Things are starting to stick

Blog #7
by Nishani

Yesterday’s morning report on hypertension was a very valuable teaching session. I know that all of the concepts that were covered were taught to me at some point during medical school. However, it was very helpful having them reviewed again, especially now that I have a better frame of reference. I try to place myself in the position of the first person who has to see the patient that is being discussed and think about what I would do. Since I have a base to start from, I find it useful to be able to compare my thoughts with the decisions made by the team working on the case. I have also noticed that it has become easier to learn and consolidate new information. Part of the reason for this could be that I already learned the information at some point, and subsequently forgot. Or, it could also be that I find it less difficult to add new information to the basis of knowledge built over time than start from scratch. I am better able to identify knowledge gaps around specific topics and address them more quickly and effectively. My selective partner and I both agreed that we are getting more out of these teaching sessions than we did while we were on our core internal medicine rotations. We are picking up more of the subtleties in each case. At any rate, it is becoming easier to distinguish between the “need to know,” and the “can look up later if interested.” I think we are both glad things are starting to “stick” better.