In between...

This weekend, I am in between two rotations. I finished endocrinology on Friday and starting Family Medicine with my favorite mentor ever on Monday... This looks like it will be a great month!

My first rotation ever was great. I was a little anxious doing a speciality as my first time in the hospital, but I have to say, it was just perfect! My supervisor is a very good teacher and he made it easy for us. I learned a lot, about endocrino, but most of all, about myself and the type of practice I would like later. And, to my surprise, I completely fell in love with the diabetes, the patients, the treatments and everything that goes with it.

My most important learning of this month is about taking charge. I want to take the patient as a whole and not just part of him. I saw a patient for a reason, which was not abnormal in the end, but had another medical issue that would not be handle by endocrinologist. We referred her back to her family physician. It felt unsatisfying, leaving the poor soul like that when it was not a huge problem to fix. (and let just say that we followed up by a phone call directly to the said physician just to make sure she would be seen very soon, so not just letting her wanders on her own). And I completely understand why the specialists do that, because 1- it would be totally unmanageable if they would address every problem of every patient and 2-they cannot be confortable dealing with every health issue because, well they are specialists and they don't (and cannot) follow guidelines and new treatment for every disease there is.

So, I suppose this confirms that I would like family medicine. I still consider general internal medicine, where you can take charge of patients as a whole, but having sicker and more complex patients than family physician (usually). I think I would like that very much. Still, food for thought for the next few months...

And, as of tomorrow, family med hospitalization for a week. I am thrilled! Hope it will meet up my expectations!

The best moment to be happy in life...

This week, I've heard on the radio of a study by University of Alberta about mid-life crisis. (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/mid-life-crisis-a-myth-university-of-alberta-study-concludes-1.3399494)

I completely agree with the results. I feel that I enjoy life (and my journey in med school) much more in my 40's than I would have had in my 20's. I was an anxious little thing back then, and I now have more self-confidence, a quality that can be very useful during clerkship. I enjoy myself tremendously right now and I had good comments this week that make me think I am not doing too bad. (One patient told me that if I become a Family Physician, she wants to be my patient, what a compliment for a first rotation! That is my salary for this week!)

As of tomorrow, I will have gone through half of my first elective. I am currently in endocrinology and I have to say, I really like this. I spent the whole week seeing diabetes patients, but I also saw, osteoporosis, thyroid problems and even a patient with acromegaly. I also love the quality of life I have right now. I feel that clerkship is much more easy to manage than was studying.  I have more personal time. I discussed it with a collegue doing another specialty and she feels the same (so I am not crazy, or not doing what I should do).  And the motivation of seeing patients everyday, and learning so much! Wow! Also, I feel I have a much more normal life, being in the hospital all day, and then coming home and not studying until midnight every night.

My husband is gone for work this week and, even tough I am eager to see him this weekend, I feel it is easier to manage being a single mom than while in school. I feel the worst is behind. I will certainly have rotation much more difficult than this one (ObGyn, two months in a row?), but still a month is so short!