COVID-19 Shutting Down Schools?

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fldoctorgirl said:
I don't know if I can handle studying for Step until September 🙁
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Hopefully it won't go that long, but at this point I honestly don't know. Prometric is shutdown for a month.
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Not sure how I’ll handle being at home doing online instruction through the end of the semester if it comes to that. But I guess it can’t be helped
 
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hallowmann said:
Word from a med student here is that they reduced elective time requirements for graduation. He basically said he could leave today and he'd be OK to graduate.... And then later today email from our departments clinical rotation coordinator is that all medical student rotations have been suspended until further notice.

The preclinical students have offered to run errands, babysit, etc. for staff who need them with all the schools closing and us still working.

This stuff is pretty unprecedented. What we're going to likely see is 4th yrs graduate early and be hired to screen if needed, 1st and 2nd years doing all online classes for the time being and likely delaying steps and rotations, and 3rd years being stuck in some kind of limbo. I feel for you guys right now. Really a weird time to be in healthcare.

The FM board just gave word to all the 3rd yr FM residents that they are postponing the board exam that's scheduled for April, and may push everyone to the Nov date if they can't reschedule.
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LOL our school is - as of today - sure not graduating fourth years early, that's for sure. They actually warned us of fourth years not graduating on time because they might miss some requirements due to rotation cancellations. Asinine. Us third years are sure in limbo. I can see lots of schools moving towards some sort of online module thing for the time being. I'm crossing my fingers by June/July Prometric will be back running but like you said, who knows.

It's definitely a weird time, but I must say, it's oddly exciting. I've been absolutely consumed by this story since early Jan and I'm pretty convinced now we're going to be entering a whole new world for the next 12-18 months.

I feel really bad for students planning to take CS/PE this next few months. Cancelling that can throw off your entire application. That would be horrible. I'm also curious how this is going to impact our ERAS apps this September. This definitely will still be a thing at that point. How significant? Who knows... Things are evolving by the hour.
 
Espressso said:
LOL our school is - as of today - sure not graduating fourth years early, that's for sure. They actually warned us of fourth years not graduating on time because they might miss some requirements due to rotation cancellations. Asinine. Us third years are sure in limbo. I can see lots of schools moving towards some sort of online module thing for the time being. I'm crossing my fingers by June/July Prometric will be back running but like you said, who knows.

It's definitely a weird time, but I must say, it's oddly exciting. I've been absolutely consumed by this story since early Jan and I'm pretty convinced now we're going to be entering a whole new world for the next 12-18 months.

I feel really bad for students planning to take CS/PE this next few months. Cancelling that can throw off your entire application. That would be horrible. I'm also curious how this is going to impact our ERAS apps this September. This definitely will still be a thing at that point. How significant? Who knows... Things are evolving by the hour.
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That's awful that fourth years are being penalized. Ours cancelled rotations today but there has been no talk of credits or graduation. I planned ahead and took time off to do interviews so now if I am not given some sort of alternative for the rotation I am currently on, I will be short four credits for graduation. The classmates that are done right now are the ones that scheduled rotations during interview season and then just didn't make the school aware of how much time they were taking off to interview...

I've said this before on other threads but fourth years should be able to do "away" rotations "at" other schools online courses. Individual schools don't have a ton of online courses built but many have at least a few. This would save the schools from having to rush to develop online courses of their own for the time being. That's IF they want to help us graduate. I guess the other option is to not graduate us and lose a good portion of the intern class next year.
 
Anyone know how this will affect class of ‘23 both short term and long term? Besides moving lectures online that is
 
Espressso said:
LOL our school is - as of today - sure not graduating fourth years early, that's for sure. They actually warned us of fourth years not graduating on time because they might miss some requirements due to rotation cancellations. Asinine. Us third years are sure in limbo. I can see lots of schools moving towards some sort of online module thing for the time being. I'm crossing my fingers by June/July Prometric will be back running but like you said, who knows.

It's definitely a weird time, but I must say, it's oddly exciting. I've been absolutely consumed by this story since early Jan and I'm pretty convinced now we're going to be entering a whole new world for the next 12-18 months.

