The one in which I'm awesome... Just kidding

The past week has been crazy, crazy busy and crazy fun, so I thought I'd give you a little recap.

1. THIRSTY THURSDAYS

 

In an effort to actually see everyone before the end of medical school, I started planning weekly happy hours for the fourth year class (mostly just for my friends to have a reason to all go to the same bar at the same time). We're now in our 6th week, however, it's quickly becoming one of my favorite times of the week; You never know who you're going to see until you get there... It's so great to catch up with people after not seeing them for almost a year.

2. LAMPOON

Saturday was the day (among others, see below) I've been planning for almost all year: Lampoon! I was super stressed all last week just trying to tie down all the loose ends, but it came together the night of the show. It was a great show, or at least that's what people have been telling me (I'm hypercritical about shows and timing of scene changes and technical aspects... Blame my mother, the theatre director). Needless to say, the show went off with out a hitch (almost) and left me barely able to move the next day; I was on my feet from about 10:30 am to 1:30 am, running around, moving chairs and tables, running the booth, etc.

It was a success either way, and I am so proud of our 4th year class: Our class has won 7/8 of the all the Lampoons during our time at Wayne (we lost for best video our 2nd year). 

This year it was a lot harder to watch though, because 1) I was in the booth texting the stage manager all night about screen cues while she was texting me about light cues, and 2) because watching the 4th year videos made me realize how close to the end we all are right now. 

I'm not going to lie and say I would do med school all over again, but to quote ZDoggMD, "I definitely wouldn't not do it once." It has been a hard, but great four years, and I'm going to miss all the friends I've made here. Seeing the videos confirmed that fact, at least for me.

3. BLACK MONDAY

Even though Match Day is officially March 17th (3rd Thursday of March... which conveniently coincides with St. Patty's Day this year), I think most of my friends were more concerned about Black Monday.
Black Monday is the day you find out if you have a job for next year... To quote one of my friends, "It's like Christmas, if Christmas could go horribly wrong."

Surgery has gotten a lot more competitive in the past few years; this past year it was #4 on the list for unmatched US seniors (meaning the fourth most common specialty for which US graduates didn't get a job)... So, while everyone else was sitting there telling me it was going to be fine, I also knew it could go "horribly wrong."

I could not fall asleep on Sunday night and half convinced myself that I was not going to match (to stave off the utter despair that would have manifested should the worse actually happen). I almost got out of bed at 2 am just to check my CV and make sure it was in order in case I had to scramble. At about 11:30 yesterday I started feeling even more nauseous. Around 11:45 am I found a corner of the hospital where I could be alone and started to have palpitations as I was opening my computer to both the NRMP site and to gmail.

Thankfully, I was one of the people who got their email right away (Although, I could have just looked at NRMP if I didn't get the email; Some of my friends didn't get there emails until after 1 pm yesterday):

That's right, folks! I'm gonna be a surgeon! I have matched into a categorical surgery program, somewhere.

I find out Thursday at noon where I'll be going. Crossing my fingers now.

I think there were only 2 open categorical spots for surgery... giving it something like a 99.8% fill rate this year, which makes it more likely that someone could have matched RadOnc, Derm, or even ENT when you compare fill rates and open spots.

Anyways, I'm glad to report that almost everyone I know matched (including my roommates into ENT, OB/GYN, and PM&R). I only know 2 people for sure that didn't match; both of whom applied to general surgery, one of whom I know scrambled into a prelim spot at the program he ranked #1 for a categorical position.

=============================
I'm not sure the validity of this statement, but per one of my friends Wayne had to scramble 18 this year, out of a class of 347 (roughly 94% match rate), many of whom had board scores >240.


To make matters worse, the NRMP website was down until well after 1pm today; Scramble starts at noon. I'm not sure overall how we did, I can just hope they did well.

=============================
A Few Definitions (nitty gritty and most likely somewhat inaccurate)

• Categorical: A program that once you match to, you complete your entire training with... i.e. Surgery, Medicine, Peds, Family Med, Ob/Gyn
• Transitional: A 1 year program that is a prerequisite for another specialty's program; needed for things like neurosurgery, urology, orthopedics, radiology, radiation oncology, etc.
• Integrated: A program for a specialty that usually requires a transitional year, but who's transitional year is guaranteed at their institution.
• Preliminary (Prelim): 1 year program which does not guarantee a PGY-2 spot; requires the applicant to reapply for the match in the following year.