Fainting/Panicking, can I get over this?

[idemandeuphoria]

Med school has been a dream of mine for a long time. My family has a history of chronic illnesses and it’s always been fascinating to me. I volunteered at a hospital throughout high school. I took a break from volunteering my first year of college, but I did ~50 hours of shadowing.

I’m starting to freak out though because out of no where I’ve developed problems. I fainted while shadowing a pediatrician. It was so embarrassing because she was simply talking to a patient’s mom about medical things. Nothing gross or anything. But after that I shadowed a pathologist, an interventional cardiologist, and an interventional radiologist and I was fine!

Then recently I had to get some immunizations for travelling reasons. I’ve never had issues with needles or getting my blood drawn or anything. I started feeling weird after getting one shot and I kinda just told my body to “stop” which didn’t work. I fainted with my eyes still opened and had a couple convulsions. Only lasted seconds. Later, I had to go back and get allergy tested. It was the environmental one where they use a bunch of syringes, and I started having the same light headed weird feeling as soon as I saw them. Halfway through the test I’m completely sobbing and I have no idea why.

I just don’t get it. I’m not scared of medical equipment, but my body keeps reacting that way. I don’t want to react this way! What can I do?

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[bananafish94]

You should talk to your PCP if it's something that really concerns you! It's not a particularly uncommon problem. As for feeling woozy around medical stuff, you will get rapidly desensitized to that in medical school.

 

[ciestar]

Im in medical school.
I faint with shots/needles too lol

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

The needles thing is super common. We have people in the military who are afraid of needles. These are people that get shot at for a living.

As for passing out, that’s pretty common too. A lot of people start breathing very shallowly when they are really focusing on something, along with locking their knees. Boom, out like a light. Don’t forget to breathe and make sure you keep yourself grounded.

 

[Benz MD]

The best way to get over your fears is to face them head on. My fear was cadavers. I was so scared of them I had to leave the room within thirty seconds of seeing one. So I took a cadaver dissection class and forced myself to get over this fear. The first day of class we didn't even see the bodies, and I will never forget trying to put the blade into the scalpel. I was a train wreck. I completed the course..

Also, I fainted during my blood work. There are many things to take into consideration. Such as not eating or drinking enough, amount of sleep etc.

If you can dream it; you can do it. Don't give up on yourself.

 

[sunshinefl]

The needles thing is super common. We have people in the military who are afraid of needles. These are people that get shot at for a living.

As for passing out, that’s pretty common too. A lot of people start breathing very shallowly when they are really focusing on something, along with locking their knees. Boom, out like a light. Don’t forget to breathe and make sure you keep yourself grounded.

Man I’ve felt close a few times. Never actually did though. If I’m getting blood drawn and I can here the spurt hit the side of the tube !!! The worst one was when I got a steroid injection in my knee. Holy hell. Took me 3 hours in the office to recover to 90% and drive home, and basically 24 more hours not to feel woozy anymore. Sometimes I wonder why I do fight it so hard, and think to myself that it would probably be easier to just succumb to it. I’m talking stark white, buckets of sweat, tunnel vision, ringing ears, dizziness, sensation of fading, all of that. Only feel that way when I’m the patient though

 

[HKSZYU]

You can definitely get desensitized to it. I used to get super light headed or even have to leave the room for all sorts of procedures. Increased exposure helped a lot: doing more shadowing, watching videos of procedures, etc.

Also, there are physical things that you can do to stop the lightheadedness from leading to fainting: slightly bending your knees, tensing your quads and abs, deep breaths etc. These help me ward of the faint feeling and also give me more confidence since I know I can better control whether I'll faint.

In regards to getting your own shots/getting your own blood drawn, I think it's pretty normal to have adverse reactions to that. I still do, but I don't think too much of it.

 

[VikingWarrior]

I fainted when I got my tetanus immunization when I was 12. Then a couple of years ago I fainted on the second day of shadowing when looking at a patient's skin lesions. I have worked as a scribe for over a year, have seen much worse, and have not fainted. Sometimes things happen; whatever it is I just pick myself up and move on. You should not let one or two experiences worry you about your future in medicine.

 

[coffeebythelake]

does make things more challenging to be in the medical field but not prohibitive. you will become desensitized to it over time. i never liked needles and was very squirmish around them when i was in medical school... never vasovagal though. i'm now an anesthesiologist and i poke patients daily.

you can also talk to your primary physician about this. SSRI's can help.