The Short Coat (Audio): An Inside Look at Getting Into and Getting Through Medical School

As a planned parenthood sex educator, listener T'keyah wants to know what medical schools teach about meeting the needs of LGBTQIA+ patients. Amy Young, Patrick Brau, Liza Mann, and Teneme Konne can't, of course speak for all medical schools, but they can speak about what they are learning: quite a lot, not least because we have a great LGBTQ clinic for our students to do clerkships on! T'keyah snuck a second question in, too: she loves her job, and it's important work. So, is the advice she's gotten to stop working while studying for the MCAT valid? A study out of the UK says that men of advanced paternal age (ahem, forty or older) tend to father geekier boys: smart, focused, and unconcerned about what people think of them. And we took note of an column this week on why doctors swear so much. Hint: it's not all sunshine and roses, being a physician. With this in mind it is only logical that, in the name of science, Dave has his co-hosts stick their hands in ice water and recite Dr. Seuss. Will they be able to withstand the ethically induced pain? Thank you, T'keyah for your question! If you have something to say or a question to ask, call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

A flood of listener questions this week! It's probably due in part to medical school application season has begun, which means medical school applicants are trying to figure out if they have what it takes...on paper. For instance, an anonymous listener ("Meldor") called in to find out what kinds of gap year jobs Liza Mann, Elizabeth Shirazi, Kelsey Adler, and Teneme Konne thought would allow her to keep connected to the world of medicine while she's applying. Of course, there are lots of jobs like that...but is it really necessary? We play a game to find out who can best spin any gap year job to an admissions interviewer. Also, listener Mike returns to let us know more exactly what he was concerned about in our long-past episode in which we spoke of gun violence. Meanwhile, Andrea wants to know more about what medical students learn about health disparities; given that much of human disease is about societal influences, including economic and racial divides, it turns out the answer is quite a lot. Lastly, after hearing our recent discussion on food deserts, Erica let us know about an organization at her alma mater, the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN. Brightside Produce is devoted to generating scientific results that increase yields and reduce environmental impacts of small-scale agriculture in cities. Basically, they're fighting inner-city hunger using science to enable urban farmers.

Listener T'keyah sends Cole Cheney, Aline Sandouk, and John Pienta a question on gap years, which boils down to what kinds of gaps are okay according to admissions committees? Cole reveals his post-med school podcasting plans, and he and John discuss how not getting your residency match can be a GOOD thing...after one is done crying. And at T'Keyah's suggestion, we try to offer sex education to each other without using words or concepts banned by state boards of education. Listeners, share your suggestions with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

A listener wants to know more about the secondary application. Given the the turnaround time often recommended (a week), how important are they? Do they need to be as well crafted as your personal statement? What do schools get out of them? And are they just a way for schools to extract more money from applicants? We asked our medical school's admissions staff for answers to these questions so you can get on with crafting your best possible application. And JC writes in to say nice things, including that he wants to start his own show when he matriculates this fall. Go, JC, GO! In science and medicine news, one major destination for patients' medical dollars is the emergency room visit. One recent study asks what do docs know about the costs of caring for some common complaints they see in the ER? Turns out, not much...but when doctors are in charge of knowing the costs of care, is the patient really helped? Meanwhile, a startup in (where else) California wants to charge $8000 to give old people young blood, because we need more dystopian sci-fi concepts. And a discussion on the problems people can experience surrounding orgasms reveals something about Kylie that would have made Jim Henson blush. We LOVE hearing from listeners, and we really work hard to answer your questions. If you have something to say or a question to ask, call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

What is it about public health issues that lends itself to bandwagons? John Pienta, Levi Endelman, Hillary O'Brien, Issac Schwantes, and Jason Lewis discuss Finland's contribution to parenting, the cardboard box in which babies sleep. This year, hundreds of thousands of boxes will be given to new parents by US states in an attempt to improve infant mortality rates. Is that at all helpful, or are we ignoring other causes of death among infants? You know things are weird in healthcare when baking soda is in such short supply that hospitals start cutting back on open-heart surgery. And thanks to a certain 19th neuroanatomist's ideas about the relative sizes of the frontal lobe and the olfactory bulb, we decided that humans have crappy senses of smell...a 'fact' that turns out was never tested and is probably not at all true! We also heard from listener Mike, who we offended 70 episodes ago. We're not entirely sure what we said, exactly, that made Mike give us up after listening to roughly 80 hours of our half-baked opinions, but we always count ourselves fortunate to hear specific negative feedback (and hey, positive feedback is nice, too). Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

