a very strong impression from their website, short of them offering wilderness medicine.  

The next couple weeks will be exciting to see who is interested in me, and how many choices I will have.  The thing I don't know is whether they have actually read my personal statement or if these interview invitations are based on my COMLEX/USMLE scores.  I have a feeling they must have read my personal statements, because my scores, as I said, were around the average for successful family medicine applicants. I really hope I get an interview at every place I listed, because that would make me feel a lot more comfortable about the match, come March.  Time to drink in celebration!

Inpatient Medicine - Finally

Well, I have finally started my inpatient medicine internal medicine rotation at a teaching hospital.  The first day was pretty exciting - we rounded on patients, I got to know my team, we hung out in the emergency department and admitted people, ran to catch a code blue, etc.  It had a very "Scrubs in India" feeling to it because the residents and the attending are all from India (except one woman from Bosnia?).  They are nice, but one challenge is they have very thick accents and are kind of clique-y.  One of them in particular has a very thick accent that I have a lot of trouble understanding, and I know he has trouble enunciating so I feel a little bad asking him to repeat himself all the time.  They all talk softly too, mumbling, so it is hard to tell what they are discussing unless I am super close.  

It's gotten a bit more negative as time goes on - first day I thought things were going to be good: I would follow a patient, the attending told me to pick a patient and a topic to research, and then I'd discuss it with them and present the patient.  My first day I wanted to follow a patient with COPD, but then she was going to be transferred to ICU where we don't really round or follow patients.  This was after I had already done a writeup and was preparing on that topic.  It was then suggested that I follow another patient - so I picked a man with liver cirrhosis and varices.  So that's two writeups and two topics I needed to look over that night, on the off-chance we went to the ICU.  When I finally try to present the next day, the attending corrects me on the order in which I was giving information, the standard form that were taught and how I've been doing it over the last year with no complaints from any of my preceptors.  After I do half a presentation,  then the resident I was working with filled in the physical exam portion (which was essentially what I would have said, minus two small findings), and another resident presented the next patient.  That person did the EXACT format of presentation that I did, but of course without being called on it.

To make things a bit worse, today the resident who has a thick accent wanted me to look up some information - how a medicine is connected to a condition.  I figured it was a "this is a good topic to know, look it up and we'll discuss it" type task, similar to what attendings have done in the past, and he didn't give me any indication it was otherwise.  After a 30 minute search on my usual online textbooks, all reputable sources like Harrison's and Current Medical Dx and Tx, I couldn't find anything linking the two.  I come back, told them what I found out about the topic and medication, and they tell me to just google it or search on pubmed.  I got pretty annoyed because I didn't know he was just scouting possibilities for research projects and there WASN'T an established link between the two things.  I go back to pubmed, which they spelled out to me as if I had no clue what it was even though I've used it a million times, and I still couldn't find a single article linking the two conditions.  Everything was consistent with what I had previously reported.  

Ultimately I found an article about use for the medication in the condition in general (which I had already described) and there was another medication he was curious about so I found a couple token articles about that, but I left in a rather sour mood after having to do almost 2 hours of busywork for no real payoff and reviewing an esoteric topic that I already knew.  

The topic I'm reading up on for the attending currently, bacterial meningitis, was something I read through yesterday - I must have read through 3 different full-length UpToDate articles, and where I thought there were holes in my knowledge I continued to investigate.  Wrote everything out, went and checked out the pertinent sections in my review books, and today he still wanted to give me more time because he said UpToDate isn't the best source and kept asking about random textbooks that they used back in India.  At least he approves of Harrison's and CMDT, but I read over the meningitis information in those texts, and it was verbatim what I found in the UTD articles, and actually was less detailed.  I understand that UTD is a quick reference and half the articles are short and to the point, but I went for the full-length meaty articles.  

Long story short: Feels like they underestimate how much I know without even testing me, or letting me go on when I try to engage in a discussion.  

Plus sides: There is night call twice a week, 8pm to 8am, and then morning rounds, usually get off around 11am the next day - meaning I get to sleep in the day before, study, eat at home, and then spend the night in the hospital, knowing I have the entire next day off.  Essentially reduces my number of shifts by two.  I am not sure if I have weekend duty, but if I can get by with just 3 shifts per week, I'll be pretty stoked.  

As far as rotations go, I got sub-internship at the program I plan to rank #1 - the guy who called was I think a rank higher than the lady who actually does the coordinating and he went over my application.  He commended my USMLE Step 1 score and grades, and liked my personal statement - tried to connect a bit with some things he's done as well.  It almost felt like an interview - which, in a sense, it was, but it felt almost like a residency-screening interview.  I'll assume that his positive feedback about my application indicates I have a good chance of getting an interview for the residency program (provided I don't screw up my boards and rotations between now and then).  

