The events for the day were far from thrilling. The first part of the day was dedicated to "Diversity" and all that implies. The first presentation was by the two assistant deans for minority affairs and while they were informed about the subject, I couldn't help but feel that I was being preached at. I always come out of listening to diversity presentations feeling bad about being a white male, lol. Following the deans was a presentation by two 2nd year students about diversity in our class and in prospective patient populations. It was actually one of the best diversity presentations I've seen in a while. It started with us filling out a survey about experiences, mainly about discrimination. We then passed our surveys around ten times so we each had some random survey. Then we were asked to raise our hand if the survey in front of us had answered yes to each of the questions. It was shocking just how many students had been discriminated against. Most of our class is pretty fit and almost all of them said they were discriminated against for their appearance at some time. The presenters went on to talk about how to observe and embrace diversity in our professional lives when dealing with patients. It was really entertaining because they played clips from Grey's Anatomy and Scrubs, showing the major problems that each group encountered whether it was dramatic or humorous. Diversity, while it may not seem that important is actually a major influence in almost every part of our lives and I really enjoyed learning how.
After the diversity presentations came the most enjoyable part of the day. One of our associate deans brought in a patient of hers to talk about experiences in the medical field and how they can change your life. This girl, Kelly, and her mom started by showing us a lot of pictures through Kelly's life from when she was a little kid to now, showing us a lot of photos from treatments she went on. Kelly's mom then told her story. In about 2-3rd grade, Kelly was taking part in a language study at P.K. Young when she was given an MRI to look at language development. A Graduate Student saw the scan and that night went to talk with Kelly's dad at their home. Kelly's mom, an oncology nurse, was at work. The graduate student told them that they had found something on the scan and that they had to call this neurosurgeon, handing them a card with a name and number on it. Scared and confused, Kelly's parents worked their way through the bureaucracy and got an appointment with the neurosurgeon. At that time, they were told that Kelly had a brain tumor between her medulla and her pons. The neurosurgeon went on to say that Kelly should most likely have radiation therapy to treat the tumor since surgery was too risky. As she grew up over the next few years, Kelly had radiation therapy to treat her tumor. Eventually she was put on some steroidal medications to deal with some of the side effects. As she underwent these treatments, she ballooned up, gaining 70 pounds in 3 weeks. Due to the radiation and steroids, her bones and muscles became too week to handle her body weight and she was forced to move to a wheelchair. After several years, she developed scoliosis and hip flexor weakness due to a lack of physical therapy while in the chair. She was forced to undergo over 10 more surgeries to put in rods to straighten her back and help alleviate pain. During this time, her family was selected by the make a wish foundation to go to Washington D.C. where they had a blast. Eventually, they came home and still nothing seemed better to Kelly's mom. After all of the treatments they went through, they were still concerned. They began seeing our associate dean for pediatrics and after a while, Dr. Novak (our dean), became suspicious of the results she was getting from Kelly's neurological exam. They took her original scans before the UF Tumor Board and were told that it wasn't a tumor. Kelly never had a tumor. This was confirmed by specialists in St. Louis. After this revelation, all of the departments working on Kelly's case went silent. They were treating a girl with a tumor and now that she no longer had a tumor, they felt no need to be involved in her care. Eventually, Kelly was diagnosed with Alexander's Disease, a very rare genetic disorder involving the degradation of myelin on her nerves. All of the treatments Kelly had been through from radiation and steroids to all of the treatments to curb the side effects were all for nothing. At that point, her family knew what they were dealing with and were able to plan out how to handle her medical care from that point on. After they finished this heart-wrenching story, we, med students, were allowed to ask some questions. One person asked Kelly how she felt about this whole experience. She responded, "I just wish the doctors would say, 'I don't know' or 'I'm not sure, let me look something up' rather than 'you have this, I'm sure'. When everyday is filled with tears and heartbreak, you just become happy for what you have and what you got. If I went and was angry about this or was sad in the corner, who's that helping? No one. So I go out and volunteer wherever I can and do as much as I can, while I can." Her story was so sad, but she seemed so resilient and happy. Just hearing her in all of this was a moving experience. It showed me many of the screw ups that will pop up in medicine, but at the same time, it showed me a truly resilient girl and her family that, through all of the mistakes and all of the pain and sadness, prevailed with a great attitude. I really enjoyed her talk. At the end, Dr. Novak presented Kelly with a College of Medicine pin and a Certificate which was very nice.
The rest of our day seemed menial. We got lunch and watched a presentation on health disparities throughout the U.S. and especially in the Gainesville Community. They showed us the Shands Mobile Clinic that goes out around town offering health screenings and free care, which seems like such a great opportunity. After that we went to the computer testing center to learn how we will be taking tests. We also got our formal pictures taken and were trained in information security. At the same time, Dr. Cooper, our head of evaluations, had our class take a study survey about stress. From what I'm told, they will be using this and other surveys from time to time to gauge how stressful the experience of med school is on our class and how they can help us deal with that stress.
Tonight they have free bowling planned for us which seems really exciting. I will be hitting the lanes and making some more friends in the near future hopefully. In the realm of good news, my car should be headed to the shop on Friday to be fixed and I should be getting my new camera tomorrow. All in all, things are looking up, and I only expect great things coming soon.
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