Hey guys! Welcome back to the channel.
If you're new here, I'm Sebastian,
a medical student from Australia.
And welcome to a productive day
in medical school
My alarm wakes me up at 6:20 a.m.
and I hit the snooze button a few times
before finally rolling out of bed.
I tidy up the place and get into some clinical clothes.
After I pack all my things and brush my teeth,
I make my usual morning smoothie of Weet-Bix, protein powder,
milk, greek yogurt, and mixed berries.
I down it as quickly as possible so I'm not late for my bus,
and I make my way out.
The trip into the hospital isn't too long,
and even though I'm not really a morning person,
it does feel nice to start the day bright
and early so you can make the most of it.
On the bus trip in, I click through a few
Anki flashcards.
And a lot of people ask me if I make my own cards.
I don't usually make my own cards.
I prefer to find ones online because I find it saves me
a lot of time.
I arrive at the hospital and after signing in,
I head over to my locker to dump my bag,
and take out my iPad to bring during the ward rounds.
I like having my iPad so I can search up
unfamiliar topics while the team is rounding
and I can also take a few notes.
I'm currently on my general surgical rotation.
And ward rounds usually start anywhere
from 6:30 a.m. onwards, but today's a later start,
so I catch up with my friend Grace and the two of us
head in for ward rounds at 8:00 a.m.
We're currently assigned to the upper gastrointestinal team
for the next four weeks.
And our uni usually pairs us up with another classmate,
so that we're not trying to navigate
through the term alone.
If you don't know what ward rounds are,
it's when a medical team travels from inpatient
to inpatient to assess the patient,
discuss any issues that may have occured
over the last day or any changes in management
and to coordinate care and discharge planning.
A team usually consists of doctors and medical staff.
Usually of more senior doctors like the consultants
or the fellows and more junior doctors
like interns and residents.
Us medical students tag on to the teams
and try to learn as much as possible
from seeing each patient.
And sometimes if the doctors are not too busy.
They will ask us questions and provide teaching
on topics which come up during the round.
2 1/2 hours later once all the patients
have been seen, we head downstairs
to the cafeteria, and the senior doctor
kindly buys us a coffee.
The team does a quick paper round to delegate tasks
for the interns and residents to complete during the day.
And usually after the rounds, some of the surgeons
will have already been in theatre preparing
or performing procedures.
And so us medical students would go over to theatres
and try observe a few of the operations.
But today there's no list for the upper GI team.
So instead, Grace and I head over
to the student-kitchen area because they're doing
a free morning tea.
We grabbed some of the free food
and after downing a few wraps, I head over
to the library to review some topics discussed
in the morning round.
The registrar asked us about post-operative
splenectomy complications.
So I start there, and learned that these patients
are at an increased risk of infection
from encapsulated organisms such as Streptococcus pneumoniae
and Haemophilus influenzae.
And in rare cases can lead to this thing called OPSS
which stands for overwhelming postplanectomy sepsis.
It soon approaches midday and after an hour or so
of studying, I head back to the student common room,
because there's another free lunch organized
by the postgradute students society.
I grab another free wrap and a Subway cookie
to top it off before making my way
to the hospital clinics.
The outpatient clinic for upper GI starts at 12:30.
And I sit in with one of the registrars
from this morning as they see different patients.
Anatomically, the upper GI tract consists of the esophagus,
stomach, and duodenum.
So some specific pathologies to this region
include things like esophageal perforation,
gastroesophageal reflux disease and diseases
of the biliary tree like cholangitis.
We finish up at around 2:30 p.m. and I head straight
over to the ophthalmology clinic.
As part of our clinical requirements,
we need to attend a specific number
of ophthalmology sessions during the year,
and need to see a variety of patients
with different eye pathologies.
Today is the acute eye clinic, and I get the chance
to use the slit lamp which is a fancy microscope
used to assess the back and front of the eye.
And it helps ophthalmologists make anatomical diagnosis.
Cataracts are a very common eye problem as you get older,
and the registrar shows me what a brunescent
or brown cataract looks like on one of the patients
we examined.
After a whirlwind of seeing different patients,
it's soon 5:00 p.m.
And with the mental fatigue kicking in,
I grab my bag from locker, head out
of the hospital and start making my way home.
Currently, I'm reading The Book Thief
by Markus Zusak, which I'm enjoying.
And I recently finished The Midnight Library
by Tom Haig.
It was rated the best fiction book on Goodreads for 2020,
and it definitely lived up to the hype.
So if you're looking for a heartwarming story,
it's definitely worth picking up.
Once home, I hit up some food, chomp down
on some lentil stew and spent an hour to relax.
And then put on some sports clothes
and head down to the garage for a gym session.
For the last month, I've been trying my best
to be more consistent with my gym routine.
And my brother recommended me this cool app called Strong
which has really helped me to keep track
of my training sessions.
Today is pool day focusing on back and biceps.
And my typical workout split involves five sets of pull ups,
four sets of barbell bent-over rows,
six sets of cable lat pulldowns.
I like to do three of these with an overhand grip
and three with an underhand grip.
Four sets of dumbbell bent-over one arm rows.
And to finish it off, four sets of bicep curls.
With my muscles feeling the burn, I shower, freshen up,
and get comfortable at my desk.
I load up Anki and crack out the rest
of my scheduled cards.
I've been trying to stick to about 100 new cards per day,
and sometimes I don't get there but I'm trying not
to miss a day so I can beat that forgetfulness curve.
I grab some food.
Thanks mom for a delicious stir fry.
Turn on my warm evening lights and get on to editing
this video.
I start with writing and recording the script,
cutting the footage, and then adding
the final touches like on-screen effects
until I've got the final video which you're watching now.
Well that wraps up a productive day in medical school.
If you enjoyed the video, be sure to hit that like button.
Subscribe if you want to see more content like this.
I'll link some of my other medical school vlogs
if you wanted to keep watching.
And as always, this is Sebastian. Stay sharp.
(outro music)