Session 49

In this Halloween edition of the podcast, Ryan and Allison talk about the scariest stuff they’ve encountered during their path to premed, medical school, residency, and beyond – with most of them coming from first time experiences they’ve had.

The path to being a physician is pretty scary with a lot of hurdles, a lot of unknown, and a lot of hard work that you don’t know if it’s going to pay off but at the end of the day, it all comes down to great patient care which is definitely worth all the journey. Lastly, you’re not alone. You’re surrounded by other people who are going through it with you so knowing that is comforting.

Here is a list of the scariest stuff Ryan and Allison have encountered along their path:

• MCAT!!!! – Taking the MCAT as very intimidating

• Step 1 test

• First day and night on call – (What could be worse is sleeping through a page!)

• First family meeting – (Allison had to conduct a family meeting at only Day 3 of her internship that got her peeing in her pants, figuratively)

• Being in the ER waiting for trauma patients to come in (At Ryan’s medical school, they had a very large level 1 trauma center and waiting for the calls is scary.)

• Allison being in the OR the first time

• Allison’s first acute stroke call (Getting as much history as you can and jumping through a stroke scale to determine the extent of the stroke)

Scary stuff patient-wise:

• Ryan and Allison getting into a locked psych ward

• Ryan doing his internship at a prison hospital

• The difficulty of communicating with a psychiatrically ill patient

• Allison dealing with a 48-year old patient with AML and died within 48 hours

Some pieces of advice for premed students:

It’s okay to be scared getting exposed to these situations the first time but you will get lots of practice and practice makes perfect.

Keep a journal of what you encounter as a premed because there are lots of stories you can draw from, take with you for years, and talk in your interviews or personal statements.

Links and Other Resources:

Save $225 on the Princeton Review’s MCAT Ultimate or MCAT Self-Paced Prep Course through March 30th 2016 by going to www.princetonreview.com/podcast

If you need any help with the medical school interview, go to medschoolinterviewbook.com. Sign up and you will receive parts of the book so you can help shape the future of the book. This book will include over 500 questions that may be asked during interview day as well as real-life questions, answers, and feedback from all of the mock interviews Ryan has been doing with students.

Are you a nontraditional student? Go check out oldpremeds.org.

For more great content, check out www.mededmedia.com for more of the shows produced by the Medical School Headquarters including the OldPremeds Podcast and watch out for more shows in the future!

Free MCAT Gift: Free 30+ page guide with tips to help you maximize your MCAT score and which includes discount codes for MCAT prep as well.

Hang out with us over at medicalschoolhq.net/group. Click join and we’ll add you up to our private Facebook group. Share your successes and miseries with the rest of us.

Check out our partner magazine, www.premedlife.com to learn more about awesome premed information.

Blueprint MCAT (formerly Next Step Test Prep): Get one-on-one tutoring for the MCAT and maximize your score. Get $50 off their tutoring program when you mention that you heard about this on the podcast or through the MSHQ website.

Listen to our podcast for free at iTunes: medicalschoolhq.net/itunes and leave us a review there!

Email Ryan at ryan@medicalschoolhq.net or connect with him on Twitter @medicalschoolhq

Tweet Allison @allison_mshq or send her an email at allison@medicalschoolhq.net.