So when will I start feeling like a doctor?

[carolinablue]

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simple question.
im starting med school in august (ms1).
i know it takes a while to get through the books and everything, but i want to know when students first start to "FEEL" like they're a doctor.
is in rotations? maybe in their first medical volunteering trip in first year? Maybe its only in residency? Maybe its after residency when you are finally fully liable for whatever happens to the patient?

its funny, no matter what volunteering work or shadowing i did in undergrad i never really knew what it would FEEL like to be a doctor...i mean i can watch from the sidelines and imagine what its like, but in the end i am just assuming that it will be something that i will enjoy feeling myself.

i just started feeling like a real medical student in the past few weeks when i tell people that im an ms1 and not just some pre-med college kid. its weird, but very very nice.
Ideally i would love to get that "doctor" experience as quick as possible 🙂

 

[Law2Doc]

simple question.
im starting med school in august (ms1).
i know it takes a while to get through the books and everything, but i want to know when students first start to "FEEL" like they're a doctor.
is in rotations? maybe in their first medical volunteering trip in first year? Maybe its only in residency? Maybe its after residency when you are finally fully liable for whatever happens to the patient?
...

you will start to feel like a doctor during intern year after a few nights alone on call where you are the only MD on the service. Before that, you will more or less just be wearing a white coat and acting as intermediary for actual doctors. And you aren't an MS1 until orientation, you are still an MS0.

 

[carolinablue]

you will start to feel like a doctor during intern year after a few nights alone on call where you are the only MD on the service. Before that, you will more or less just be wearing a white coat and acting as intermediary for actual doctors. And you aren't an MS1 until orientation, you are still an MS0.

ill be the only DO actually 😉
sorry i am actually an ms0

 

[turkeyjerky]

you will start to feel like a doctor during intern year after a few nights alone on call where you are the only MD on the service. Before that, you will more or less just be wearing a white coat and acting as intermediary for actual doctors. And you aren't an MS1 until orientation, you are still an MS0.

yeah, I mean I certainly don't feel like a doctor yet. Although, I will say it probably doesn't feel as great as the OP thinks it does.

 

[Law2Doc]

ill be the only DO actually 😉
0

Either way. Until you work without a net and act as decision maker, (ie alone at night) you won't regard yourself as doctor.

 

[Law2Doc]

... Although, I will say it probably doesn't feel as great as the OP thinks it does.

it's great when you make the right calls and are lauded. Not so great when the reverse. Or when the right call is to wake up an attending at 3am who is going to shoot the messenger.

 

[tigress]

And you aren't an MS1 until orientation, you are still an MS0.

lol, whatever

But also, why would you start to feel like a doctor before you're actually a doctor? Also, what does it mean to feel like a doctor? Half the time I can't even believe I'm an adult 😛

 

[rhesuspieces]

Screw feeling like a doctor, I'd still like to know when I'm going to start feeling like a real adult. 😕 I still feel like I'm going to get caught when I go into a liquor store and I'm a bit nervous that child protective services is going to go after my parents for letting me move to Cleveland all by myself. 😳

 

[Skialta]

You will feel like a doctor the first time you have a complication from something you did (procedure) or something that you did not do that results in hurting someone. Welcome to the big leagues, not always the great feeling you would imagine. On the flip side there are days that you make good decisions and you have good outcomes and you think "this is why I am a surgeon/physician.

skialta

 

[carolinablue]

im not sure if it will be overrated....i think i wanna feel llike a doctor because i've felt like such a bum for too long 😎

 

[Labslave]

Echoing what's been said above, I didn't feel like a real physician until my 3rd day of internship when I was sans senior resident and attending, alone in the CICU. I was practically crapping my pants every five minutes. But when the morning came and patients were still alive, it was a good feeling.

Enjoy being a medical student and not having real responsibilities for a while. Take your education seriously and learn as much as you can while having fun along the way. The whole "feeling like a doctor" thing will come in due time, and it will be significantly sooner than you think.

 

[sineapse]

simple question.
im starting med school in august (ms1).
i know it takes a while to get through the books and everything, but i want to know when students first start to "FEEL" like they're a doctor.
is in rotations? maybe in their first medical volunteering trip in first year? Maybe its only in residency? Maybe its after residency when you are finally fully liable for whatever happens to the patient?

its funny, no matter what volunteering work or shadowing i did in undergrad i never really knew what it would FEEL like to be a doctor...i mean i can watch from the sidelines and imagine what its like, but in the end i am just assuming that it will be something that i will enjoy feeling myself.

i just started feeling like a real medical student in the past few weeks when i tell people that im an ms1 and not just some pre-med college kid. its weird, but very very nice.
Ideally i would love to get that "doctor" experience as quick as possible 🙂

When you graduate?