I feel really bad for students planning to take CS/PE this next few months. Cancelling that can throw off your entire application. That would be horrible. I'm also curious how this is going to impact our ERAS apps this September. This definitely will still be a thing at that point. How significant? Who knows... Things are evolving by the hour.
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I'm sure this will change. Areas of the country that are not yet on the front line are not understanding what's happening. Seattle and NYC are the tip of the spear in the US and it hasn't even started yet in NYC. Things won't be back to "normal" in the sentinel areas until probably July at the earliest, and much, much later in the US interior.
 
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longhaul3 said:
I'm sure this will change. Areas of the country that are not yet on the front line are not understanding what's happening. Seattle and NYC are the tip of the spear in the US and it hasn't even started yet in NYC. Things won't be back to "normal" in the sentinel areas until probably July at the earliest, and much, much later in the US interior.
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That's what I suspect as well. It seems like there will be different peaks and inflection points throughout the country, almost like mini epidemics, probably starting in the urban areas before moving inward. I can tell you, from where I'm currently at, they still joke about it.

I'm just crossing my fingers Prometric is open in June when I take Step 2.
 
DameJulie said:
Anyone know how this will affect class of ‘23 both short term and long term? Besides moving lectures online that is
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People don't know how to plan for the next month, let alone the next four years. Weddings are in limbo, honeymoons are canceled, a presidential primary season has come to a screeching halt. How would anyone know how it will affect the Class of 2023 short term or long term? Anyone who tells you they do is full of it.
 
I'm guessing the only answer anyone can provide is that no one knows, buuuut...does anyone know if there's a possibility incoming 3rd years will have to delay beginning their 3rd year until this thing gets under control? I'm most afraid of what that would mean financially. I don't have any family members who can help financially, and if I can't get my next loan disbursement due to us not being enrolled next semester, I won't be able to afford rent or anything.
 
Do you guys think any domestic travel bans will be implemented or not really? I know airlines themselves are already starting to shut down a lot of their flights due to low capacity
 
hallowmann said:
At this point, I see this easily going to June, if not Sept.
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My personal bet is that we don't really return to any sort of normalcy until around July, but that is completely just my hunch. There will have to be massive concessions made by schools and on a national level so current 3rd years can still graduate and apply to residency on time. Some schools, *cough mine*, are acting in a very resistant way to conceding any ground on required rural rotations, graduation requirements, etc, but I think this will get bad enough where they will not have any choice but to do so. Honestly, my school basically said that if there isn't enough PPE at a site for you then tough and to try to limit exposure, "staying at the clinical site is better for education than online modules." I am very disappointed in how this has been handled.
 
naway said:
I'm guessing the only answer anyone can provide is that no one knows, buuuut...does anyone know if there's a possibility incoming 3rd years will have to delay beginning their 3rd year until this thing gets under control? I'm most afraid of what that would mean financially. I don't have any family members who can help financially, and if I can't get my next loan disbursement due to us not being enrolled next semester, I won't be able to afford rent or anything.
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You're literally in the same potential position as a huge swath of the population, I'm hoping Congress is going to intervene in some way. The JHU daily report basically said that 25% of survey respondents making <$50k/yr have been laid off or had significantly reduced work hours due to Covid. The impact of this is going to be big.

sharkbyte said:
Do you guys think any domestic travel bans will be implemented or not really? I know airlines themselves are already starting to shut down a lot of their flights due to low capacity
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Possible, likely to be limited more by what you have already described, shutting down of flights by airlines.

AnatomyGrey12 said:
My personal bet is that we don't really return to any sort of normalcy until around July, but that is completely just my hunch. There will have to be massive concessions made by schools and on a national level so current 3rd years can still graduate and apply to residency on time. Some schools, *cough mine*, are acting in a very resistant way to conceding any ground on required rural rotations, graduation requirements, etc, but I think this will get bad enough where they will not have any choice but to do so. Honestly, my school basically said that if there isn't enough PPE at a site for you then tough and to try to limit exposure, "staying at the clinical site is better for education than online modules." I am very disappointed in how this has been handled.
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Ridiculous. We just got word today that we are eliminating clinics to patients that absolutely need to be seen. Its not going to be a great educational experience for students for a minute.
 
hallowmann said:
You're literally in the same potential position as a huge swath of the population, I'm hoping Congress is going to intervene in some way. The JHU daily report basically said that 25% of survey respondents making <$50k/yr have been laid off or had significantly reduced work hours due to Covid. The impact of this is going to be big.
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I do think there is a decent chance Congress will step in and provide assistance to people who are out of work/working significantly fewer hours if this thing goes on more than a month or so, like you said. I'm worried people in positions like mine will fall through the cracks and be ineligible for any government assistance since we are unemployed, though. I'm trying to keep on top of studying for my exams and for Step, but I'm honestly really scared right now. I got 3 hours of sleep max last night because I kept waking up in a panic.
 
