New Pregnancy Diagnostic Test coming soon

Interesting research has been done in the field of prenatal diagnostic testing. Right now the current diagnostic tests are invasive and come with a small risk of miscarriage, but now there might be a new DNA test that can be done to identify babies with Down Syndrome while the mom is pregnant. You can find the story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7654201.stm

It should be available in 2-3 years. I was told that the information I learned about in the next four years would be obsolete by the time I came to practice but i didn't realize information would be obsolete within the first month!

Female vs. Male Med students

I just read an article about comparing female versus male medical students and how they estimate their skill level.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081003122713.htm

Basically the gist of it is that female medical students have the skills but are not as confident as their male counterparts. I am not sure if this is a good thing or not. On one hand it seems like female med students might be more humble and therefore less likely to overestimate their skills and make mistakes. On the otherhand sometimes you have to be a bit cocky to convince other people they can trust you. There is a good episode of Scrubs where the surgeon Turk stops being cocky and says he is a capable average surgeon, which causes the patient to rethink the decision to have surgery. When he returns to his confident attitude the guy agrees to have the surgery.

I am sure there is a happy medium in there somewhere.

Rural Family Medicine

I never thought I would consider family medicine, the lowest paying of all areas of medicine, in a rural area. But the other day I went to a physician panel the other day where I heard what it is like to be a family physician in an urban area and a rural area. It turns out in Canada that family docs can also sub-specalize with anesthesia, OB/GYN, surgical assists, ER etc to create variety and expand their practice. The things they get to do make it seem like family docs have the best of both worlds. In other words they get to build relationships with patients while doing a variety of procedures. I am now seriously considering working in a field like this. And in a rural area physicians get to run hospitals and be involved in group practice with an overhead of 25% and make around $200,000 I am very impressed. I am not totally convinced but it is definitely something to think about!

I am a "real" doctor

I just bought my first stethoscope the other day and the feeling was amazing! I feel like I am officially a doctor now and I spent a lot of time walking around with it around my neck and listening to my own heart beat. It is interesting how one simple piece of equipment can define my identity. I was tempted to buy a lot more equipment like an ophthalmoscope (for looking in eyes) and an otoscope (for looking in ears) but the total would have been well over $1000. However, I am glad I am not in dentistry because their tuition is much higher than mine and they need over $10000 worth of equipment! Hopefully my skills will not suffer because of not buying all the extras but every exam room has most of this equipment anyway. I guess it is official now...I am going to be a doctor.