For this year at least, classes are over.  I am a little uncertain if we will be having regular classes next year or not.  I think it will depend on the rotation.  There are five main divisions next year, Rural Medicine, Surgery, Mental Health, General Practice, and Medicine.  I think they will all run a little differently, and have heard rumours of PBLs next year as well, but run on one day instead of two (separated by study on the topic) and that there might be days or half days of lecture next year.

Anyway, it’s a little sad to realize that the student life as it is formally recognized has come to a close for this campus, right when I started to feel like I knew what was going on.  I am really excited about next year though.  It will be a lot of learning as it is a paradigm shift moving into the hospitals on a full time basis, but I’m looking forward to it.  Now I just need to get through these next exams.  I have three rounds of assessment coming up, called the MSAT, PSA2.1 and PSA 2.2 respectively.  The MSAT is a Multi-Station Assessment Task, which is a live exam of five different stations, as the name suggests.  There are: Clinical Reasoning, Examination, History Taking, Ethics and Advanced Life Support stations.  The idea of this exam scares me, as I feel as though there’s nowhere to hide.  Just you and the examiner.  And the patients I guess… they usually are actors at this stage, but some might be patient-actors with real signs.  This test is on November 8 for me.

Then on the 10th and 11th I have two more exams, the first being PSA2.1 (Progressive Summative Assessment) which is based on material from this last semester.  Then the next day is based on all material covered up until now.

Then my plans are to recover a little from the exam, clean up and go check out the Sunshine Coast, as that is where I will be living next year, and then I’m headed to New Zealand for 10 days.  I will be home in the beginnning of December.  I am looking forward to being home very much.

Tags: Australia, Life, Medicine, UQ by David Graff
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On the way to the grocery store, I often take the back path, which leads through a bit of scrub. Just after leaving the fenced back yard, there is a bunch of bushes. When I pass, there is usually a scurry sound in them. It sounds like it is made by something bigger than the ubiquitous geckos. I figured it was probably a snake, and despite always looking, I’ve never seen anything. Well today I almost stepped on this guy, maybe he is the noisemaker.

PS.  Even though it kinda looks like the suspected snake, it’s actually an Eastern Blue-tongued Lizard

Tags: Australia, Life by David Graff
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I know I haven’t updated this in a while, but I have been spending less and less time with my computer on.  I have recently bought a few text books that I am really getting into and have printed out my student notes.  This means that I have not been updating as much, since it hasn’t been in front of me.  But life is pretty good, I am currently preparing for my final exams which are coming up in a few weeks.  In the last little bit I had a party for my birthday which was lots of fun, we had a holiday for a bit, and now I have been back at class for a few weeks.  My life has settled into a zone where I know what is going on.  I know how to be a second-year med student.  That has made day to day life feel like it isn’t as report-worthy as before.  The adventure is becoming more commonplace, but I am still loving it.  I miss everyone at home so much, and am sad for the good times together that have been forfeited.  I am living.  Here.

Tags: Australia, Life, Medicine by David Graff
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All the year 2 med students have a list of examinations that they need to perform for a clinical tutor this year.  I finished my list today with a cardiorespiratory examination.  I know it’s a small victory but finishing the list was a huge relief, and a little bit of a marker in the sand.  I have been previously going through the clinical examinations wondering if that’s really what is done in practice, as it all seemed like a little bit of an abstract song and dance to me.  But today I felt like I knew what I was looking for, and why.  I felt as though I was, despite being a bit nervous, able to balance talking to the patient as a human being, being aware of what they needed while still doing what I needed to do.  And it felt great.  The tutor I was with was very encouraging and more than willing to teach while examining.  Also, in the actual examination I was able to discern what was happening to the patient, which is one of the first times I have done that without really asking the patient what is going on, or knowing the background from the history.  I know that it’s a pretty minor thing, but as I said, it’s a little victory.  And with years and years of training ahead of me, I need to take the little victories.

My reward after all this? Three written words:

It’s a small step I know, but I find it pretty encouraging.