Called a few more places today, starting to get a few more things on board - I'm going to see about doing some easy rotations while studying for my Step 2's so that I can have more vacation left over for a potential trip to Europe.  I think I have ER and Surgery in the bag, and ICU and a Medicine Subspecialties should be easy enough to arrange since Touro has a few exclusive arrangements.  Still waiting on Davis to get back to me, but I'm not really holding my breath too much for them.  Also waiting on another program out there, but they just updated me that they're looking over the application and I should hear from them any day now.

Perhaps time to take a nap and then read up on more meningitis and do some practice questions.......

Closer and closer

Now that it is getting closer to the orientation (August 3rd), we have our class listservs up and everyone is posting information about themselves. It is great how connected everyone can be through facebook and email - the internet is really amazing for networking. Though, it seems the hottest topic for everyone is finding roommates or comparing housing prices. This will be my smallest class since 8th grade - my high school class numbered around 400, and at UCSD over three thousand. Now? Probably between 125 and 200 students. I am really hoping to get to know a lot of people and feel an actual comradery, maybe even a sense of school spirit.

As much as I am looking forward to it, I am already having nightmares about medical school. In the first, I did not have a white coat for the opening ceremony and there were 15 minutes left before everyone was meeting in the auditorium - frantic scrambling ensued. The second dream starred me as a new physician out in the world, and I had no regular patients and couldn't even dress wounds or put my password into the computer to look up a patient chart. I thought these jitters were supposed to happen in a few weeks? July 26th is when everything begins for the most part - I officially end my employment with Kaiser and begin moving my stuff back home.

A Productive Day

Well, one of my tasks was very simple, the other much more frustrating. The matter of getting my immunization records was a hassle because I am no longer a member of the HMO which holds all the records of my immunizations, and because I was a member of two different regions, Northern and Southern California. I was on the phone for forever, getting shuffled around until I finally ended up at member services and I was told I could send the form to them and they would give it to my old doctor. I heard this from Northern California. So I tried to do it down here, assuming it would be the same, and I was told it would not be possible to have a doctor sign it because I am no longer a member. I am now stuck sending official immunization reports from the office of medical records, and hoping Touro accepts them and is able to put two and two together. On the plus side, I was driving to so many different Kaiser locations that I came across one that was having a blood drive, so I stopped to donate and get an ice cream coupon! Blood for ice cream, a very sweet deal. I also got some art supplies, so I can work on creative endeavors in my spare time. I also made my appointment to see a D.O. for a physical (Osteopath pride!) - July 23rd, and she's a graduate of Touro University (California)!

The second task, which involved calling Wells Fargo and sorting out my student loan situation, was much more pleasant. I got my loan application numbers, got my Master Promissory Notices, and took out that second loan for $13,500 which will be at 7.5% interest, lower than the "recommended" Federal PLUS loan for graduate and professional students, which has a fixed interest rate of 8.5%. The title of that loan is MedCAP (Medical College Access Program, an alternative loan for health professionals). I knew my history and good credit with Wells Fargo would pay off. It's a shame I didn't qualify for a Perkins loan (issued by the school, $2,000 maximum per year, fixed 5%) but maybe if I file early enough next year I will get it and/or a grant.

Baby steps

I must admit, I am a bit of a procrastinator. Not just with studying, but with everything, including financial aid and certification deadlines. Each time that I nearly do not make a deadline is a lesson, and usually I learn. I think I am slowest with snail mail correspondences. I finally mailed the financial aid award letter back to Touro, indicating that I accepted the $8,500 federal subsidized and $32,000 federal unsubsidized Stafford loans. Based on my calculations and some estimates from Touro, I will need about $13,500 more from a private loan to cover personal expenses, equipment and texts, plane flights for Kit, car maintenance and gas, health insurance, etc. It may be more than I need, but I'd rather have extra than not enough. I need to call Wells Fargo tomorrow and see how to go about dealing with them, since I don't know what information they want from me and I don't think I am supposed to fill out an entirely new loan application (at least not for the Stafford stuff) - just sign the Master Promissory Notice. I also need to call a doctor within my PPO to get a physical for school. Joy.

