I'm 1/8th of the Way Done with Medical School . . . Yay

Hello blogging friends! I'm back from the cold, dark cavern of physiology graphs, histology slides and patient presentations within the hidden corners of the "fishbowl" at the school of medicine and health sciences.
Here's our school website if you're interested: http://www.med.und.nodak.edu/

I apologize for the lack of blogging over the past month, if anyone has actually visited my site. Despite my appearance as a non-chalant laid-back dude I'm actually a super studying freak when it comes to school. Fortunately it has paid off once again. And once again, I'm absolutely blown away how well I did considering how frustrating at least one of the exams was. My previous blog explains my fascination with our tests if you're interested.

So here I am, 2 blocks down, 6 more to go, then another year and quarter in North Dakota, and then . . . who knows, maybe overseas to finish my 4th year.

Assessment Week

I have to say the most interesting week in medical school is assessment week. This is the very last, 9th week, of our block when we get to receive "our pay" as my anatomy instructor likes to put it.

In most medical schools, or graduate schools, or undergraduate curriculum for that matter, one will be tested frequently throughout the semester to evaluate their progress on "mid-terms." Of course this makes sense. After all in any curriculum and especially in graduate school one will receive a high volume of information and it seems impossible to expect any student to know how much of that volume they're supposed to understand and regurgitate. Apparently the med school here has rebelled against such an idea.

The joke that 2nd year students tell us during the first block for studying advice for the first assessment week is "too not worry . . . just make sure you know everything." Of course this is impossible. According to my dad though this is just something I'll have to get use to - that is, not knowing everything. That's because as a doctor you are a "lifelong learner" and you'll be constantly flooded with information everyday for the rest of your life and it is your responsibility to siphon through it all and decide what is and what is not important.

In light of this I guess it does make sense why UND makes us endure the brunt of eight weeks of physiology, cell biology, embryology, anatomy, and histology without any sort of evaluation of our knowledge and understanding of the class material. It's preparation for the real world of a career in medicine. It's probably the same reason why 64 anal retentive and relatively smart medical students feel like they fail every exam during each assessment week. Because we didn't know everything. Yet somehow, someway, very mysteriously in a somewhat sort of Gandalf-wizard-mystical-style we all not only pass, but most of us usually do quite well. It's so very interesting. Like if Gandalf was our teacher and he took all our crappy test scores and made them good. That'd be cool - to have Gandalf as my med school prof. I think I'd give him a good evaluation.