Tags: Australia, Life, Medicine by David Graff
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Every now and then there are really great days.  It wasn’t particularly special today, but I had a great day.  I am currently on holidays, and today was perfect.  It is Monday, and everything went my way today.  I woke up at my leisure, took it easy with a coffee in the morning, found out that I am going to the Sunshine coast next year (more on that later), had lunch with a friend, relaxed all afternoon, then went out for a steak dinner at a cook-your-own restaurant with some friends of John’s.  We had a bunch of laughs, a great steak I cooked myself, and then went to Southbank for a swim in the somewhat cold and deserted pool.  Tossed the ball around a bit in the water too.  Then I threw on the shorts and hopped over to the theatre to meet another friend for a movie.  He’s also going to the Sunshine coast, so we were able to share a bit of joy about that and enjoy our time watching “The Inglourious Basterds”.  It added to the poetry that I went with a guy that, I am certain, gets told he looks like Quentin Tarantino by every person he meets (It was a Tarantino film).  Anyways, it wasn’t till the end of the day that I realized, this was basically a perfect day.

Tags: Australia, Life by David Graff
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Just to put a marker on the day, today is the day that we undertake the first actual procedures on people we don’t know.  Up till now we have practiced on each other.  When we have been involved with patients, it was more a case of observing their pathology post diagnosis, and nothing remotely invasive.  Soon, this won’t seem like an event at all, but right now, I feel like I crossed a bridge today.

Tags: Australia, Medicine by David Graff
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A half world away, lives most of the ~100 people with whom I graduated high school.  Except one of them lives here.  I met her, randomly, at the gym tonight.  It was good to see someone from so far back in my past.  So far back that when I think about that time I feel like it (I) was a different person living then.  At the same time, she was not surprised at all to hear that I was studying medicine, or the course of life I have taken.  It goes well with the feeling that I am being more true to who I am now than ever before.  Having someone else recognize that after all this time and distance was really great.

Tags: Australia, Canada, Life by David Graff
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Petrol as they like to call it here.  On July 1, there was a removal of a government subsidy on gasoline in Australia.  A move made to try save money on their budgets.  It resulted in a ~20 cent jump in gas prices.  Sensing opportunity in the new-found perceived preciousness of petrol, the big grocery stores are running promotions that offer 40 cents per litre off fuel.  This has hit the headline news, because you only get the offer if you buy $300 worth of groceries at once.  The media is kinda in a stink about it because the offers are a little deceptive, and it’s not worth it to buy that much food to try claim the petrol discount if you don’t really want the food.  Then, the grocery store combines the offer with less sale prices on their items, making their profits higher when people go searching to fill out the minimum purchase.  The two big grocery stores are working hard to control the whole market here and it’s getting attention because they do abuse their near oligopoly from time to time.  They do things like advertise specials and then don’t honour them at the checkout or just double the price and advertise it as a special when you buy two.

Most of this is just background capitalism to me, except that I do end up paying more for regular groceries here than I do at home.  Sometimes I wonder if it is just that Australia doesn’t benefit from the closeness of America, and their demand for cheap food.  Nevertheless, this is the way it is here.

But one reporter raised a good point that started me thinking about all this.  The grocery stores are not charities.  The fuel discount is not something they feel they owe the people that have supported them to these heights of capitalistic success.  They will simply take back the funds through higher prices or less discounts.  More tricks to increase the ARPU.   And one of those U’s is me.

Tags: Australia, Life by David Graff
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After a long time away I’m back to it.  Both here and elsewhere.  The last month has been full of studying, feeling helpless and going nowhere, exam writing, time off, trying to rest and trying to make sense of it all.  The exam was a gong show, with almost everyone doing poorly.  I did hear a rumour of someone getting a grade in the 80s but it has yet to be confirmed.  My colleagues around me were surprised when the person mentioned that “they knew someone” who scored like that.  That gives you an idea of how the class did.

While studying I didn’t feel like writing much, as each day seemed the same for so long.  Then I kinda dropped off the habit and here we are!   I am back into class now, even tho the rest of the students at UQ are now on break.  It’s great, cause like in January, we have the campus nearly to ourselves.  We are doing the nervous system these weeks, which are pretty packed sessions.  I’m glad we didn’t have a long break like last time, as it was very hard to get back into it after being away.

Tags: Australia, Medicine, UQ by David Graff
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This is my 500th day in Medicine.  It feels like every other day, except that it’s noon and I haven’t left the house.  I got out of bed, put on a hoodie, made a coffee, and sat down to my desk.

My life is exciting.  That’s why I’ve been writing so much about it lately.

Tags: Australia, Life, Medicine by David Graff
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