Now, I need to decide how to best spend my time, as I am starting to feel a bit listless with so little to do. I could work on my book list, keep collecting insects, computer games, cook new things...I have writer's block so that is frustrating. In two weeks I will be going to Monterey with the family for a week, then I will be going back for the 4th of July, and then at the end of July I move back home. I kind of wish I weren't going back for the 4th, since it's a whole week that I could be spending with Kit AND working, and I'll be living with the family for the next four years... The 4th wasn't my idea. At least I'll have summers - it'd be nice to leave home next summer and spend the months with Kit. Such a long road...but it'll be worth it (my new mantra).

Losing Patience

I am about ready to withdraw from the alternate list at Western U. First they cannot tell me the decision, about four days later than they had promised, while I had a pending deposit at another school. Next, they supposedly send me the official letter, which I have not received. Now, after about three e-mails back and forth wondering why I haven't gotten my first letter, they tell me that it was sent in March but that they will send me another copy - I already confirmed my home address with them and received their first few letters as far as secondaries, interview, etc. Two weeks after they said they would mail me a copy of the first letter, it still hasn't been received. I do not see how this could be such an issue, but apparently it is. I am extremely sick of dealing with Western, and won't even bother with a letter of interest - they're not worth my time. If I get in there, I'll still probably go, but at this point I'm about ready to just say "screw it" and go to a school that actually wants me.

In other news, I still haven't filed my FAFSA...I need my parents' information before I can file it. Other than that I am ready to do it. Touro is sounding better and better every day - especially since it is right in the East Bay, and I cannot stand LA. We shall see if I ever get a call from Western, but I won't be holding my breath.

Residencies and Fellowships

I do not know why I never thought about this before, but whenever I peruse the match lists for universities, these are the specialties I come across: anaesthesia, neurology, neurosurgery, OB/GYN, psychiatry, pediatrics, internal medicine, family medicine, emergency medicine, orthopedics, general surgery, radiology, physical medicine and rehabilitation (PM&R) and pathology. Somehow it did not occur to me to ask why no one goes into a cardiology residency, or a gastroenterology (GE) residency.

I am sure we learned about it at some point in MED at UCSD, but those extra specialties are actually subspecialties of internal medicine. So, if you want to go into cardiology or GE, you'll start out in internal medicine for three years and then proceed to a fellowship in the subspecialty of your choice. Here are the 13 commonly recognized subspecialties: adolescent medicine, allergy and immunology, cardiology, endocrinology, GE, geriatrics, hematology, infectious disease, nephrology, oncology, pulmonology, rheumatology, and sports medicine. Others that may fall under one of the above categories include: transplant hepatology, sleep medicine, clinical cardiac electrophysiology, critical care medicine, interventional cardiology, and nuclear medicine.

The duration of each fellowship varies from 1-3 years. Since I have been reconsidering infectious disease as a specialty, I tried to find out how competitive it is compared to other subspecialties of internal medicine. According to most websites and forums, specialties are more competitive based upon the eventual salary, so the specialties with more expensive procedures are reimbursed more for services. The most competitive are cardiology, GE, Allergy/Immunology, and Hematology/Oncology. The least competitive, to my relief, were geriatrics, rheumatology, and infectious disease! So now the plan is to go into internal medicine and from there decide in what to subspecialize. Even if I do not subspecialize, internal medicine deals with difficult diagnoses and treatments, which I find quite interesting!

The Waiting Game

Being on the waitlist at a school is frustrating in more ways than just the waiting. It is frustrating that I have to put off my excitement about a school since I am not certain about which school I should be excited. I want to start getting to know my classmates, looking for housing, planning when to move, investigating the activities and curriculum offered by the school. Unfortunately, I cannot because I do not want to be disappointed about getting into a school or not. As now, I am trapped in a limbo period, trying not to become too attached to either school on the off chance the one I choose is the one I end up not attending.

I cannot quite understand why it is taking so long for them to send me notification that I am on the alternate list - if I had not learned their decision on the phone, I would still not know their decision. People who interviewed after I did have already received admissions notifications - no alternate list/waiting list/rejections though. Alas, what can I do. I was told they would be sending it any day now, so tomorrow or Saturday I will hopefully receive the official decision.

Who can become a doctor?

Sorry about the lack of posts, but not much of interest relating to my going to medical school has happened lately. No news from Western U yet, they still haven't sent my official alternate list letter. And Touro still hasn't withdrawn a thousand dollars even though I gave them the credit card form weeks ago.

On another note, I came across an interesting article which brings up the question of who should become doctors. Now, if you asked someone, "Can anyone become a doctor?" then usually they would respond, "Of course! If you want something and work hard enough, you earned it! This is America after all." Then you have to ask, "What if that person molested a child, or killed a Jew in a neo-Nazi hate crime?" You usually don't picture a person like that aiming to become a doctor, but in many countries, most recently Sweden, such cases have occurred.

