The oral board exam is behind me. I have completed all of the requirements needed to become a board-certified general surgeon. I have been often asked how long it took me to complete all of the training required for this career. This is a difficult question for me to answer because I do not know when to start counting. I suppose 4 years of undergraduate Education followed by 4 years of medical school and a 5 year residency would equal 13 years. I do not think this is completely accurate because we are an amalgam of all our formal and informal education and experiences. When I was sitting next to my friend during one of our medical school lectures we began discussing our potential specialties. At this time I was attempting to keep an open mind because I had limited experience in medicine as I was the first person my family to even go to college. She looked at me and said “Do not kid yourself. You are a surgeon!” This was a bit shocking to me. Did I display many of the negative attributes often times ascribed to surgeons? Perhaps I exhibited some of the positive characteristics of surgeons. I certainly have always been driven by long-term goals. Possibly she simply thought that I fit the stereotype.
From the time I was trying to decide what career path to right now, I have always had a clear goal focused plan. My goal oriented nature and long-term planning has been a fixture in my life. For as long as I can remember I would always think about where I wanted to be 5 years. I would formulate a plan and work diligently toward that plan. I now am in the first year of my surgical practice with both my qualifying and certifying exams behind me. Life is just happening and I am uncertain what my next goal is going to be. For these reasons, I have decided to make a blog with several goals. The 1st goal is to chronical my experiences both good and bad as I try to establish myself and career as a surgeon. My second focus of this blog is to provide advice and opinions about navigating through the education required for a career in medicine. As I was in the midst of my education path, I would often hear opinions and advice from other students who were going through the same thing as me. These buzzings and rumors were sometimes accurate but often times not. It was often difficult to gain access to people who have already completed the education and training. This was especially true as my family had no ties to the medical community. My hope is to provide insight based on my experience that can hopefully provide students with clarity and decrease some stress associated with the unknown aspects of our training.
This task seems somewhat daunting to me because I am a surgeon and not a professional writer. I think the reader will find my posts to be honest and relatable but with tremendously underdeveloped and unskilled literary style. There will most certainly be plenty of spelling an grammar errors. I beg the reader’s forgiveness of spelling, grammar, and sentence structure errors as I embark on this new journey.
Opereight 