AnatomyGrey12 said:
... There will have to be massive concessions made by schools and on a national level so current 3rd years can still graduate and apply to residency on time...
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I completely agree. Residency programs aren't going to go without an entire class of interns. That will disrupt their staffing for years (no intern class becomes no PGY2 class, becomes no PGY3 etc). It may be chaotic, but the system needs everyone to graduate on time to function.
 
holdthemayo said:
I completely agree. Residency programs aren't going to go without an entire class of interns. That will disrupt their staffing for years (no intern class becomes no PGY2 class, becomes no PGY3 etc). It may be chaotic, but the system needs everyone to graduate on time to function.
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Or early...
www.buzzfeed.com

Medical Students Are Being Graduated Early And Fast-Tracked To Hospitals

The newly graduated students will be able to carry out some hospital tasks such as patient assessments and blood tests.
www.buzzfeed.com www.buzzfeed.com
www.reuters.com

Italy rushes new doctors into service as coronavirus deaths rise above 2,500

Italy will rush 10,000 student doctors into service, scrapping their final exams, in an effort to help the struggling health service cope with the coronavirus which claimed another 345 lives.
www.reuters.com www.reuters.com
 
AnatomyGrey12 said:
My personal bet is that we don't really return to any sort of normalcy until around July, but that is completely just my hunch. There will have to be massive concessions made by schools and on a national level so current 3rd years can still graduate and apply to residency on time. Some schools, *cough mine*, are acting in a very resistant way to conceding any ground on required rural rotations, graduation requirements, etc, but I think this will get bad enough where they will not have any choice but to do so. Honestly, my school basically said that if there isn't enough PPE at a site for you then tough and to try to limit exposure, "staying at the clinical site is better for education than online modules." I am very disappointed in how this has been handled.
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When you graduate, be sure to write an in-depth review for pre-meds. They need to know about the schools that don't care about the safety and well-being of their students. Also, be sure to remember this and let them know every time you get one of those alumni donation calls.

hallowmann said:
Ridiculous. We just got word today that we are eliminating clinics to patients that absolutely need to be seen. Its not going to be a great educational experience for students for a minute.
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I hope you mean you're limiting clinics?
 
As of now, NBME still wants in-person exams, so not all MS1/2 can be completely online. Defeats the purpose of distance learning if people still have to travel back for an exam...
How are your schools dealing with exams?
 
Mass Effect said:
When you graduate, be sure to write an in-depth review for pre-meds. They need to know about the schools that don't care about the safety and well-being of their students. Also, be sure to remember this and let them know every time you get one of those alumni donation calls.



I hope you mean you're limiting clinics?
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Limiting, yes, eliminating was the wrong word. Shutting down non-urgent clinics, doing all other follow-ups by phone. Only people that absolutely need to be seen are being seen. Obviously, urgent/emergent visits are still on the table, but after reviewing it, easily 1/3 or 1/2 of visits could be postponed, most of the rest can be done over the phone for many of the most acute concerns requiring eval, and a handful are actually necessary to see in person. Eventually most of the psych side will be telepsych. Unclear if the other clinics will be telemed or just telephone with plan to follow-up when things calm down.

naway said:
I do think there is a decent chance Congress will step in and provide assistance to people who are out of work/working significantly fewer hours if this thing goes on more than a month or so, like you said. I'm worried people in positions like mine will fall through the cracks and be ineligible for any government assistance since we are unemployed, though. I'm trying to keep on top of studying for my exams and for Step, but I'm honestly really scared right now. I got 3 hours of sleep max last night because I kept waking up in a panic.
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I'm hoping they implement something that does not restrict to only people that have lost jobs, but includes all Americans, possibly based on income, because this is going to hit a lot of people in a lot of different circumstances.