This article describes a current problem at Sweden's most prestigious medical school - they admitted a Nazi-sympathizing felon who was convicted of murder and served for 6.5 years before applying for medical school. In Sweden, it is almost always illegal to require a criminal background check, and apparently the screeners and interviewers did not seem concerned about the 6.5 year gap in this student's record. They have managed to make it nearly impossible for him to graduate and become a practicing physician by restricting him from clinical experience, but the issue still remains.

Being a physician, like being a school teacher or a priest or in any other position in which you have a mentor-like power status, includes certain standards of behavior and morality. Would you want your fourth-grader being taught by a physically abusive alcoholic? Would you want your priest to be an ex-child molester? Just the same, you would not want your physician, someone you trust when you are at your most vulnerable, to be a convicted rapist or murderer. I believe in equal opportunity as much as anyone, but you have to draw a line at some point in the interest of protecting people. We usually want to think that the only criteria for a job is a person's academic background, work experience, and recommendations, but there is a host of personal qualities that are equally, sometimes more, important. I know there is always the question of whether a person can change, learn from what they did, etc. I understand forgiving "mistakes" but maliciously murdering someone? I think some "mistakes" teach best by prohibiting a person from achieving their dream. If after raping or murdering and thoroughly destroying the lives of others they can spend a few years in jail and then live the rest of their life as if nothing happened, that is a crime in itself.

UCSD in Reflection

Today marks the end of my time at UCSD. After 4 and 2/3 years at UCSD, I now have my B.S. in Biochemistry/Cell Biology, and B.A. in History. I hadn't intended to go to UCSD right from the start, I had applied to about 6 schools (Puget Sound, UCSD, UCD, UCB, Yale, MIT) and got into half of them (Puget Sound, UCSD, UCD). Ultimately, of those three, UCSD had the best pre-med program so I chose UCSD. It turned out to be a great choice - beautiful campus, emphasis on biology, family member close by, etc. I do wonder, though, what it would have been like to go to a small Ivy league or liberal arts college - really small classes and getting to know professors by first name, meeting with them after hours or for lunch as a class... To attain that level of familiarity with a professor at UCSD you have to try really hard - go to office hours, sit in front at every lecture, talk to them before and after lecture, distinguish yourself academically, and have a professor who actually cares about students. I only started to manage that near the end, when I was pressed to get to know professors for letters of recommendation.

It really feels like I applied to medical school for four and a half years - every class I took, every extra-curricular activity, my work, etc. was in order to get into medical school. The only part of my college life unrelated to medical school was my history major, and near the end medicine became intertwined (History of Medicine, History of Bioethics, History of Localization of Brain Function). In retrospect, it might have been nice to be involved in other things, but I'm not a particularly outgoing person, and I do have my pet projects - manga, writing, drawing, insect collecting, computer games. I feel nostalgic already - professors and classes I will miss, the times in the dorms/apartments. I think I would feel more sad if I were not going to continue higher education - the world of academia is too wonderful to leave just yet. It is easy to stop learning when you leave the classroom.

Caffeine and Touro

Well, I submitted my second deposit to Touro-CA for $1,000 today. I am really horrible with fax machines and phones - I don't know how to transfer calls for one, and I am so used to my cell phone I forgot that all other appliances require a "1" before an out of area phone number, so I wasted 5 pages thinking that the machine on the other end was busy (the option is busy/no response). I am getting more and more used to the idea of living at home again - I almost look forward to it. It'll be my last chance to really be a part of the family again, before I'm a truly independent adult and starting a family bud (only scientists can think of yeast while talking about starting their own family). Also, the prospect of saving an estimated 17k per year is very exciting - nearly 80k cut off my loans. The commute would be great also - 35 minutes each way, no traffic. Whether I stay at home more than a semester hinges on how well it works out for me, and for Kit (my boyfriend). Being long-distance and not having my own place will be difficult. We've worked out a contingency plan though, so we're prepared.

On an unrelated note, my cognitive science textbook has some very interesting tidbits thrown in, most recently on caffeine. It is a cool mechanism - as we are awake, adenosine accumulates in the brain and is thought to induce sleepiness. Caffeine acts as an adenosine antagonist, so it competes with adenosine for binding spots on adenosine receptors, but does not produce drowsiness when bound to the receptor. As more adenosine receptors are tied up with caffeine and not adenosine, the accumulated adenosine has a weaker effect. This explains why using caffeine too late has no effect, and why you "crash" after ingesting a lot of caffeine. First, if caffeine is administered after adenosine molecules have bound to a significant number of receptors, then you will be too sleepy for the caffeine to reduce the effect much. Second, if you have caffeine in the receptors, adenosine accumulates in the space near the receptors, so when the caffeine dissociates from the receptors you get a rush of adenosine binding and the subsequent drowsiness.

