Hell Week

After countless hours of study, vacillation between trepidation and confidence, the first exam of medical school has come and gone. Going into the exam, I felt that the exam itself was just a mere formality to verify that I had acquired the knowledge of gross anatomy. Still, having to endure about five hours of “mere formality” challenged me to think abstractly, integrate concepts, and use every ounce of knowledge stored in my brain to pick one of five possible responses (a, b, c, d, or e).

The best worst questions are those that meet the following criteria:

• Badly worded questions
• Which of the following EXCEPT…
• Maligned questions that comes out of nowhere just to spite you for once having read about that which the question requires you to know
• Test us in manners that do not reflect real-world conditions, as in “You may not touch to figure out in what intercostal space you are.”

• Put a pin in a structure close to that to which the question is referring, but not directly on it. Add in None of the above and you have the most devious question of all time.

  There is a committee that oversees student gripes about specific questions on the exams, and I am sure there will be a few. I know I have at least one really good gripe that is valid. (The question in mind is about ischial tuberosities, pudendal nerves and vessels and riding a bike…)

  Overall, however, I think the test was fair and complete. The few off-the-wall, out-of-nowhere questions were far out-numbered by those that were expected, so it was not that bad. I will definitely know how I fared in those “odd” questions tomorrow after I compared my answers to the posted answer key.

  The most interesting part of the day was observing the reactions of the rest of the class, which varied from ecstatic (few) to arrogant boasting of performance (few more) to “that was hard” and “I don’t know” (even more) to the non-committals (most). As we are graded against each other on a curve, this certainly makes for some entertainment. The deans preach to us that this is not a competitive endeavor, and yet here we are, 190 people vying for those 19 top spots to get “honors pass.” Comical and ironic, isn’t it?

  Now I have to get back to the books, as I have another exam on Wednesday and another on Friday. Welcome to “Hell Week!”