The youngest mother, how old could you expect her to be? Ten, Eleven, or Twelve? Those were the ages that first came across my head as I began to read about five-year-old Lina Medina, who gave birth to a 6 lb child at the Andean village of Ticrapo in 1939. It was a very phenomenal case and the likelihood of it was so rare that many individuals still believe it is not true. Most girls began to develop around the age of 12 when they hit puberty, however, doctors found that Medina had a regular cycle of periods since the age of 3. According to her doctor, Escomel, she had a hormonal disorder of the pituitary gland that became the cause for this early development. Around the age of 4 1/2 Medina’s mother began to believe she had some type of tumor in her stomach and after taking her to a local doctor was it found that the girl was pregnant. Much speculation has been made that the father of the child was Lina’s father. He was put in jail for a short period of time but later released because of a lack of evidence. After giving birth to Gerard (name of Medina’s doctor), Medina’s psychological behavior remained the same. She would prefer playing with dolls rather then her own child. Also her son Gerard believed his mother was just his sibling but around the age of 10 found out the truth as local boys teased him about it.  Both grew up to have healthy lives and Lina married at the age of 33 and had a second child.

Ever had the cough that just never ends. It starts kicking in everyday around 8p.m and wakes you up 5x a night eventually ruining your mood, taking away vital hours of sleep, and keeping the rest of the house awake. Well if your one of those people I know exactly how you feel, and after reading a few blogs I came across an interesting article that brought upon a theory that I have always held true. That cough medicines DO NOT HELP. They bring a small period of relaxation similar to what a Halls cough drop may do, and in that time period the throat can relax from the constant irritation making it less susceptible to more coughing. Coughs are a viral infection and cure when they complete their cycle, similar to a cold, and most people including myself decide to take Buckley’s guaranteed cough medicine on the last day of the cycle and VOILA cough is gone,the credit goes to the cough medicine, and more users rush to get it. Cough medicine can at times be looked to as a placebo for many individuals.  Studies show that a sugar coated pill has the same long-term effect on a cough that a actual medicine would. Even in my two years of not taking cough medicines the cycles of my coughs remain the same and they still last as long as they did when I did take medicines. Also overtime my coughs have reduced, now I doubt this is because I have quit taking the medicines but hey if not taking them cures it then I’ll go for it. Now with all this said I’m not trying to say lets all quit on medicines, because there are still those nights when I take a teaspoon of nyquil to relieve the irritation in my throat and, of course, to get a good night’s sleep, however, I do believe that most individuals depend to heavily on medicines. A small cough hits them and they rush to their medicine cabinet.

The full article on this issue can be found here.

December 08, 2007, the last time I would ever get up at 7 AM to go take the ACT. For those of you that don’t know what the ACT is, it is a exam taken by high school students throughout the United States. The score often determines the amount of scholarship a college will give and whether they will even accept the student. A perfect score is a 36 and a 32 usually means a free ride into most colleges. Anyway this was my the final chance I had at the ACT and did I study? Absolutely not. Watched a cricket match the night before, went to sleep around 1 a.m, woke up at 6am and went to school to take on the ACT. A few minutes after getting there I realized I didn’t have a pencil, but it was pretty easy to borrow a few from people who brought like 25 (we aren’t writing the constitution here). Anyway the ACT itself went pretty well. The English grammar part had a few questions here and there that left me puzzled, reading was a fight for time, math was filled with way more questions on degrees n triangles then I could of imagined, and the science this time was much easier for me. Overall I think it went pretty smooth and I am hoping for a 29 or higher. I’ll be sure to post up the results soon as I get them.

Whether the ACT scores come out good or bad, one thing is for certain and that is the fact that I feel much more relieved. It was becoming a huge weight on my back and now its over with. With 1 more week left until midterm exams and Christmas break I feel life is getting better, and of course I should start getting time to finish up a few actual med-related articles I have sitting in my draft for the past few weeks.

P.S - Just in case your reading this ‘J’ I hope my guessing skills come out as good as yours…yea he did end up making a 29 out of 36 on the most hated science section of the ACT by reading half the question and taking a ‘educated’ guess.

The last few days…hmm…how can I describe them. Dull, uninteresting, and with so much to do that there is nothing to do. Even writing this article is taking much longer then it should. I’ve sat here the past few days thinking of the millions of things. College, the ACT, SAT, Calculus final exams, AP classes, personal life, what not? Its difficult to describe but there is just so much work to do that I can do nothing. I sit here and can make an endless list of tasks, however, start on none. I dreadfully make way through my homework everyday and 2-3 hours fly by in a matter of minutes. After that everyday chores, outside work, etc.. eat away the rest of my time, and no matter how much work I do or don’t do I never feel that the day was productive or successful. I feel bad even saying that the first few parts of this article have been sitting in the draft area of the blog for the past week, and just now I have finally begun editing and updating it. But today I’m gonna make a commitment to get on task once more, and hopefully the blog shouldn’t go through a dark age again.

