MBBS Year 4, Semester 2 (Sleep, Grind, Repeat) + What I did in the 2024 summer vacation

 

First things first,  Apologies for the late semester recap. 

Lmao... one day before the semester starts? You got a lot of nerve Dee 

But......better late than never? or good things come to those that wait (patiently)..? (HAHA)

But hey, I have my reasons for this late semester recap.  

The reasons in question:

• Observership Schedule
• Completing Research
• Procrastination
• Writer's Block

I will let you be the pick for the reasons. (Heh).

On today's lengthy blog post, I will be having a recap on MBBS Year 4 Semester 2 in the first bit, and then in the second bit, I will talk more about my ✨hot✨ summer here, in Hangzhou. (So scroll lower if my hot summer observerships interests you more... OR hey, read it all 😉)

So, what are the courses (or bane of my struggles) this past semester? 

Well, in hindsight it was just a list of 5 items... and you ought to be thinking eh, it can't possibly be as bad as other semesters seeing as it is a mere 5 courses. WRONG. 

In another way to put a descriptive way of the struggles :     ✨It's small..... but! Packs-a-Punch!!✨

So the courses we had are listed below..... (And I shall shamelessly put them in MY order of most favourite to least😝)

1. Obstetrics and Gynaecology (OBGYN)

2. Internal Medicine II

3. Radiology

4. Surgery II

5. Medical Chinese IV

As always, I will first start off with a relatable meme for each subject, and chuck in my pros and cons. 

Course: Obstetrics and Gynaecology (OBGYN)

If anything that was highlighted in this course.... YES, being a woman is hard and tough. 

It is no wonder, it is a core subject in med school. From hormones, puberty, pregnancy, birth and everything female reproductive system... You will learn it all thoroughly. (but also as a woman, you would also be worried about every dysmenorrhea, AUB, PMS, primary, secondary etc). All in all, if you have a uterus, we tough it out every 28-30 days in our womanhood (Yay!)

Pros: 

Ma Laoshi 🩷

Imagine having such a dedicated resident, who would answer every of your query (regardless of how silly it is), and she always being so organised and accommodative for every teaching lab sessions we had. She was such a role model and was never afraid to speak her mind about women empowerment. Her friendly demeanour made learning and attending the class comforting. (Plus, she would be back teaching during my internship? Heck yes!). 

The course was so organized, where we had the schedules for the lecture, and the lab at the beginning of semester! The TA herself, was also very on-her-toes with informing the students of any changes and the topics that would have been covered the week. Additionally, the endless amount of support from the teaching department in the OBGYN hospital was a win. 

It goes to say, that when women leads and become the organizer for a course, everything was pretty smooth going and it was such a relief for my need to schedule behaviour. 

Bonus: Here is a cute 0.5 selfie of a few of us in the lab simulation delivery room, where we each got to experience how a baby should be delivered 😎

Cons:

I do not really have a con for this, because i actually thoroughly enjoyed this course. For the topics that i felt were not delivered to the point of easy understanding, I utilized two resources.

• BLUEPRINTS Obstetrics
• AMBOSS (Highly recommend this resource once you hit 4th year!)

The only complain i really had was the need to do MOOC and an online simulation lab that did not work well at all if you are a MacBook user. 

Course: Internal Medicine II

Every teaching lab session in this course requires you to be thorough with you, as a medical student taking their patient history and in some cases, some patients are more chatty than others.... 

So it is always handy to premake a checklist for history taking for each sub-rotation within internal medicine. You would always have a list of questions you should ask for patients when you are in cardio, respiratory or endocrinology department. This is a perk in ruling out differential diagnosis, and makes you stand out in knowing the differences well. So tip (make a checklist for history taking, and do it in a logical manner).

Pros:

The lectures would always mimic what your assigned professor in the teaching lab would be showing you. So, it is pretty organized in that manner. The TA hands out a schedule at the start of semester and it is accurately followed through. The recommended book "Cecil's" is thorough and used by every professor in the lecture delivery session. (So, if you cannot followed it during the 8am and 3 hour long lecture sessions, read the chapter by yourself.... otherwise, use AMBOSS). The TA makes sure to also upload a weekly quiz for the lessons covered and I guess that makes sure you are consistently up-to-date.

Cons:

The classes being early at 8am and lasting for 3 hours for lectures. (I am a goldfish, my attention span lasts 5 minutes that early)

Course: Radiology

 

At the start of this course, it was literally so hard to 'see' what the professor who has already 'X' amount of years in seeing what they saw. Despite this course being one of the 'drier' subjects it was "aite" in my opinion. Most of it is either self-taught from the lecture material or memorizing the qbank that they would provide at the end of the semester as 'review.'

Pros:

You get to learn the differences between imaging modalities! (Yay).

The TA provides sufficient review material for the finals!

Cons:

This course was literally a hit or miss with me. It was dry to the bone (pun intended). We had to go to several buildings for the teaching lab, and every switch in topics, a few of us will get lost. 

At one week, there was such a miscommunication that one class of 20 students, did not show up at all and had to attend a replacement class instead (Whoops).