And surely this is a troll.

 

[TheRach1025]

Screw feeling like a doctor, I'd still like to know when I'm going to start feeling like a real adult. 😕 I still feel like I'm going to get caught when I go into a liquor store and I'm a bit nervous that child protective services is going to go after my parents for letting me move to Cleveland all by myself. 😳

I'm still afraid that my mother will abort me.

 

[45408]

Screw feeling like a doctor, I'd still like to know when I'm going to start feeling like a real adult.

It's pretty gradual, but when I had the MD, a house, wife and son (three of which happened in six months), I realized that I was probably an adult at that point. It's also when I tell people that I've been with my wife for 10 years that I realize I've actually been an adult for a while...

 

[Hemichordate]

when you graduate?

And surely this is a troll.

+1

 

[carolinablue]

When you graduate?

And surely this is a troll.

What, how am i a troll?😕

 

[IHeartNerds]

i started intern year a week ago and still don't...

 

[45408]

i started intern year a week ago and still don't...

That's because you haven't changed your status yet.

 

[drlisa0318]

I can't speak to the OP's question since I'm just a premed, but as to the question of when I first felt like I was an adult, that would be when my husband and I bought a washer/dryer without me first consulting my parents for their opinion. Twenty-plus years later it was brought home to me (this time in a very concrete way) when my mother-in-law passed away. My husband was her only family, but the most he did was sign legal documents. I handled all of the funeral arrangements. Definitely one of the most unpleasant duties of an adult.

 

[willen101383]

What, how am i a troll?😕

Says the guy who joined over a year after you lol

 

[willen101383]

I first felt like SOMETHING...when last week at work one of the docs needed a first assist on a vasectomy and he grabbed me to help him instead of a nurse. (I work in the clinical lab) lol.

Snipping another mans vas bilaterally made me feel so......powerful MUHAHAHA

 

[OpalOnyx]

... i still feel like a ms0! and cherish it greatly

 

[OpalOnyx]

I first felt like SOMETHING...when last week at work one of the docs needed a first assist on a vasectomy and he grabbed me to help him instead of a nurse. (I work in the clinical lab) lol.

Snipping another mans vas bilaterally made me feel so......powerful MUHAHAHA

hahaha thats awesome

 

[UnclePhil]

Screw feeling like a doctor, I'd still like to know when I'm going to start feeling like a real adult. 😕 I still feel like I'm going to get caught when I go into a liquor store and I'm a bit nervous that child protective services is going to go after my parents for letting me move to Cleveland all by myself. 😳

The video in your sig makes me want to go to the local petting zoo.

 

[UAAWolf]

The video in your sig makes me want to go to the local petting zoo.

lol'd hard @ username. Uncle Phil lmao...so awesome

 

[UAAWolf]

And I won't feel like a doctor until I make actual money and move out of my 200 sq foot apartment

 

[SMCmedicine]

I think Melvin Konner said it best in his book, "Becoming A Doctor: A Journey of Initiation In Medical School."

You know you're a doctor when ...

"You have learned to bypass existential moralizing and to grapple with a grotesque pragmatic reality that cannot be ignored. Eventually, you do this even when you are well rested and not under any stress. And when that happens you have become a doctor."

 

[DrCoffeeBean]

Still waiting to feel like one...

 

[chidoman]

.

 

[Kaustikos]

Either I'm not smart enough to understand the quote or I'm still sleepy, either way ?

Disregard moralizing, acquire realism.

 

[VenusinFurs]

I don't think it's a question of feeling like a doctor. I think its a question of faking that you feel like one.

 

[mrwesticles]

In my opinion, you won't start feeling like a doctor until you have medical students under you. At that point, you realize just how far you've come and the skills at your disposal.

 

[azzarah]

The first time a nurse pages you in the middle of the night to ask you to come up to write a senna and colace order. In those cases, I highly recommend that you write for an enema to give them more work so they stop calling you. Just remember my advice, when you become an intern in 4yrs!!!!

 

[45408]

In my opinion, you won't start feeling like a doctor until you have medical students under you. At that point, you realize just how far you've come and the skills at your disposal.

No, I don't feel like I've come farther, even though I know I have. Kind of like how the 7th graders seemed all mighty and all powerful when I was in kindergarten, but I never felt all mighty or all powerful as a 7th grader. Now the 7th graders look about like the kindergarteners to me.

The first time a nurse pages you in the middle of the night to ask you to come up to write a senna and colace order. In those cases, I highly recommend that you write for an enema to give them more work so they stop calling you. Just remember my advice, when you become an intern in 4yrs!!!!

Thank God for telephone orders.

 

[cowme]

The first time I signed my name on a script, and put in orders/signed H+Ps that didn't have to be verified was the first time I felt like a doctor (day one of internship)/