White Coat

Yesterday was our white coat ceremony in which we donned the traditional garb of our profession and recited the oath our class had created.




(Me with my friends L-R Phat and Steve before the white coat ceremony. Phat is from Vietnam and has become a study partner of mine; we've been meeting up to quiz each other and find areas we are weak in/explain them to the other person. We're planning to hang out and cook some time soon as I want to learn how to cook Vietnamese and Phat wants to learn something that is not Vietnamese!)




(The three neighbors, L-R Emily, myself, and Anst with our white coats and lake Mendota in the background. Neither Anst nor I had family that was able to make it so Emily's family took us on as surrogate children and even gave us a ride to the ceremony.)


I went in to the ceremony not too excited but ended up having a pretty good time. The two highlights were meeting several classmates' families and listening to Dr. Cynthia Haq, the main speaker for the event and also a UW professor of family medicine and head of the global health center. She talked of the excitement and challenges ahead as well as reminding us to take care of ourselves in the years to come so that we may continue to be of use to those we serve. Right on! As for the white coat, well, to be honest I hope to not wear it as much as possible. I tend to overheat with extra layers and in addition feel in some cases the coat can be a barrier between doctor and patient. We shall see; I know they want us in them when we are in the hospital but my preceptor physician told me right off the bat not to bring one and no tie either - fine with me!

Speaking of which, I've visited the family doctor I was assigned to twice twice now and just this last time (Friday) I was with the doctor for a kid's exploding abscess, frying off warts with liquid nitrogen, , general well exam, several substance abuse/depression cases (which are so tough - you can just see the potential in the person if only they could remove the yolk of their addiction), I felt a possible testicular cancer and, the highlight, I interviewed my first patient!

The patient was a young spanish speaking woman with a sore throat and got to ask her the questions we have been learning in our interview class: "where does it hurt, how long, fever?, tried any medications or home remedies?, etc." Then I reported bac to the doc before we both went in and he finished up the interview. Watching him I realized I missed some key questions but overall most of them! It may have been a pretty minor event/illness but for me it was pretty exciting - my first real patient interview - and it was in Spanish!

In other news we finished up our first round of exams last week and so far the 2/4 grades I have seen came out well. It's nice to know I haven't forgotten how to study after 2 years out! It's also getting colder - fast. My first month was a paradise like 70-80 degrees, sunny all but one day with low humidity. Then about two weeks ago it dropped an average of 30-40 degrees!

One final highlight. Right before exams I needed a study break and decided to head out for a short run. I was chugging along when all of a sudden I noticed apples at my feet! A quick scan of the tree above showed it loaded down but the tree was a big one (closest apples were a good 20 ft up) and it was smack in the middle of someone's yard. I decided to knock on the door and see if the owners were OK with my going for the apples. The man who answered seemed a bit perplexed - "they're pretty high up but go for it if you want." I returned home, grabbed my football and bag, ran back to the tree and began to chuck the football up into the branches. It worked great! The best times were when I would knock an apple down and then catch it and the football! After I was at this for a good half hour the wife came out, she had been watching me for some time, and commented she'd never seen anything quite like it but it sure looked like I was enjoying myself! I collected a good 30 of the most amazing tasting apples and proceeded to make a huge apple crisp which I just finished up yesterday. Awesome!

I hope you're all well.