Vesalius

The first page I saw when I flipped open the cover of my cognitive science text book was page 3, including one of the woodblock prints from Andreas Vesalius' De humani corporis fabrica (On the Workings of the Human Body). Now, after my history of medicine class and my colloquium on localization of brain function, I have a profound respect for Andreas Vesalius - his work is simply remarkable. His work was the next step after centuries of following Galen. The detail and completeness of the text is staggering. I think I would like a copy of the translated text, including all the woodblock images, as a reference. It's pretty pricey. On a side note, the woodblock images were the inspiration for the poses and exhibits at the BODY WORLD/BODIES exhibits.

As far as other news, I sent in my $2,000 deposit to Touro-CA, and I received today a notification that they received that first deposit along with a reminder that I need to send them a second deposit of $1,000 by March 15th. Once these deposits are over, I'll be able to relax and earn money for a bit before I have to cash in checks on loan from the government or private institutions for the next four years. If I live with my parents, since they are about 35 minutes away from Touro-CA and in the opposite direction of traffic, I might be able to avoid taking out a private unsubsidized loan. I seriously think Wells Fargo would give me a better deal than the average grad-saver plus. I should plan to finish and submit my FAFSA by the end of next week...

The Latest News

Well, I have my news from Western University - I'm on the alternate list. From what I have heard from students, a lot of people are taken off the alternate list. However, in the meantime, I need to find ways to beef up my application. I am going to submit a letter re-emphasizing my interest in the school, and hopefully I will be able to tell them I am doing insect research (still pending). I may be able to obtain another letter of recommendation, but it is not too likely. There should be some wait list movement around March 20th, because people will need to make their second deposit of 1,000 dollars by then, and one of the last interview day decisions is made on March 19th. I will make a separate post about wait list limbo after I have further researched my plan of action.

Now, I need to fax in my deposit for Touro-CA tomorrow, and wait until I receive my official alternate list offer in the mail. I hope I do not have to put down a deposit to stay on the alternate list. Luckily I have many contacts for information, advice, etc - a Pre-Med adviser, a current Western U student, and a doctor mock-interviewer with experience on admissions boards. I wish I didn't have to lose $2,000 but that's the way the cookie crumbles, as they say. At least I have been accepted to a California school in a familiar area.

The End of Interviews

At long last, the application process is essentially over. My last interview was today at Western U. The day started off badly with nightmares of being late to the interview and getting a parking ticket...but after that the day went pretty smoothly. One of my interviewers had a real poker face too, and made it a bit tough to know whether I did well in the interview or not. I now know he is a department chairman for pathology, so I have a feeling he is one of the committee members... I didn't have any real stumping questions and they didn't grill me, so I think the pressure was just in not being able to read their reactions to me. At any rate, I really like Western U most of all the schools and hopefully I will matriculate there.

Some other tidbits - they have a strong emphasis on medical Spanish, because of the veterinary school and Banfield on campus we get a lot of vet discounts (good for me since I have a kitty), the boards scores are impressive, there is a ton of clinical experience, and the campus is pretty nice. One of the other students there to interview surprised me a bit - he could not have looked more pissed off to be there. I do not know why he was acting the way he did, but his body language was almost flamboyant in its distaste for the school. He didn't speak to any of the other interviewees, he kept leaving the room during the current student Q&A, and I swear he was rolling his eyes during the OMM demonstration. Since he clearly couldn't hide how much he didn't want to go to Western U, I'm not worried about him getting my spot, haha. Also, the dean of admissions informed me, after the interview, that we are the last group to be receiving acceptance notices - after this point, they are interviewing people for the alternate list...but most of the people on the alternate list get into the school this year or next year at least.

Second Acceptance!

Today I was notified that I have been accepted by the committee at TUCOM-CA! As great as the feeling was at TUCOM-NV, I really do want to stay in California. I need to have green around me and be close to the coast. If I do not get into Western U, I will be very happy to go to TUCOM-CA. Also, TUCOM-CA offers a joint DO/MPH program, which unfortunately Western U does not. I am definitely a lot less stressed having this knowledge. Another perk of the school is that the anatomy lab is on the second floor, full of light, instead of in the basement like a morgue...

Now I just need to do awesome at my interview at Western U on Thursday. I'll be staying at my boyfriend's family's place, so I won't need to pay for a place overnight. In the meantime, I get to go to work tonight from 3:00-9:30.