Course: Surgery

If I had learnt ANYTHING from this course....  I would say not to neglect it and take my pre-existing anatomy knowledge for granted. The content was actually pretty heavy and I advised not to do what I did (Start cramming 6 weeks before the finals on this content... Literally DO NOT DO THIS⚠). 

Pros

The smartest decision I had made was to make use of AMBOSS 6 weeks during my cram session and get through all the surgery key points that needed to be known!. I am also grateful that alongside this course, I was given several opportunities to 'look' at some surgeries by the Thoracic Department. 

Some surgery labs were quite good, when the surgeon holds a case discussion and takes us on ward rounding, or even show us equipment used post-surgery. 

Cons

Yoooo.... If you are in Class 2 they did us sooo dirty with the many campus travels for surgery teaching lab sessions. (Those self-funded taxi rides lordddd)..

It annoyed me the most when we had to travel 30 mins away from campus and we just had to sit in the teaching room for a resident surgeon to give us a lecture and not even allow us in any OR or Ward rounding. (Then, it should have been done over like a lecture in class and we need not travel all that way far out).  

Understandably, to accommodate 20+ students to the OR was not sterile, but I wish there was a better organization for how this could be done for students wanting to go into surgery for observation. The TA needs to listen to the students' feedback and work something more cohesive out for better learning progress (We only saw the TA once, and it was only during the final exam... )

Course: Medical Chinese IV

This course just keeps getting progressively harder to cope in terms of language skills. The jump from HSK 4 level to medical chinese is beyond a doubt, painful. Personally I struggle lots with learning a new language, and to have this course alongside the heavy medical ones.. it does drained you.

Pros:

We are taught OBGYN related medical chinese (Yay!)

Cons:

Learning this with other medical courses is a con itself. Period. 

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*Jump down for What i did this summer entry*

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Alrighty, so what did I do on this 🌞HOT🌞 summer holidays?

1. Observerships (Thoracic, Emergency and Neurosurgery)
2. Completing a Research
3. Binge watch Love Island USA

I did not want to be the couch potato🥔 I thrived to be this summer holidays, so instead I did the crazy. 

My 🩷 and I decided we should embark on a back-to-back observership learning experience, for this summer would have been our LAST chance to get this learning opportunity, before we are thrown into the Internship lifestyle.

Our crazy observership schedule (at one point this summer), was.....

Monday: Neurosurgery (ward rounds)

Tuesday: Thoracic Surgery (Lung resections, VATS, Lobectomy etc)

Wednesday: Thoracic Surgery (RAMIE and Esophagectomy)

Thursday: Emergency Department

Friday: Neurosurgery (CSF drainage, Moya-moya, Tumor resections etc)

It was beyond tiring! At one point, where we were going to several hospitals in a week.... the sheer amount of exposure to germs and all... We BOTH fell massively sick 😂😂. 

But would we do it all again? Yes. 

Firstly, I am so grateful that I was given the opportunity to take on 3 observerships this summer and learnt heaps from it. I am even more thankful that the professors we had reached out, who were so willing and accomodating in taking us in and teaching us, despite our lack of chinese language skills. They were all very willing to teach us in English and explain each of our questions in every step of the way. Obtaining these observerships were very much a 'carpe diem' moment for us and I am so glad the stars✩✩✩✩ were aligned for this opportunity! 

What did I learn? (Lets keep it short and sweet)

• Thoracic Surgery

I had the opportunity to scrub in several times to assist in the surgeries. The surgeries ranged from VATS, lobectomy, wedge resections to esophagectomies! 

I had learned the proper wrist maneuver in suturing the patient close along with several ideal suture types for the particular surgery! (So that the Anesthesist doesnt breathe down my neck! AHAH).

I had learnt how to properly stay still when holding the fan retractors in assisting. 

I had learnt how to use the laparoscopic camera for optimal view!

• Emergency Department (ED)

I had the opportunity to understand how systematic the ED works in a heavily populated country as China.

I learnt how to embrace the organized chaos whilst keeping calm alongside the professor who was teaching and explaining to us every condition that had walked into the ED doors (and he had managed all of them, very thoroughly!)

I learnt how to do bedside ECG and how to insert and Nasogastric tube!

I learnt that emotions run high in this department and it is vital to always keep cool with our heads straight on!

I also learnt not to be in the way, and stand at a corner whilst observing keenly!

• Neurosurgery

I had the opportunity to engaged with my interest in anything neuro-related!

I had learnt how CSF drainage was performed and how long certain surgeries are done! (Surgeries are exceptionally long when it involves the brain!)

I had the opportunity to watch a renowned surgeon perform his skills on a Moya-moya patient.

I was surprised to see and learned that there are so many vast technologies used in the treatment of brain related disorders!

I was thoroughly surprised at how detailed micro-surgery can be!

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Whilst doing all the above, I was also on the verge of completing research that I had started during the semester (and it is still ongoing).

Research is hard, for every information keeps getting updated along the way and ensuring that you are up-to-date is tough business! 

But I also did not forget to have fun in this summer. 

I binged watch Love Island USA, watched heaps of animes, read mangas and above all, learned how to tolerate the Hangzhou summer heat.

That is all for my wordy blog entry, 

Lots of love,

-D.