Archive for August, 2010

Living Car-Free in Medical School

When reconsidering the role of an automobile during medical school, weigh the demands of scattered clinical rotations against the direct and opportunity costs of ownership and upkeep.  The Economical Academic poses useful questions to aid your decision. 2. If I lived in a place where I wouldn’t drive my car to work, what else would [...]

How to Stop Being Late

Some practical advice for those medical students finding it difficult to make deadlines… 2. Surround yourself with clocks (not just the one on your cell phone) 4. Give yourself a handicap. If you’re a bad estimator, double the time you think it will take to get there. 7. Don’t try to do too much. Keep [...]

Guide to QT Prolongation & Torsades de Pointes – Drugs of Risk

The University of Arizona Center for Education and Research on Therapeutics provides a handy list of medications associated with Torsades de Pointes, a ventricular tachyarrhythmia often seen in the setting of hypokalemia, hypomagnesemia, hypocalcemia, diarrhea, or alcoholism. Torsades has the dangerous potential for degeneration into ventricular fibrillation and is treated with magnesium sulfate infusion and, [...]

How to be a Good Medical Student

An excerpt from Kendra Campbell’s 8 pointer’s for first-year residents – equally applicable to medical students… 1. Show up early, stay late. 2. Know as much as possible about your patients. 3. Be BFFs with the nurses. 4. Do things without having to be asked. Figure out what needs to be done, and do it [...]