One of the things final year of med school brings into one's life, besides anxiety attacks, dark circles and constant fear of failure, is the ordeal of "Khep classes". This weird term refers to a set of extra ward classes which final year students take under the guidance of Post Graduate Trainees (PGTs) in order to gain clinical exposure and learn the art of patient examination.
At the very beginning of the year starts the crazy race of getting into "Khep" groups under various PGTs. Some outstanding students join multiple groups for the same subject to earn themselves the golden title of "Khepologists". While the morning ward classes go predominantly unattended, many students leave themselves entirely to the mercy of these all-important "Khep" classes. Such is the craze about these classes that one sees friendships breaking over one question: "Why didn't you add me to this particular khep group?" The answer to : "Which Khep group did you join?" is guarded as a national secret worth dying for by most students who would rather answer questions about their private fantasies than about khep.
Each of these "Khep" groups has an organizer- in some lucky groups it is the PGT himself/herself while in other groups the responsibility of organizing classes, convincing Mr. Busy PGT, finding patients and informing others falls on a poor, hapless student. Thus, a tough life begins for the poor organizer who always has to answer questions like, "When is the next class?", "Why don't you go and convince Mr/Ms PGT?" . After countless phone calls, unanswered text messages and unfulfilled promises when a class is arranged after all, one feels as if one has already won a gold medal for being "Khep organizer of the year". But at the end of 2hrs of standing in the stuffy ward, one's fellow khep mates comment, "This class was a bit theory based. Why don't you tell him to make the class more clinical examination oriented next time?" This leaves the poor organizer to wonder, is all this worth the effort?
By the end of the year one realizes that maybe all the khep organizing was not worth the effort so one shifts to practicing on friends in hostel. These group study sessions, jokingly called as "Hostel Khep", yield much more in terms of learning the clinical methods and getting them right. As a bunch of people get together to share their cumulative knowledge gathered from books, ward and khep, one also finds probable questions, and answers to one's doubts. But theses classes also come with two major follies: 1) You cannot be sure that the method you agreed upon is indeed correct. 2) None of the findings are generally present (unless your hostel buddy is secretly harboring some disease).
But as it is said, everything has its pros and cons. While the effectivity of the khep classes depends on the enthusiasm of both the students and the teacher, and the effectivity of group study depends on the knowledge of the group members, but at the end of the year anyone who wants to learn truly will get the basics somehow or the other.
Lastly, if khepology is an art, it has certain formidable, talented artists who attend two khep classes for the same topic of the same subject under two different people within the same evening. Kudos to these rare talents because of whom the art of "Khepology" is achieving new heights every day.
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