OMG sorry I am just catching up on this thread because I've been working on my appeal and trying to find a job to pay the bills. Thank you to those who have been supportive. To those who have just used this thread as a playground for argument, vet student, I again suggest you take it somewhere else. For your info, I HAVE earned the right to graduate by completing all of my school's clinicals, basic sciences, etc. Yes the exam is a requirement too. However, this damn exam does not show that I am not fit to be a doctor , that whole "there's a reason they didn't pass" is bullsh$t o.k. These tests, USMLEs don't represent the real world. You are usually with your patient more that 1.36 minutes, but that's how long you get to read about a patient and their illness, look at labs, asses the scenario and answer the question. Times that by 9 hours and you get Hell. I am sure some others, whether they passed or not, will agree the exam was hellish.... not something you want to repeat if you don't have to. Oh and how many times have you seen your resident pull out their epocrates, pharmacopia or that little pocket ID book and look something up? That's the real world. But we are expected to carry it all in our heads, at least until the exam is over. You know nothing about what I did to prepare , for how long, and what circumstances surrounded that prep and there were "circumstances".... family circumstances. I had to be the health care decision maker to my sister who was in the hospital dying, yes actually dying, of an infection that the docs were taking a little too long to find....so I helped them out with suggestions....which they took because they could tell I knew some stuff after 4 years in med school and if they hadn't found it by now, what's a few extra tests. Now I know I am not a doctor yet and so don't know more than those docs did, I guess, but I'll be damned if I was going to sit there and watch my sister deteriorate and do nothing. I had access to medical databases and journals, etc through my school's wonderful proxy server. so when I wasn't at the hospital I was looking up stuff at night, you know rather than sleep. After I left my home town to come back to school to STUDY, while she was still in the hospital, I had to play long distance health care provider.... Doctors calling me asking if they can run this test and that test and give this med and that med.... Conference calls, talking with social workers, the "whole 9 yards". Now I am not complaining because there was really no one else in my family to do it and she is my SISTER, but I'm just giving you some context. You know to erase that image in your head of me twiddling my thumbs for weeks and weeks and then just up and taking the test. Don't deny, you know a part of you thought that, which is why you are so harsh. You think I don't deserve to get my MD because I didn't work hard enough for it. Well I've worked harder than most. Oh and let's not forget my father's cancer coming back and going all metastatic. That was a surprise. Oh and let's not forget one of my favorite anuts dying. ALL while I was studying for the boards...ALL 3 times. Yes, tragedy was spread out for me... how lucky am I. A little distracting wouldn't you say? Now this is not my "excuse for not passing" but give me a damn break. You tell me you could think straight with all that sh$t going on and I'll say either you're a lyer or just have no feelings at all. So before you judge somebody else, in an open forum no less, you need to stop and think about what you're about to say and whether you #1 have the right to do so and #2 have the whole story. 'kay? And if it wasn't apparent, yes I am angry and I know once you put something on the internet it's out there forever, but this is nothing I wouldn't say again in a heartbeat, online or in person.
