lab coat

[greater_omentum]

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here's a semi serious question for you guys...
so i'm going into MSII next year and i'm doing a bit of basic science research at my school. anyhow, it involves tissue culture and my PI got me this full length white lab coat. so basically i'm just wondering how big a sin it is to wear this full length coat out of the lab while i'm running to the autoclave down the hall and to use the microscope upstairs and whatnot. i've gotten what i thought were a few funny looks from some attendings in the hallway...i assure you that during my rotations with my clinical preceptor last year i wear the shortest white coat you can possibly find...should i try as hard as possible to take this thing off everytime i step outside? or do the petri dishes/pipettes i'm usually holding in the hall offset the long coat/tell the casual observer that i am not in fact an attending but a lowly med student?

haha or am i just exposing my neurosis/obsessions with rank that are leading me to consider a career in surgery?

 

[LJDHC05]

here's a semi serious question for you guys...
so i'm going into MSII next year and i'm doing a bit of basic science research at my school. anyhow, it involves tissue culture and my PI got me this full length white lab coat. so basically i'm just wondering how big a sin it is to wear this full length coat out of the lab while i'm running to the autoclave down the hall and to use the microscope upstairs and whatnot. i've gotten what i thought were a few funny looks from some attendings in the hallway...i assure you that during my rotations with my clinical preceptor last year i wear the shortest white coat you can possibly find...should i try as hard as possible to take this thing off everytime i step outside? or do the petri dishes/pipettes i'm usually holding in the hall offset the long coat/tell the casual observer that i am not in fact an attending but a lowly med student?

haha or am i just exposing my neurosis/obsessions with rank that are leading me to consider a career in surgery?

I'm pretty sure that attendings give everyone funny looks.

 

[group_theory]

In a bench research setting, everyone wears the long whitecoat - from the lab techs, the post-docs, the delivery guy, etc. The only people who don't wear the labcoats are the PIs 🙂

Besides, you don't want to spill those precious expensive toxic and radioactive stuff onto your pants just because your labcoat was too short

In a basic lab setting, how will people know you're a med student and not a college student or the new lab tech or the new post-doc, etc (and thus know that it is appropriate to give you funny looks)

 

[Flopotomist]

Uhm... the long lab coat is supposed to be functional, and not just a fashion statement. If you are working in a lab and require the protection afforded by the long coat, I would hope that you would get funnier looks wearing a short coat and leaving a good portion of yourself unprotected.

 

[Mr. McDuck]

I think attendings just look funny at everyone who isn't an attending. At work, they give the ancillary staff weird looks all the time. I don't really know why, but I think maybe they're used to the mask hiding their facial expressions, so they forget you can see what they look like.

 

[Callogician]

Oooooh! Ooooh! A long white coat just like a real doctor! Yay!

 

[greater_omentum]

thanks everyone for their replies. now i can sleep at night and stop my uncontrollable weeping! 😀

 

[ForbiddenComma]

I wonder if any med school lets their students wear the long coat, like whenever you see students in the TV shows.




I bet students at that school would get more chicks.

 

[Blade28]

Just wear your ID badge and everything will be OK.

 

[BozoSparky]

haha...yeah, i had a long lab coat way back when i was an undergrad. now i have a phd and as a med student i get to wear a little white coat like a soda jerk...oh well, at least we look cute, or funny, or whatever... 🙂

 

[DrChandy]

here's a semi serious question for you guys...
so i'm going into MSII next year and i'm doing a bit of basic science research at my school. anyhow, it involves tissue culture and my PI got me this full length white lab coat. so basically i'm just wondering how big a sin it is to wear this full length coat out of the lab while i'm running to the autoclave down the hall and to use the microscope upstairs and whatnot. i've gotten what i thought were a few funny looks from some attendings in the hallway...i assure you that during my rotations with my clinical preceptor last year i wear the shortest white coat you can possibly find...should i try as hard as possible to take this thing off everytime i step outside? or do the petri dishes/pipettes i'm usually holding in the hall offset the long coat/tell the casual observer that i am not in fact an attending but a lowly med student?

haha or am i just exposing my neurosis/obsessions with rank that are leading me to consider a career in surgery?

If you're workign with tissue cultures, its best that you dont use your lab coat outside of the lab environment. Granted, you will find microbes and mold spores in the air in the lab itself, but exposing the coat to the autoclave area (which isn't the cleanest), hallways, or maybe even the outsides of buildings, are not a good idea. It can really be a hassle to end up with fungi or any other microbe growing in your tissue culture. If that ever happens, you have to scrap your entire culture and restart from scratch. It's happened before. I've discovered that in the context of a medical lab, protection worn such as gloves, lab coats, are more often than not for the protection of the samples rather than for the protection for the experiementer himself/herself 🙂 (unless, of course you are working with hazardous reagents).

 

[greater_omentum]

If you're workign with tissue cultures, its best that you dont use your lab coat outside of the lab environment. Granted, you will find microbes and mold spores in the air in the lab itself, but exposing the coat to the autoclave area (which isn't the cleanest), hallways, or maybe even the outsides of buildings, are not a good idea. It can really be a hassle to end up with fungi or any other microbe growing in your tissue culture. If that ever happens, you have to scrap your entire culture and restart from scratch. It's happened before. I've discovered that in the context of a medical lab, protection worn such as gloves, lab coats, are more often than not for the protection of the samples rather than for the protection for the experiementer himself/herself 🙂 (unless, of course you are working with hazardous reagents).

prudent advice my friend. 👍

frickin cells, man. always with their "split me, split me" and their need for more "media," whatever that is. really they're pretty demanding for a bunch of circles with little crazy dots in them. 😀 seriously though bench research has been treating yours truly well this summer, well enough to consider taking a research year at some point.

have any of you guys taken a research year/extended 4th year or whatnot? i'd be interested to hear any words of wisdom.

 

[DrChandy]

prudent advice my friend. 👍

frickin cells, man. always with their "split me, split me" and their need for more "media," whatever that is. really they're pretty demanding for a bunch of circles with little crazy dots in them. 😀 seriously though bench research has been treating yours truly well this summer, well enough to consider taking a research year at some point.

have any of you guys taken a research year/extended 4th year or whatnot? i'd be interested to hear any words of wisdom.

Sure thing, g_o. I did a year of it before matriculating. Let me know what you'd like to know more about it.

 

[Miami_med]

I wonder if any med school lets their students wear the long coat, like whenever you see students in the TV shows.




I bet students at that school would get more chicks.

Come to Miami. Long white coats at preceptor MSI.