Immobilize

 

While a number of nation-wide scams depress the budding medicos and the young doctors looking forward to post graduation, the weather around gets thick and gloomy with confusion and fears. The present situation is reminiscent of the COVID period when suddenly all board and competitive exams were cancelled as the nation went into a state of lockdown and the students into a state of confusion which lasted for months. While some might believe that a postponed exam means extra preparation time, but only the hard working, dedicated student who prepares for months giving up on all else, knows how much of a mental toll this brings.

When one is preparing for an examination with nineteen extremely volatile subjects, some of them while working full time jobs, it takes a lot of effort and determination. If one fights such a hard battle, only to realize at the eleventh hour that the examination system itself is broken, the hopeless feeling is probably indescribable with words. While confusion clouds the mind, mindless posts fill social media and news channels host useless discussions and debates the helpless student loses the urge to study, which may create a set back on a strongly built preparation. Or when an unfair examination provides unfair results, months of earnest preparation seems to be wasted. How does one deal with it then?

Final year of med school, though extremely hectic, enriches one with interesting ward experiences and insights about clinical practice as well as life. One such subject probably is orthopedics which teaches one about how to deal with twisted, complicated, displaced fractures. One first does clinical tests and then radiological investigations to understand the situation and get a clear picture. Then the orthopedic surgeon makes a diagnosis and treatment plan for the patient. Similarly, when life gives one such a severe blow that breaches through all layers of protection and creates a deep wound, that throws one into a complex, twisted situation one needs to investigate, get a clear picture with a clear head and come up with a plan to manage the situation.

Moreover, the mainstay of treatment of most fractures is to reduce and immobilize, which may be performed through various modalities. Similarly, when dealing with a deep blow one should learn to protect oneself, probably not get into situations which can further disturb or infect the wound. This is because any wound needs time and care to heal. When fighting a lonely battle, this immobilization is difficult to achieve as the mind flies to social media posts or group chats which cause further anger and disturbance to the mind. But no matter what, one must remember that in times of confusion or sorrow, we must turn to the right set of people. So, find the right people around you, people who are probably just around you and will not be found in social media, news channels or group chats.

Lastly, not only in terms of cancelled exams or shattered dreams, whenever any blow breaks a person, or a bone. Not all of them heal the right way- some never heal (that is they go into non-union), some heal the wrong way creating a permanent deformity (that is they go into malunion) and lastly some blows result in severely infected wounds which result in amputation. What do we do with such wounds? Well, then we accept, rehabilitate and build a life around that deformity, a life that needs a little more courage, more perseverance and determination to live. But it is our life and our battle after all, so we just live it anyway.

 

Buffering

 

After a bad exam with a bad question paper, one finds many people whose thoughts resonate with theirs. People get together in groups, counsel each other, slander the University and say sweet words about the Professors who set such papers, and finally the mood lightens as someone cracks a dark joke that makes everyone laugh in spite of themselves. But there are other days when you and everyone around you craves that resonant frequency that is nowhere to be found. Every heart seems to play a different tune and everything combined seems to create a chaotic din that makes the air heavy.

The wait for results at med school is a test of patience. Weeks full of false alarms, fake news, tension, and flashbacks finally lead up to the day of results when people initially don’t want to believe that this time in fact the news is true. As usual, website conveniently crashes. Then begins another long phase of trying, staring at the words “Error” or “Connection timed out” on the screen and trying one’s level best to keep calm. As friends and family call to find out the much-awaited result, or to ask for your help to see theirs, your mind screams, “For God’s sake, let me be! I don’t know!” And then just like that, standing alone at the foot of a statue late at night, one finally sees their result, and for a moment the mind cannot believe that the buffering has ultimately stopped and what the eyes see is in fact the final fruit of their efforts.

