After a 4+ month hiatus, I returned to the operating room and had a blast! I spent the day shadowing an awesome anesthesiology resident in the neurosurgery O.R. who explained everything from pre-op and ventilation to induction and reversal. He also walked me through the common agents used in general…
Rosai-Dorfman is a very rare condition with unknown etiology characterized by histiocyte-rich lymphadenopathy throughout the body. I had never encountered this disease process before my preceptorship on Thursday and was eager to learn a bit more in spite of its low prevalence.
Now that Step 1 is over, I’m beginning my group B selectives – two weeks of anesthesiology followed by two weeks of neurosurgery. Although I’m very excited about both, its been several months since I was last in an operating room (or in the Texas Medical Center, for that matter).…
The night before the exam, I slept a total of 2-3 hours. After midnight, my mind was racing with everything I learned over the last few weeks. It’s like I was consciously consolidating information; my heart was racing and I had a horrible headache. Why my brain chose to sacrifice…
Tomorrow I’ll be taking the most important exam of my life to date – the United States Medical Licensing Exam (USMLE) Step 1. I’ve spent countless hours reading and completed thousands of practice questions, yet there’s an underlying sense of eustress (see what I did there… using my behavioral science)…
Over the last 48 hours, I’ve completed UWorld’s SA #2 and NBME #7, scoring equivalent scores of 265 and 259, respectively. While I’m humbled by these results, the real exam is 75% longer than any of the practices I’ve done, so endurance might become an issue on test day.
At this point, I’ve gone through all 2090 USMLE World questions, UWorld’s Self Assessment #1 (around 200 questions), over 1000 NBME questions, 300 questions from Kaplan’s free Qbank, the 138 questions from the USMLE website, and any random questions I can find on forums across the Internet. With only eight…
During my ob/gyn and surgery rotations, I saw plenty of cool procedures but only had brief opportunities to learn about what goes on “behind the curtain” with the anesthesia team. The following video provides a succinct yet informative outline from induction to anesthetic reversal and is a must-watch for any…
Between getting the house ready for my grandmother to visit and the NBA All Star festivities, today was a lax day in terms of studying. I’ve reached the point where I’m now browsing the Internet looking for insightful information regarding USMLE Step 1, but it seems that the consensus is to just…
This evening was a milestone in my studying – I finished the 2090 questions in USMLE World’s Step 1 question bank. Now it’s 4am, and I’m struggling to get through endocrinology in First Aid. Most of my colleagues have already finished Step 1 or will be taking it in the…