Well on the brighter side my first college application went through and they accepted me with a scholarship beyond my expectations, keeping in mind it is a private college and one of the most expensive colleges in the area. My final shot at bringing a higher ACT score is also going to take place this Saturday where I am hoping to take the score to a 33 out of 36. Let’s see how it goes, also thanks everyone who has commented on the blog and for the emails.

P.S - It took me queite some time to describe the last few days, after a little help with Dictionary.com stodgy seemed to be the best match.

Stodgy - heavy, dull, or uninteresting; tediously commonplace; boring; of a thick, semisolid consistency; heavy

Update: Been around a hour since I made this post, and I’m starting to feel today has been a productive day, after the past few weeks of ‘hardship’.

Another day of related rates, but today I’m actually listening in calculus, after missing the past two classes, I was a couple 100 theories behind already. After a few minutes of derivatives we got off topic and Mrs.K started discussing why she was gone Friday. Her father-in-law’s artery was swelling on Thursday night and had to have an emergency surgery Friday. One of the doctors involved in the process was Dr.H, father of ‘R’, a student in our class. Mrs.K started commenting on how nice and sincere Dr.H was throughout the whole process. Later she stated how doctors/surgeons have a job which is priceless. ” A salary doesn’t pay for it, nothing does. It is amazing how they can open another human’s chest, go through hours of surgical processes, and two weeks later that man is walking around again.” When I heard this it greatly inspired me once more that I didn’t care about the hours of studying or years of struggle it would take to accomplish my goal, because once I got there I can save lives, help families, and bring happiness back into many people.

Another great video by him: Anaesthetists Hymn

Watched it three times already and it still hasn’t bored me. The singer makes a great song on ‘Careless Surgeons’. Some of the stuff is just so very true, and a statement at the end just brings back the old and gold statement on medicine - “It is a calling, if your not so sure or if your doing it for the money….just don’t go into it. However that is my personal opinion. Anyway great video, worth the watch.

Money & Medicine is one thing that is constantly put together. I hear other students always telling me that they are entering the medical field for the financial factor, and inside I just think about the big mistake they are making. So today as I was reading a few blogs I came across the information below at Mad About Medicine, it isn’t factual data, but personally, it just seems so very true. Most of the public doesn’t consider the different costs a doctor has to go through before he can take his check home and buy a new Rolls Royce *sarcasm*. Becoming a specialized doctor itself is extremely costly itself, in addition to that the insurance, taxes, etc also add up. If one doesn’t have pure passion to medicine..I think its better to just stay out. Anyway now to the table:
——————————————————————
A few postulates about the public:

1. The public has absolutely no clue how much their own doctor gets paid
2. The public has no clue how much the average doctor gets paid
3. The public has no clue how much even the wealthiest doctors make.

A few postulates about doctors:

1. Doctors have no clue how much the doctor across town is making ( or how much their patients make for their jobs)
2. Doctors have no clue what their services are actually worth in a free market
3. Doctors have no clue what their worth is as compared to other professions

But wait, there’s more…

1. The public thinks that doctors are grossly overpaid.
2. Doctors think they are grossly underpaid.

Now let’s look at cost:

1. The public has no idea how much it costs to support and run a medical office
2. The public has no idea of the cost of training a doctor
3. The public has no idea of the amount of time their own doctor spends treating patients

Of course, the other side:

1. Doctors are not the most savvy businessmen and have no idea how to efficiently run a service company *
2. Doctors think the world owes them forever for the financial and personal sacrifice they made to go to medical school
3. Doctors think that they are entitled to a huge amount of money for every service they do with the patient.

————————————————

Now the doctors not being businessmen thing…I disagree with that when it comes to me personally. Lets see if business techniques can be mixed in with medicine, will find out in around 10 years.

I feel so releived to know that Lakshmi’s operation has gone successful. I posted about it just recently here. Lakshmi was suffering from a parasitic twin that was attached to her from birth, giving her four arms and four legs along with numerous other problems including spinal problems. Just a matter of minutes ago the operation ended and Lakshmi has come out successful. Thirty surgeons spent around 27 hours in gifting her with a normal life.

