Elective Procedures

Since I have so much free time these days, I decided to go ahead and sign up for a "medical Spanish" elective. They typically offer the course at three different skill levels: advanced beginner, intermediate, and advanced. This year they were unable to offer the advanced level course, so only the first two are available. I just got home from taking a placement test to make sure that I am qualified to enroll in the course, and to find out which course is appropriate for my abilities. After a brief oral test (I also took a written test, but he hadn't even looked at it), the instructor told me that I am probably qualified for the advanced level, albeit "weakly" so, but definitely a solid candidate for the intermediate class. I was actually under the impression that I had performed pretty poorly, so I think with a little (or a lot) of practice, I should be able to do ok. I was pretty amazed at how much I had forgotten, though. Very basic words on the written test--like "green"--totally eluded me. I'm a little apprehensive about enrolling in the intermediate course; whereas the advanced beginner course offers a review of grammar and terminology, they skip over it entirely at the intermediate level. On the other hand, I think I will get a lot more out of the intermediate course, so I  think I'll go for it. I may simply have to put in a little more work. The class meets weekly from 6-8pm on Wednesdays. Unfortunately, Wednesday is also the day that I have PCM from 1-5pm, as well as a lunchtime meeting from 12-1pm, so I will essentially be in class from 8am-8pm, excluding a 1 hour break for dinner. Eek!

There are also a few other electives I'm considering taking, all of which take place weekly from 12-1pm on various days. One of them is called Global Health Talks and is simply a series of lectures on various topics regarding global and public health, disaster response, etc. I've recently become very interested in medical opportunities abroad (since my trip to Costa Rica/Panama, really), so I think this would be a great elective for me to take. There's also another one called "Specialty Talks" where they highlight a different medical specialty each week and have a panel of doctors specialized in that field provide info on their career. This one is great for people who are totally clueless about what area of medicine they want to pursue, just like your friendly neighborhood blog writer, yours truly.

I think it's really important to be involved outside of simply taking classes, and there are already so many great opportunities to do so; it's too bad I don't have the time to explore them all.