One of the "old" people and random thoughts

I just returned from the annual MD/PhD retreat and realized that I am one of the "old" people in the program. I am starting my 7th year(!) and most of the younger students don't even know my name. That is also a function of me spending the majority of my graduate school years out of the country, but my friends and I laughed a bit at ourselves now that we are the old people arriving late (because we can't get out of the clinics early) who sit in the back and have strong opinions about everything.

Despite my earlier fears I'm actually enjoying learning how to be a doctor and take care of people. It's been a tough transition from being autonomous, respected, and knowledgeable in my field to knowing nothing, but the learning curve is steep and it is (mostly) a lot of fun!

I'm on my surgery rotation right now and spent a month doing general surgical oncology and am now spending a month doing surgical subspecialty services. I'm currently doing otolaryngology (ear, nose, and throat) and will spend the last two weeks doing plastic and reconstructive surgery. The hours were pretty brutal on surgical oncology - up at 4am and in the hospital/OR until 9 or 10 most nights, but the days flew by because I was so busy. The attending physician I was working with had very complicated patients and many of them were patients that all other surgeons had refused to operate on. I enjoyed the fast pace and hands-on aspect of surgery a lot! I also remembered how much I loved oncology. Our Hematology-Oncology block my second year of med school (way back in 2005) was my favorite block of the year, and I think it's so cool how interdisciplinary it is. Every week the surgical oncologists, medical oncologists, radiologists, pathologists, geneticists, etc. get together in the same room and discuss the patients who have been referred to or are receiving treatment at the Cancer Hospital. There are also so many interesting and important research questions! I was able to switch one of my months of in-patient medicine to the heme/onc service so hopefully I will get an appreciation for the medical oncology side then.