What I will say is, don't be afraid to reach out for help. I remember lending friends money in med school when they ran out and had more immediate needs than me, and people paid back once disbursement came. There's likely a lot of people out there that will need to be helping each other get through what's coming. There's a lot of people that care about you, and many would jump to help if they can.
 
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randombanana said:
As of now, NBME still wants in-person exams, so not all MS1/2 can be completely online. Defeats the purpose of distance learning if people still have to travel back for an exam...
How are your schools dealing with exams?
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Some schools are doing in person exams in multiple rooms, with students spread out and more proctors.

Our classes are in a large auditorium, there is one for 1st years and one for 2nd years, each one holds roughly 175-200 people. They can put 75 students in each of these spread out, and proctor those large auditoriums with 2-3 faculty members. We also have large conference rooms to further spread test takers out.
 
pagingdoctormom said:
What’s the contingency plan for OMM? Isn’t there a required amount of “hands on” hours that have to be done?
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All classes (didactic and lab) are cancelled for us as well. Instructors are restructuring the grading regimen and have no intention of making up “hands on” OMM hours at the moment. The same applies to the rest of our clinical experiences as well.

The next 3 months are going to be interesting.....

pagingdoctormom said:
Some schools are doing in person exams in multiple rooms, with students spread out and more proctors.

Our classes are in a large auditorium, there is one for 1st years and one for 2nd years, each one holds roughly 175-200 people. They can put 75 students in each of these spread out, and proctor those large auditoriums with 2-3 faculty members. We also have large conference rooms to further spread test takers out.
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Not NBOME, but we are going to exams at home with monitoring via live webcam.
 
Our school finally reached back out to us yesterday to say that we'll officially be held out of rotations for two weeks after Friday (being the last day). Then after two weeks they will reassess before either keeping us out more or letting us go back.

Does anyone actually think the situation in two weeks will be much better for students on clinical rotations? It seems like in two weeks cases will be quadrupled and I can't see schools looking at the situation then and saying, yep, you can go back in.

For schools that have cancelled rotations already, what has been the timeline for return?
 
“45 days” is what all the nyc bodies keep citing as time to peak effect. I am pretty sure they’re pulling that number out of nowhere but if you assume it to be true, I’d imagine at least 2-2.5x45 days so 3-4 months at the earliest before things gain any sense of normalcy
 
Espressso said:
Does anyone actually think the situation in two weeks will be much better for students on clinical rotations? It seems like in two weeks cases will be quadrupled and I can't see schools looking at the situation then and saying, yep, you can go back in.
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Not at all. Even in the hardest hit areas, the actual crisis phase hasn't even started yet. I think it's irresponsible of schools to reevaluate every week or every two weeks. They should adjourn for X number of weeks so the students can go ride this out wherever is most comfortable and financially feasible instead of keeping you on call just to tell you it'll be another week.
 
randombanana said:
As of now, NBME still wants in-person exams, so not all MS1/2 can be completely online. Defeats the purpose of distance learning if people still have to travel back for an exam...
How are your schools dealing with exams?
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We have about a dozen rooms. We are supposedly doing our NBMEs in shifts with only a few people per room.
 
Matthew9Thirtyfive said:
We have about a dozen rooms. We are supposedly doing our NBMEs in shifts with only a few people per room.
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We just took our shelves like that. 10 people per room. What’s even weirder is instead of appropriately spreading out to 6+feet , my classmates somehow decided sitting one computer away was sufficient . Like come on bro , life is urinal rules now .Stand the Farthest away you can.
 
libertyyne said:
We just took our shelves like that. 10 people per room. What’s even weirder is instead of appropriately spreading out to 6+feet , my classmates somehow decided sitting one computer away was sufficient . Like come on bro , life is urinal rules now .Stand the Farthest away you can.
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Urinal rules are much different in the Navy.
 
Espressso said:
Our school finally reached back out to us yesterday to say that we'll officially be held out of rotations for two weeks after Friday (being the last day). Then after two weeks they will reassess before either keeping us out more or letting us go back.