Sometimes you're having so much fun that the time flies by and you forget that you have other important things to do. That's what happened on this week's show, in which Dave brings Aditi Patel, Aline Sandouk, Kylie Miller and Irene Morcuende along for a trip through the medical supplies section of Amazon. Can they guess what the medical device is based on the reviews alone? We did get to talk about one bit of medical news, pointed out to us on twitter by AJtha808Scientist: the fact that Iowa made national news by forcing the closure of 1/4 of its Planned Parenthood clinics. Thanks for the tip! We also heard from Hannah of Jackson Hole, Wyoming. She wrote in to let us know why, according to the study we discussed in our last show about longevity in US counties, her beautiful corner of the country is so damn healthy. Spoiler: it doesn't involve sitting on the couch and eating chips like Dave was hoping. Listeners, share your suggestions with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

It's a more-or-less unstated goal of ours to show medical learners that podcasting can be a beneficial experience both for the host and for listeners. And we're always banging on about the need for better science communicators. So Erin Pazaski, Levi Endelman, Kylie Miller, and Irene Morcuende were recently excited to get an email from Terel Jackson, a premed at OSU who said she had gotten the message! She started her own show, Health Science (For The Rest of Us), which takes "a super practical look at the body, its shenanigans, and the world of fascinating ways we try to keep it healthy." Of course, we had to have her on the show to tell us all about her adventures in radiation, body odor, neti pots, and more. Also, how Americans' lifespans vary widely by county, and the unusual prescription one PA hospital is giving their patients. Listeners, share your suggestions with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

Listener T'keyah sends Cole Cheney, Aline Sandouk, and John Pienta a question on gap years, which boils down to what kinds of gaps are okay according to admissions committees? Cole reveals his post-med school podcasting plans, and he and John discuss how not getting your residency match can be a GOOD thing...after one is done crying. And at T'Keyah's suggestion, we try to offer sex education to each other without using words or concepts banned by state boards of education. Listeners, share your suggestions with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

One of our podcasting goals is to encourage others to create their own shows, especially medical learners. So John Pienta, Irisa Mahaparn, Adam Erwood, and Erin Pazaski were pleased to hear from listener Terel, who got it and launched a podcast of her own! Go, Terel! Although perhaps she and her fellow pre-meds should (not) consider the path taken by another undergrad, who decided to skip all that pesky applying and test taking and just declare herself a medical student so she could jump right in and start seeing patients. On the other hand, if you worked hard getting your MD, then getting married to it may be something to consider. And Dave offers his co-hosts some practice at answering health questions they might really hear someday, which he pulled from the saddest place on the internet: Yahoo! Answers. Listeners, share your thoughts with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT any time, and email [email protected].

Improvisational acting is a greater part of medical school than one might expect. Between pretending to be doctors for one's simulated patients, or acting like you know what you're doing when you're not entirely sure, a big part of med ed is faking it until you make it. So Dave, in his never ending quest to offer (ahem) valuable teaching moments, asks Mark Moubarek, Irisa Mahaparn, Kaci McCleary, and newcomer Johnny Henstrom to put on their masks once again for a game of General Haze-pital. Will Johnny be cured by the dashing doctor Dr. Mark and his two eager med students, Kaci and Irisa? Tune in to find out. Also, we discuss the recent trend of trying to cure public health issues by using market forces, including the recent proposal to tax prescription opioid manufacturers a penny per milligram to fund addiction treatment and prevention. And an Indian medical student turns to Whatsapp to deliver a baby on a train...thus fulfilling a heroic daydream we've all had about saving the day in dire circumstances. Listeners, share your thoughts with us each week. Call us at 347-SHORTCT anytime, or send your greetings to us at [email protected].