Once again it is stories like this that push me towards the medical field. I hope the best for Lakshmi’s future and hope her condition remains stable. To me this is just one of the many miracles that medicine has brought forth. The various doctors, surgeons, etc… that performed on the young girl are probably angels to the parents of Lakshmi now…it is truly a wonderful job.

Just recently I decided to take a college day to The University of Mississippi. It has one of the best pharmacy schools in the United States and is also recognized for many other areas. The part of it that interested me was the Honors College, ranked in the top 3 honors colleges in the states by Reader’s Digest. Well here it is, my trip to Ole Miss and the things I learned there, the people I met, and the places I saw.

—————————————————————————————————————————————-

Only a few hours away from leaving and I still haven’t printed any maps, ironed any clothes, and spark spark WAM the electricity goes out. This was one of the many times in my life where I regretted my habit of doing things at the last minute. With the electricity back in the morning, I hit MapQuest, print what I need, take a shower, iron my clothes, jump in the car, call my friend and we take off for Ole Miss. The ride to Ole Miss lasted hours and was full of interesting sights to see, including a few fields of cows and even a gas station every now and then! I started to wonder where I was going to end up at, the further and further we got the closer it seemed we got to the end of civilization. Finally after long hours of nothingness I was met with a Ole Miss entrance and minutes after I was there. The campus itself was like a mini-city of younger people. More accustomed to seeing smaller private universities, the campus of Ole Miss was extravagant. It was clean, lively, full of young individuals and occasionally I’d spot what looked like a professor carrying a bundle of books. I headed towards the visitors center and they directed us to the proper building, Martindale (it was basically the center of everything for anyone visiting). From there I learned that the honors tour had already begun 2 hours ago, so we decided to schedule our own mini tours with different guides. The first thing I noticed on arriving was that the staff was extremely kind and worked to fit their schedule into mine. We arrived at 10:00am and by 10:45am our tours and timings were all set. Our first tour or Information session was set at 1 P.M giving us around 2 hours to check the campus out. (By us I mean to a friend and I, I’ll refer to her as ‘H’ from now on). We walked around campus for around 45 minutes when I found ‘L’ a old high school friend of mine. He canceled a few of his meetings and took us to the honors college. As soon as I entered I saw a computer lab with very new desktops each paired with huge 21’ monitors, and free, unlimited printing, hehe. He introduced me to one of the biology professors. I was starting to get the ‘I want to be a surgeon’ feeling again after talking to the professor and seeing the resources available in the labs. Another thing I found interesting were the study rooms, some were as big as a corporate conference rooms, enough to seat 16 people and some as small as a personal lavatory. L explained that some students liked to study in larger areas and some in small confined areas which explained the many different study rooms…mm…yea. After seeing the honors college and different labs and classrooms for chemistry and biochemistry I headed back to Matindale for the info session. The session went by quickly as the recruiter, who explained that he wasn’t fat but instead just had a lot of ‘Love’, entertained us while answering hundreds of questions bye of course me. Finally after the presentation I met the much talked about ‘DSG’, just by looking at him I could tell he was one of those…enlightened people…he was the Dumbledore of Ole Miss, and yea so what If I did read Harry Potter. He introduced us to some of the top students in the college, each of them inspired me more. The rest of the story is pretty straight forward, tours after tours, meetings after meetings, and the ride back home which was full of adventure including me falling asleep almost the whole way back.

Basically at the end of the day, I am glad that I went to visit the college. I met a variety of people that gave me that final nudge to pursue my dreams of a surgeon. What inspires me at many time is listening to people who are higher then me and smarter then me. It inspires me to beat them and become better at what they are best at.

Oh yea I also went to see Saw IV, and being able to stand the gore in their without any problem assures me, surgery is the thing for me.

Med School here I come.

Just today I was watching the news and across the bottom I read about a surgery taking place in India composed of a team of 30 doctors. The surgery will be approximately 40 hours long and the patient is and her condition is what left me with a feeling I can’t describe. It is taking place on a 2-year-old girl, Lakshmi, born with two extra arms and legs. Lakshmi was born with a parasitic twin that stopped developing while in the mothers womb. Her parents kept her hidden after a circus crew saw her as a money-making opportunity and offered to buy her…I regret we have people like that on this planet.

————————-
“A team of 30 doctors was removing the extra limbs and organs, surgery that if successful would give her a good chance to live past adolescence. They have already separated the fused spines and the next step will be to remove the extra limbs and the rest of the “parasite,” said Dr. Sharan Patil, the orthopedic surgeon leading the operation.
————————-

I really hope Lakshmi’s surgery goes well and the results bring her a pleasant future, and a life without any regret