Thoughts about the white coat

Being in medical school is such a gift: everyday you are immersed in a world of intelligent individuals, individuals who are passionate about the things that you have always cared about. It's really special to see a case and have so many people, just like you, interested in exploring the nature of the case. We throw out diagnoses, etiologies, long term sequelae... it's such a high to be in this driven and interested environment. We delve into patient presentations with the same attention and passion as detectives in a murder case. What we talk about and what we do each day immerses us in an exciting learning environment.

Although I feel like I am thriving in this environment, it has been a struggle for me to adapt to situations where I am no longer in this safe haven of discussion. It's challenging for me to hear a woman in the grocery store describing symptoms of an illness and not shout out, "It's CML! Or maybe it's pernicious anemia!" Similarly, it's challenging to see friends or family members who I have learned have increased risk for developing certain diseases, and not freak out trying to explain to them all of the reasons why they might develop something like CHF in the next minute. I struggle to separate my learning environment at school and my "real" life. It's hard not to ask questions and shout out diagnoses at the store or on the phone when I think that way at school for hours.

I've also realized that as I learn more about medicine, it becomes more difficult to explain what I do everyday to people who aren't in medicine. How can you explain how exciting it was to realize the clinical significance of elevated ESV and hypertension? How can you explain to people outside of medicine that 4 weeks before the exam is "last minute" studying?

That said, I've also found an unbelievable camaraderie and acceptance to go along with my white coat. Physicians talk to me when they see me in the hallway just because I have a white coat on too. I don't walk by myself in the hospital: I get nods of acknowledgment as I walk by. I've found myself surprised by how much acceptance I get for my white coat. The people that nod at me are encouraging me along because they too once went through this short-white coat era.