Hey all, I just need to vent, thanks for taking the time to read if you do:
So, as my name implies, I have been balls to the wall, all-in to shooting for primary care since I scribed for an IM PCP before medical school. I specifically chose DO because I enjoy hands on manipulation as well and thought this could be a neat part of a practice. But now, I'm currently on my Family Med rotation, and I'm just so miserable; the only problem is, I can't tell if its the specialty... if it's the doctors... if it's the patients... I'm not sure exactly what it is. I just know that I leave work every day feeling super defeated and depressed.
I left all my other rotations incredibly uplifted (I only have IM and Surg left) and I really felt like I had actually done something, even if it was something super tiny. I would always call my spouse or mom after each shift and relay cool stories I had from any of the rotations. I have never had that feeling so far on this rotation and we're 6 weeks in.. and I'm getting anxious/nervous because this is what I was so excited for...and now I just come home and don't even wanna talk about work.
In all my rotations so far I would always be able to confront my attendings to give a thorough yet concise H&P and even relay my DDx and treatment ideas, and they all appreciated my thoughts and ideas. I have never been nervous talking to patients in the past... and I always seemed to be able to focus on something during a visit. Suddenly on this rotation, I just feel so incompetent. I stumble over my words when I talk to patients, I feel like I can't concisely depict why any of these patients are coming in, and half of them don't know why they're there either. Even if I do talk to a patient about a sick/urgent/acute complaint, I can't seem to even put together a DDx. The attending will ask me to hurry and see a patient but I go in the room and they're seeing a bajillion specialists and are all on 20 medications and when I try to ask them about which ones they're still on, none of them know, they haven't heard of half the medications that are on their list, and whatever conversation we were in gets cut short anyways by the attending coming in the room, but even when I do come out in good time to present, they're in such a rush and seem so uninterested I can't seem to even relay my pertinent positives or negatives, and it always seems like we're on completely different brain waves so they ask me many questions of things I didn't do/didn't feel like were indicated in the room, so I can never get out like what I actually did or think it is, and sure enough, when we go in the room, the attending begins to ask all the things I already did but couldn't relay because they' just zip away to go see them, and I just follow like a little shadow. Which I get, even if I had relayed these things to the attending, 100% I still want them to do what I did to verify, but I feel incompetent because I couldn't even relay to them that indeed I did do a Straight Leg Raise to r/o herniation.
I'm not posting this looking for sympathy. I understand we don't all have great rotations, I understand that we won't enjoy every single Doctor we work with, and sometimes we won't jive with the work environment or culture. But, I am posting this because I'm unsure what my takeaway should be. With COVID, I unfortunately have very limited options in terms of actually continuing to pursue other interests. I have this horrible feeling in my gut that I could end up doing FM or IM and being miserable and feeling trapped. I enjoyed my time with the IM PCP scribing before, but I was also so young and inexperienced. He was an old school doc and he did a lot for his patients, and maybe it's just a different ideology or culture or time... I'm not really sure what to think.
I'm just disappointed. All in all, I understand my experiences in my rotations have been highly enjoyable, and I consider myself very lucky because there are students who every single rotation is probably frustrating with attendings who don't enjoy teaching. But, given this was the one specialty I've really always wanted... and for it to be the only thing I am absolutely hating..... I'm just wondering if this is a super big red flag....and no other doctors unfortunately are taking on additional students for shadowing or learning.
I am hoping my IM Rotation next which is inpatient will be more eye opening, and hopefully if I enjoy that, I can always choose to be on the inpatient side of things.... I was just hoping I'd have an "Ah ha!" moment with my rotations that would direct me to my future specialty, but instead, I seem to have liked everything but the one thing I thought I would.
Thanks for reading my long rant if you made it this far. I'm really hoping that it's just this specific office I'm not jiving with, and maybe in the future I can slip into something and know for sure if this is what I really want to do or not.
So, as my name implies, I have been balls to the wall, all-in to shooting for primary care since I scribed for an IM PCP before medical school. I specifically chose DO because I enjoy hands on manipulation as well and thought this could be a neat part of a practice. But now, I'm currently on my Family Med rotation, and I'm just so miserable; the only problem is, I can't tell if its the specialty... if it's the doctors... if it's the patients... I'm not sure exactly what it is. I just know that I leave work every day feeling super defeated and depressed.
I left all my other rotations incredibly uplifted (I only have IM and Surg left) and I really felt like I had actually done something, even if it was something super tiny. I would always call my spouse or mom after each shift and relay cool stories I had from any of the rotations. I have never had that feeling so far on this rotation and we're 6 weeks in.. and I'm getting anxious/nervous because this is what I was so excited for...and now I just come home and don't even wanna talk about work.
In all my rotations so far I would always be able to confront my attendings to give a thorough yet concise H&P and even relay my DDx and treatment ideas, and they all appreciated my thoughts and ideas. I have never been nervous talking to patients in the past... and I always seemed to be able to focus on something during a visit. Suddenly on this rotation, I just feel so incompetent. I stumble over my words when I talk to patients, I feel like I can't concisely depict why any of these patients are coming in, and half of them don't know why they're there either. Even if I do talk to a patient about a sick/urgent/acute complaint, I can't seem to even put together a DDx. The attending will ask me to hurry and see a patient but I go in the room and they're seeing a bajillion specialists and are all on 20 medications and when I try to ask them about which ones they're still on, none of them know, they haven't heard of half the medications that are on their list, and whatever conversation we were in gets cut short anyways by the attending coming in the room, but even when I do come out in good time to present, they're in such a rush and seem so uninterested I can't seem to even relay my pertinent positives or negatives, and it always seems like we're on completely different brain waves so they ask me many questions of things I didn't do/didn't feel like were indicated in the room, so I can never get out like what I actually did or think it is, and sure enough, when we go in the room, the attending begins to ask all the things I already did but couldn't relay because they' just zip away to go see them, and I just follow like a little shadow. Which I get, even if I had relayed these things to the attending, 100% I still want them to do what I did to verify, but I feel incompetent because I couldn't even relay to them that indeed I did do a Straight Leg Raise to r/o herniation.
I'm not posting this looking for sympathy. I understand we don't all have great rotations, I understand that we won't enjoy every single Doctor we work with, and sometimes we won't jive with the work environment or culture. But, I am posting this because I'm unsure what my takeaway should be. With COVID, I unfortunately have very limited options in terms of actually continuing to pursue other interests. I have this horrible feeling in my gut that I could end up doing FM or IM and being miserable and feeling trapped. I enjoyed my time with the IM PCP scribing before, but I was also so young and inexperienced. He was an old school doc and he did a lot for his patients, and maybe it's just a different ideology or culture or time... I'm not really sure what to think.
I'm just disappointed. All in all, I understand my experiences in my rotations have been highly enjoyable, and I consider myself very lucky because there are students who every single rotation is probably frustrating with attendings who don't enjoy teaching. But, given this was the one specialty I've really always wanted... and for it to be the only thing I am absolutely hating..... I'm just wondering if this is a super big red flag....and no other doctors unfortunately are taking on additional students for shadowing or learning.
I am hoping my IM Rotation next which is inpatient will be more eye opening, and hopefully if I enjoy that, I can always choose to be on the inpatient side of things.... I was just hoping I'd have an "Ah ha!" moment with my rotations that would direct me to my future specialty, but instead, I seem to have liked everything but the one thing I thought I would.
Thanks for reading my long rant if you made it this far. I'm really hoping that it's just this specific office I'm not jiving with, and maybe in the future I can slip into something and know for sure if this is what I really want to do or not.