Family Medicine Rocks!

So after the dust settled from the exciting news and day of yesterday, more exciting news filtered in to my radar. 

2010 Fill Rate for Family Medicine Highest Ever
    The fill rate (which is the number of spots filled in the match) was 91.4% for family medicine.  Those spots that are not filled in the match are filled in the scramble by people who did not match.  This percentage is the highest for family medicine ever.  There was also a 9% increase in the number of US grads entering family medicine!  I guess we are doing something right and people are figuring out the necessity and value of primary care physicians.
     The reason it is exciting that more US grads are entering family medicine is because oftentimes family medicine, internal medicine, and pediatrics (the primary care specialties) will fill in the remaining spots with foreign medical grads, because these are the least competitive specialties.  Even though in my eyes they are the most important specialties.  Just some very exciting news for the future of family medicine.

Here are some pictures from yesterday!  Enjoy.

Pre-envelope receiving or opening.

Mel and I with our 12-year-old-sitting-at-the-kiddie-table-at Thanksgiving-sparkling-non-champagne-apple-cider.  yum :(

It's in my hands...now just have to wait until noon!

ahhhh....

The Letter!

3 new family docs enter the world!

We have jobs!

It's over.  We survived and are extremely extremely happy with where we ended up.



Here's the video of the moment!  You probably only need to watch the first minute, after that things get a little shaky.  Our cameraman stood up.  We are not screaming and jumping up and down, because it's not home, but....it is the program that we liked the most.  I can easily say if this program was in Sacramento it would have been ranked first.  We are headed to the University of Arizona in Tucson Arizona!  Where there are 360 days of sun!

Tomorrow we can say tomorrow!

"Tomorrow we can say tomorrow," was the phrase of the day yesterday.  This is in reference to the countdown to match day, which has been going on for about 2 weeks or so now.  Yesterday was 2 days away.  Today I have repeatedly shaken Sief's leg and said "Tomorrow" with wide eyes and a big smile!

It's finally here.  I cannot believe it.  We have been waiting our entire medical education for tomorrow moment at noon eastern time.  The moment we open our envelopes and find out where we will be spending  the next 3-4 years of our lives.  Thankfully we passed the test on Monday which notified us that we had matched into our preferred specialty.  And thankfully, we will only spend 3-4 years at our location of residency.  For some of my classmates going into surgery or other long specialties will find out where they will be spending the next 7 years of their lives.  That's crazy.

I cannot describe the emotions I have been feeling over the last couple of days.  It's a mixture of excitment, nervousness, and fear.  This is by far one of the biggest moments of my life up until this point.  Likely it will be the most memorable day of my medical school career.  I do not expect to feel this anxiousness and anticipation for something again until I may someday get married or have a child.  That's the weight this carries.  I know that may sound ridicuolous to some, but for us and the medical community that is the way it is. 

I have played out the moment in my head of when we open our envelopes to find out where we matched over in my head more than 100 times.  It's crazy and may be nothing like what I imagine.  I'm afraid I'll get a paper cut from running my finger under the envelope flap to open it.  I probably have obsessed over this moment a little too much.  I hope I have a few glasses of champagne in me before the actual opening.  We'll see.....

Here's a brief overview of what tomorrow will be like.  When I get a chance I will post a video of Sief and I opening our envelopes.  We have to arrive at 10:30 am.  We each pay $1 into a pot (I'll explain where this comes in later).  We have a few speeches - from our classmate, alumni, etc.  More talking not sure about what and I guess somewhere around 11am they will start calling our names and handing out our envelopes, which we cannot open until noon.  The last person to get their envelope gets the pot of $$$.  Then at noon we open our envelopes and eat a yummy lunch.  That's my understanding.

Here are some pictures from first year.  I've come a long way.  Wish us luck!

Much love,
Jen

One hurdle down and THE day is almost here!

The most important day of my medical school career will happen this week.  Some may say that day was today, because without today you don't make it to Thursday.
Here's my post on it from last year.

I don't know if you recall or not the system that we follow to find out where we will train for residency.  Briefly - you apply to x number of programs, interview at the programs that offer you interviews, rank those programs in the order of personal preference.  The programs then rank all the applicants they interviewed and....a big computer system matches them up.

Well....today we found out if we matched or not.  And we did match, both Sief and I.
Thursday noon Eastern time is when we find out where.

The Next Step!

So, I've written some about the interview trail and I can happily say that it is finally coming to an end.  I have my last interview this coming Monday and then I am finished!!!!  woo hoo!!  Don't get me wrong it has been great to be able to travel to all of these different residencies and learn about the unique opportunities avaliable through different programs.  There are some very unique opportunities out there.

It's interesting too, because the path my career will take seems to have changed slightly during the interview trail.  I was often asked, "Where do you see yourself in 5 years?"  I had a standard answer, which was really quite honestly doing a lot of things.  I see myself someday working abroad (either months at a time or a few years), I also enjoy teaching and can see myself one day working at a residency program.  I also want to deliver babies for a while, probably not for my entire career, but definitely for a while.  I enjoy women's health and moms and babies.  Do I see myself working in a hospital after residency?  I'm not quite sure about that one yet, maybe if I were at a residency program I would.  Group visits are something I want to give a try at some point in my career and the thing that I have added since being on the residency trail is that I think someday I want a Master's in Public Health.  It's funny because I have always said I enjoyed family medicine partly for the preventative medicine part of it and before starting the interview trail I never really looked beyond an individual patient, but with a little bit more education - I could in theory reach out to entire communities and populations.  Maybe someday even end up in some adminsitrative work.
    It's crazy because there are still so many options open to me through my choice of family medicine.  Anyways...back to the title of the post - The Next Step.  Now is the time that Sief and I make our rank list.  This is when we compile a list 1-10 (or the number of places we interviewed) and rank them in our order of preference.  Once we have completed our list we submit it and the residency programs do the same.  They rank the people they interviewed 1-100 (or whatever number) and then we wait... and wait....and wait...until March 18th to find out if we matched and where.  That's 55 days away.

Let the countdown begin, because it will be here before we know it!  We're one step closer :)