December 2011:
Hectic. The one word I would use to describe my life over the last few months. And the reason that this blog has gone far too long neglected. Why so busy you ask? (And you would ask, if you realised that at my medical school, 4th year is actually one of the easier ones)
Well here is a quick summary of why (bulletpointed, for timesaving ease - yours and mine!)
1. I've just started my Neurology rotation, this is easily the hardest rotation of the year plus the specialist neurology centre is not in the same city as my medical school so we have to do quite a bit of travelling in this rotation which eats into our time further. Plus means I have tried a little bit (not as much as I should sadly) to do some work outside of rotation time in order to get my brain around wellll the brain.
2. Involved in multiple committees at the moment, apparently one position just wasn't enough for me when I applied for things last year ;)
3. University sport. Totally my own decision admittedly again, but my teams in a real chance of winning our league this year and theres no way I'm going to let them down now after 4 years of us floating at or very near the bottom of the table!
4. Money, money, money. Once you get to your fifth year of study, the NHS and the student loan company combine forces to steal the food from your mouth. You are no longer eligible for SLC to pay your tuition fees but you are still eligible for maintenance loan. Fortunately the NHS step in from this stage and pay your tuition fees for you - fantastic! Wrong. Very nice in the long term I'm sure, however in the short term the fact that you are getting an nhs bursary technically (even if you are not getting any maintenance money - this is parental means tested) means the SLC give you less maintenance loan. So long term = less debt. Short term = less money to live on. Even though our years are far longer than they have been before (2 week xmas, no easter, 3 week summer, party time is over) and so that reduced amount has to stretch much, much further.
The result of this is that many of us have to work more at this stage (in the paid work sense) far more than we did in lower years (especially as we no longer have that long summer holiday to work and use for getting our banks out of the red!) even though now is the stage that we should be working less. So paid work has also eaten some of my "spare" time.
5. A research project that is a complete nightmare. See posts on dissertation for my love of research at the best of times! That one was a doodle to get started compared to this one!
So I've not just been watching J.Kyle rather than blogging (tho there has been the occasional bit of that, who needs good television shows :P ) but I'm going to try and get back on top of blogging again now!
Neurology rotations interesting so far, but challenging. Its definitely composed of quite a few doctors who enjoy grilling medical students to eat for lunch. Mostly I either a) answer wrong b) saw errrrm i dunno and look gormless or c) look desperately at other students around me for help who tend to avert their eyes to avoid getting dragged into the carnage themselves! Of course there is the very very occasional d) option which is me fluking a correct answer. However this is very occasional and would probably be more convincing to the interrogating doctors if the answer wasn't accompanied by a questioning upwards inflection to my voice! Still, learning's what the rotation is all about so hopefully by the end of it not all of my right answers will be flukes! Wish me luck :).
Halfadoc xx
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