Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: Residency

  • Regalia

    Nancy L. Hagood Charleston, South Carolina, United States   Rainbow over Haiti. Photo by Thomas Johnston. My medical school graduation regalia has hung in my closet for two years. It will never be worn. In spring 2019, I was a fourth-year medical student, planning to graduate in May and move 500 miles north to work…

  • When a medical student becomes a patient

    Andrew Gallagher Burlington, Vermont, United States   Student at a Table by Candlelight. Salomon Savery after Rembrandt van Rijn. 1642/65. The Art Institute of Chicago. Public domain. Elliot pointed to the ultrasound monitor. “What is this?” he said slowly, trailing off. His finger was on the large, black sac occupying the entire bottom of the…

  • Maintaining a moral compass in medicine

    Jeffrey Lee Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States   “The Doctor.” Painting by Sir Luke Fildes, 1891. Location: Tate Gallery, London Fildes the doctor It seemed like just another day during my third-year surgical rotation until I heard Mrs. W. cry. It was during daily rounds in the bustling ICU, and our team was squeezed around a single…

  • Lost in translation

    Jonathan Xian Houston, Texas, United States   Two Human Beings. The Lonely Ones. Edvard Munch. 1894. The Art Institute of Chicago. At the start of residency, you should make a list of five things you value most and think carefully about which ones you can live without. Cross them off one by one until only…

  • A very interesting case

    Anjiya Sulaiman Karachi, Pakistan   Image by Khan Osama bin Fraz By my fourth year of medical school I had learned to distill patients into a pure clinical form. Individual characteristics are routinely and expertly tweezed and condensed into an intricate framework of pathology, pharmacology, and medical jargon: we call them “cases.” I met S…

  • The Craft of Medical Reflection

    JTH ConnorSt. John’s, Newfoundland Allan Peterkin is a professor of psychiatry and family medicine at the University of Toronto, Canada. As a teacher and author he is probably best known for his survival guide to post graduate medical studies, Staying Human During Residency Training: How to Survive and Thrive after Medical School, which is now…

  • Medicine’s old-school technology

    Katie Taylor San Francisco, CA   I am six months into my first year of residency as a doctor. And my experience so far has been sorrowfully screen-dominated. If aliens were to come down and observe a day in the life, I am afraid they’d assume the computer is the patient and the patient’s room…