Obstruction.Retention.Stones.Penis.

Either everyone lied to me, or everyone is smarter than me in Urology. I prefer to believe the former.

” Oh, it’s like MI (Med Informatics) except that it’s Uro,”

“You just have to sit there and pretend to listen”

“You just go for attendance”

“One guy slept off and the teacher didn’t even care”

COCK.

The only other cycle I ever put this much effort into was Facultative Therapy, which made sense. I had a patient to deal with.

My Urology cycle began with the head of the department saying that we will be given patients so that we can write and submit our patient history. What what WHAT?!!! I thought there was only a report on any topic we fancied? Was I in the right hospital? Was this one of those strangely realistic nightmares? 1st City Hospital? Check. Self-pinch Test? Goddamnit, I’m awake (and that pinch hurt like a bitch).

Nothing got better. I was asked to sit in front of the class. The teacher was more than happy to question foreign and Russian students alike. Sitting in front did not help one bit. After an hour of numb extremities, cold sweat and battered intercostal muscles, he gave us a 20 minute break.

Half an hour later, a different teacher came in. He, fortunately enough for my well-being, couldn’t care less about us foreigners. However, he too went on about patient history and how it should be written. He then proceeded to tell us that to get our credit for this cycle, we have to answer some questions based on what we will learn thoughout the week, submit a patient history and interpret an X-ray. Cue to start sweating blood.

At the end of class, the teacher assigned the RUSSIAN students their patients and informed the remaining groups that our teacher is someone else and we have to find out what he has in store for us. A wave of relief washed over us, and we gaily skipped along.

Day 2: A teacher comes in, passes X-rays around and tells us to name the method of investigation, the organ being examined and our diagnosis. Oi! What’s this?! Weren’t we in a completely different league? You know, the one that has minimal radiology knowledge use, and where I get to sleep off? At this point, my heart doesn’t even bother to pump blood anymore. The teacher says that each person has to come up one by one and explain their answers to the class. This cannot go well.

Then the first teacher from the first day of class comes along to herd us out of the room. Saviour, he is not. As soon as we reach our designated class i.e the corridor of the consultation department, he bombards us with questions. To be perfectly honest, it’s not that bad. In fact, class has been good enough to keep me attentive for 3 hours, and I remember stuff without constantly jotting things down in a notebook. My teacher does have a sense of humour, although he doesn’t really encourage it.

Day 3 was the same and I suspect Days 4 and 5 will be, too. Sigh.

But my beef here is the fact that this is NOT what I expected at all! How is it possible that every other person who has had Urology says that it’s an easy cycle when I could swear I had more sleep during my Operative Surgery classes? I’ve been dreaming about ureters and kidneys and urethrae, and not in that juvenile Blink-182 way either.

Facultative Surgery had better live up to its reputation.