Starting Medical School in a Pandemic

Today is my first day of medical school!! I honestly can’t believe it's here. I’m so nervous and excited at the same time. Obviously, this first semester is not going to be what I expected. Every school is dealing with the pandemic in different ways but here is how my first semester is different. As of right now, the only in-person class is anatomy lab - I was worried we wouldn’t get this experience but thankfully they found a way to make it work! Some of the changes may end up being positive while others are not going to be so great. But, I’m just excited to be here and am definitely ready to go with the flow.

Some of the changes I have noticed: 

• Anatomy lab is split into 2 groups - each anatomy table (aka cadaver) has 5-6 people but we are split into two days. So for example, I have anatomy on Tuesdays with two of my lab partners while the rest of our group has lab on Thursdays. On Friday, the five of us will be in lab together. In order to keep room capacity low enough on Fridays, half the lab tables come in the morning and the other half comes in the afternoon. I know this is confusing but basically - anatomy lab is split into two groups.

• We each only do ~half of the anatomy labs. To be honest, I am kind of worried about this because we will still be tested on the entire body during practical exams. Basically, the Tuesday group will do one dissection and the Thursday group will do another so that we can still finish the whole body by November. We will, of course, have an opportunity to see exactly what the other group did but it won’t be the same as doing the lab ourselves.

• Almost all of our classes are online! Some classes are live-zoom sessions (aka we have to be there and participate at a specific time) while others are pre-recorded lectures. This honestly does not really bother me, except in the case of Clinical Skills. I feel like it is going to be so difficult to learn to do a physician exam over Zoom? I have my first class on physical exams on Wednesday, so I’ll let you guys know how it goes.

• We have to buy more equipment ourselves. Many of the MS2’s told us not to worry about buying BP cuffs and other physical exam equipment because we would be able to use the ones in the classrooms… but obviously that isn’t the case right now. Not the biggest deal because hopefully we only need a few extra lower cost items but it is definitely making med school a tad more expensive. We also aren’t allowed to bring iPads into lab and have to buy a physical copy of the dissector (again not super expensive but still more than the free PDF).

• Pretty much all extracurricular activities have paused. This isn’t a huge deal since most students suggest giving yourself time to adjust to medical school classes before jumping into extracurriculars. However, it is likely going to effect our ability to get involved in student-run clinics (which are huge at my school) before the new year. Super unfortunate but again, not the end of the world.

• Our white coat ceremony was via Zoom. This made me sad because I was so excited for my family and boyfriend to come to my white coat ceremony. But, in the end, they got to watch via Zoom and I still felt so loved and supported.

The most important difference (at least in my mind) is probably that I’ve only met 2 of my classmates… and I live with them! This is super unfortunate because I was really looking forward to making new friends here. As I posted before, I have the most incredible friends from pre-med at Berkeley and I was excited to build my support system within medical school. But, we are going with the flow and luckily my housemates are great! Our class has also put together weekly Zoom Happy Hours so that will have to do for the time being!

COVID has definitely shaken up the world. I am NOT saying it has affected my life in any significant way compared to the patients and families affected by the disease, the physicians working on sick patients, or the individuals who have lost their jobs/food security/safety. I feel incredibly lucky to be able to list the small ways COVID will affect my education and hopefully that list does not grow. I’ve been asked how medical school will differ this year and I wanted to share some ways I’ve seen the effects of the pandemic on my education. Again, if you can write a list of the ways COVID has affected you, looked at it and felt okay, then count your blessings. The lovely @bri taught me a long time ago that being positive is so important for your mental health and I will never forget that. Positivity in this time is more important than ever. Maybe I’ll even do a post on this at a later date… stay tuned. This is truly a crazy world we live in and I’m just lucky to have the opportunity to enter the medical profession at such a pivotal point.