Picture courtesy: Mehetab Alam Molla

For some, it is their long-awaited good news, a dream come true, while for some others it is an unexpected delight which hits them like winning a lottery. There are others who cannot meet their expectations, leading them to wonder, “Was that too much to expect?” Finally, there’s another unfortunate group, whose dreams remain out of reach. As some celebrate and some retreat into a lonely corner, people fail to support one another. The mobile phones flood with texts asking “How much?” But after sharing your scores and wishing each other through a statutory “Congratulations” or smiling emojis, conversation stops. Probably because one is too caught up in their own emotions to care, or because there is no right thing to say. The mind grows skeptical as emotions run supreme. Kind words seem like pity and cheers or best wishes seem like occult jealousy. One wonders, did we all really wait all this while for this day?

Unable to find comfort in family or friends, one feels lonely with their feelings, so much so that even two people in the same hostel room remain oceans apart, each dealing with their own emotions. So my fellow medicos, what do we do to support ourselves and others? Probably by not asking leading questions like, “How many honors did you get?” Or by not texting those batchmates we never remember throughout the year, just to ask their scores on the result day. One can also do their bit by not judging all those who did well, however unexpectedly, just to alleviate their own pain, because this author believes that slandering the successful only increases the heart’s despair.

At this point though the question remains, how do we move on? The answers of course vary from person to person, and on their ways of finding comfort. Some find it on getting drunk with friends, while others find it on dreaming about their fathers getting them a pack of chips. One must remember that everything unexpectedly sad that one faces at med school, is probably a preparation for this morbid profession which can turn gruesome deaths into casual dinner table conversations.

Lastly, these are the days when we must remember a famous Taylor Swift song which goes as: “Time turns flames to embers, you’ll have new Septembers, everyone of us has messed up too. Lives change like a weather, I hope you remember, today is never too late to be brand new.”

 

Dream or mirage?

 

On the days one feels low as a med student they remember their pre-NEET (National Eligibility cum Entrance Test) days. One remembers the hardships one bore to get to the point of being called a medical student and somehow these memories help one fight the hardships medical college brings.

The journey from being a NEET aspirant to becoming a medical student is a long and arduous one, filled with unhealthy competition, lack of friends, long hours of tuition and late nights. Basically, it provides an apt trailer to the horror movie called, “The life of a medical student.” But one still continues with the hope of seeing their dream turn into reality one day.

But what happens if the reality turns out to be a nightmare? As the line of difference between a national level competitive exam and phase 1 clinical trial melts away in the heat of elections, the average student becomes a guinea pig on whom experiments are performed against their will. As the standard of the examination approaches the standard of cleanliness in government hospitals one wonders which is more dangerous- having unclean wards or having undeserving doctors to work in them? With an increasing number of reservations, finding a seat in a government medical college, for a general (to be read as SU-Scheduled Unfortunate) becomes as difficult as making an intravenous channel in a neonate. And to add a chilly flavored icing to the cake, some people achieve impossible and unimaginable feats with the help of grace marks, like obtaining a grand total of 719 out of 720 in NEET UG.

Even if one does land up in a government medical college after all of this, does one really achieve the long-cherished dream? The answer is an unfortunate “no” for most people. Starting from the so-called clinically oriented question papers which are tailor made for torture, to the loneliness and toxicity of final year of medical college, the reality cannot be further from the utopian dream one learns to see in the preparation phase. And all these hardships lead to? Yet another exam with lesser seats, more reservations and a bigger syllabus. So the race to that utopian dream continues for some while for others it ends as the competition breaks them down turning them into the same toxic people they once hated.

How does one achieve one’s dream then? Well, the answer to this question lies in the fact that first the dream of a utopian Health Heaven needs to change. If anything, we are in a dystopian world now, and gone are the days when only hard work and dedication could make a difference. The students need to know this truth from the very beginning. The examination and evaluation system needs a long and strong pull, a pull that could change it, though not altogether. But the first baby step towards change is what matters and that comes only when everyone comes together to raise their voices against this broken system.

One also needs to remember that a doctor’s journey is a lonely one and probably the crowd and media will concentrate on more pressing matters than the mumbo-jumbo of NEET exams, UG or PG. But that should not silence the call for justice and the spirit to fight all adversities to make a change. So, medicos and aspirants, are you up for the challenge?