Does anyone actually think the situation in two weeks will be much better for students on clinical rotations? It seems like in two weeks cases will be quadrupled and I can't see schools looking at the situation then and saying, yep, you can go back in.

For schools that have cancelled rotations already, what has been the timeline for return?
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My school is pushing the same rhetoric. There’s no way this blows over in 2 weeks. I understand that leadership needs to appear strong and not incite panic and also keep us from bugging them daily but it’s making me feel like I know things they don’t know and I feel extremely uncomfortable about that.
 
Both state school universities (not med schools, yet) have moved online for the remainder of the semester in Oklahoma
 
sparkysparkyboomman said:
Both state school universities (not med schools, yet) have moved online for the remainder of the semester in Oklahoma
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The undergrad of my med school has too.

The M4’s were already off rotations this week and next (planned stuff). We’ll see what happens after next week.
 
I’m sure my school will be pressured to move online to the end of the semester too, sadly. Right now we’re doing the whole ‘online til the 6th’ and then reassess.
 
At this point I wish schools would just let MS4s go. They said it’s not safe to be on rotations now. They cancelled graduation today.Then logically they don’t think it’s gonna be safe in April. Just let us go. So we can move and get ready for residency.
 
MerYangBey said:
At this point I wish schools would just let MS4s go. They said it’s not safe to be on rotations now. They cancelled graduation today.Then logically they don’t think it’s gonna be safe in April. Just let us go. So we can move and get ready for residency.
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Yes, graduate us Italian style already! No need to be hovering around until May.
 
Those of you all whose schools are doing online exams - are your grading systems P/F? My school won't let up on in-person exams (even though our state has put in some pretty strict restrictions) and they're citing our non-P/F grading system as the reason. They've told us that all the schools who are doing online testing are true P/F.
 
A_Garrr said:
Those of you all whose schools are doing online exams - are your grading systems P/F? My school won't let up on in-person exams (even though our state has put in some pretty strict restrictions) and they're citing our non-P/F grading system as the reason. They've told us that all the schools who are doing online testing are true P/F.
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Lol, no. We were a traditional grading system. Our exams and all curriculum have moved to 100% online and yesterday our dean announced that all courses for the remainder of the semester will be P/F, with our existing adjustments still in place.
 
A_Garrr said:
Those of you all whose schools are doing online exams - are your grading systems P/F? My school won't let up on in-person exams (even though our state has put in some pretty strict restrictions) and they're citing our non-P/F grading system as the reason. They've told us that all the schools who are doing online testing are true P/F.
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Does your school take NBMEs . I heard nbme is being difficult.
 
We were initially told we’d be online for the next three weeks, but it’s been extended to the rest of the term. Thankfully we learned about this during spring break, when I had already gone home to be with my family, so I didn’t have to As an MS1, I think my year is fairly lucky - pretty much every other year is having more challenges. We’re having 1 NBME moved to MS2 and the rest of the tests will be online.

I’m MD/PhD so I am a little concerned about my summer rotation but at least my work is computational..
 
fldoctorgirl said:
Lol, no. We were a traditional grading system. Our exams and all curriculum have moved to 100% online and yesterday our dean announced that all courses for the remainder of the semester will be P/F, with our existing adjustments still in place.
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This is what I thought. Issue is they're also apparently unwilling to switch to P/F (even temporarily) to accommodate the circumstances - for a variety of reasons (of varying legitimacy).

libertyyne said:
Does your school take NBMEs . I heard nbme is being difficult.
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No, not until second year. They have said that an issue, though, is that our usual exam software offers no way to record/monitor us. That said, we run under an honor code and our normal exams are NOT proctored. So this doesn't really add up.
 
A_Garrr said:
This is what I thought. Issue is they're also apparently unwilling to switch to P/F (even temporarily) to accommodate the circumstances - for a variety of reasons (of varying legitimacy).



No, not until second year. They have said that an issue, though, is that our usual exam software offers no way to record/monitor us. That said, we run under an honor code and our normal exams are NOT proctored. So this doesn't really add up.
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Sounds like the translation is that changing things around would require them to do work for something that is definitely temporary and maybe only be for a few months, and they just don’t want to or can’t put in the effort.
 
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