Of Law and Medicine

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My tenth blog post! A rather large number of views!
How many of you actually read this more than once, and how many are just curious and never come back to this drivel I don't know!

Mama Mia was totally awesome, it was very chick-flick-ee but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Worth watching.
Next on my list of films to watch is Batman which seems to be getting rave reviews.

When we moved out of London our completely insane landlady demanded a huge sum off our equally huge deposit. Claiming for things that were already broken/in a state of disrepair before we moved in! Naturally we're fighting her being a house of largely legal people. Of course, this isn't easy, and now there are about 5000 forms to fill in, evidence to collate, print off and post to the arbitrators.
I didn't go to work on Wednesday as I had so many forms to fill in, emails to send, phone calls to make etc. At the end of the day I was knackered and felt like I'd done a little bit of quite a few things, but not actually accomplished much. Luckily work are really flexible so its no problem.

Still, today was an interesting day, I had another good chat with Mr Careers which was really useful. Statement is coming along now and bits of it are even starting to look good. Then I went into work, discovered a couple of people who had been admitted had died. This was sad, although what I really enjoy about this job is how you can see the full picture, GP visits, consultations, the highs, the lows, a bit of deterioration, perhaps an admission and if you're unlucky a death. Its the continuity of care that you just dont get doing hospital shifts.
Although I find hospital work fascinating and enjoyed dissection in the lab so much I thought about surgery, the continuity of care in general practice also appeals. Its a long long road before I have to choose between them though.

I'm back in practice again tomorrow which will be a nice and hopefully fairly relaxed end to the week.
On the subject of drama, we had a lady earlier this week who rang in saying she'd had a stroke in the night and couldn't move her arm/leg on one side of her body. She didn't want any fuss, and outright refused to call an ambulance - she hadn't finished her breakfast afterall! All she wanted was a Dr to come out and visit her later in the day. Crazy crazy woman! I meant to check and see what happened, but I forgot. I wonder if she made it to hospital or stayed at home.

That'll do for now, to bed!

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A patient today asked me to book a Fast eating blood test, I snorted with laughter before doing do. The mental image of a 70+ LOL stuffing hotdogs down her throat was just too funny.
That is all

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Been meaning to do a proper blog for a week or so now but several things have been getting in the way!

Works going well, GP's practice shifts are gentle, relaxing and generally easy going. Hospital shifts are hard work but thoroughly rewarding. I did a shift on gastro last week which was different. A lot of people were younger and although in many respects as sick as the people I've met in elderly care etc (I mean theres a certain threshold of sick-ness you need to pass to get admitted!) it was quite a different experience.
For a start people are far more self caring, and if they aren't they were happy to talk to me and tell me how they wanted something doing, which I quite like. There were a lot more obs to do which was fine as I quite enjoy going round and chatting to patients.
I ended up taking a few venflons which was cool as its not something I get to do every shift but that was good. I had a poor lady who had skin like tissue paper, I think I spent about 15 minutes taking hers off, 14 minutes of that was just peeling back the sticky bits around the needle, I'm sure the designers didn't test it on elderly people because it always seems to be a real struggle to take off without tearing skin. (The other minute was holding her arm in the air to try and stop the fairly large amount of blood coming out!)
Its no better with men though, they might have thicker/tougher skin, but atleast one of the gents now has a bald patch! As carefully as I took it off, his hairs seemed to come out very easily!

I also had to get togged up to empty a iliosteomy bag which I've never done before, as it was I manged to do this in a highly controlled manner - the face mask, gloves, apron and pads all over the floor were unnecessary! Although apparently I was the first person who had done it without spilling!

I had tuesday and wednesday off work this week to revise for the UKCAT which I also had today.
I had a fairly unsucessful weekend of revising, generally getting distracted by the rest of the family and more exciting things to do. I did get some of the unofficial online tests done and did ok on them however.
Tuesday went well, I worked through the Felicity Kendal Revising for the UKCAT & BMAT book, doing all the practice questions. Generally I felt I was strong on Verbal Reasoning and Decision Analysis, the Abstract reasoning (shape patterns) were ok although I didn't feel so confident.
It was quantitative reasoning where I thought I'd fall down - maths has never been my strong point! I did ok at GCSE and came out with an A, but haven't done any maths since, especially time pressured maths without people to ask and a decent calculator.
Solicitors and Business Accounts in the LPC is the exception to this, but was pretty much just adding and subtracting and calculating tax.
The book QR practice paper is supposed to be done in about 17 mins. Meaning 8.5 mins per half.
I did the first half of the paper in 19 mins! Whoops! After working though it, and realising that if I didn't know immediately what to do I should move on, I did the 2nd half in 8.5 mins exactly and got it all right which was a nice boost.

Then came wednesday, I did a few more papers and then started on the official UKCAT test - this isn't just a pdf or anything like that, its a full blown exe-file you download and run. So you do the test but in full UKCAT style!
My thoughts on doing this were largely Holy Crap!
The test was about 10 times harder than all the ones I'd done before and I genuinely questioned myself as to whether I'd get over 600, especially for the quantitative reasoning! My dad and I spent atleast 15 mins working out the answer for one of the travel time questions (two planes going at different speeds are going towards eachother from different time zones, they left at different times. What time zone are they in when they meet type thing) - this is something you have about 30 seconds to do in the exam!

When I went to bed last night I really was not feeling confident.

(more coming when I get home)

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continuing: (Sorry, I didn't purposefully do a cliffhanger there!)

Woke up today and went into town for the UKCAT, still pretty worried. Probably more worried than I was with my finals, I'm not usually a stresser with exams.
Went in and arrived 45 mins early for my test at 10.
I'd sat down to relax and calm down, and then all of a sudden the lady called me in! Criky!

So the exam, first up, Verbal Reasoning, This was a mixed one, I'd done well at it initially in the unofficial online tests, but then not so well at it in the UKCAT book tests and the official tests. There were some tricky ones, I find it hard to decide between Can't tell and False, but still, I finished it all without feeling too rushed with a minute or two spare having reviewed them all atleast once.

Quantitative Reasoning, probably the one I was most worried about, I'd done really badly in the official and UKCAT book practice tests. As it was this was much nicer than the official practice, generally much easier. I did most of it, although when I got to the conversion of time/speed/miles bits (ie the two planes question above) I guessed and skipped them. I can do them but it would have taken me too long.

Abstract reasoning was ok, there were some that I couldn't do but I made my best guesses and moved on. I think there were a few questions at the end that I didn't quite make it to, despite guessing quite a few towards the end.

Finally there was Decision Analysis, this was my best one. A lot of code breaking, not a lot to say about this, I like it, after a couple of questions I end up reading the numbers/sign like a language. So yeah!

Thats my UKCAT experience.
So I got :
V 640
Q 700
A 670
D750

Total: 2760
Average: 690

Its not quite up there with some peoples amazing 700+ averages but its certainly not a bad score and well above the cut-offs that I know about. Given how worried I was about breaking 500 in the QR last night, I'm quite happy, and relieved.

One hurdle down, the race continues and I'm not out yet.

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I should also briefly update this to say that I got my LPC results and passed comfortably so thats good.
Today I am Mr Personal Statement!

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So its been a week or two, about time for an update.

I moved out of the parental house last week for my "work house".
I'm finding it hard at the moment, I'm scared of work starting next week as I'll be expected to know stuff, but at the same time, I'm all unsettled because I've just moved house and everythings a mess. I like my routine!
So I have a bit of time to do mundane things like reorganising the kitchen (yesterdays job), buying ironing boards (this afternoon) and cleaning the bathroom (perhaps tomorrow!).
Its quite nice, as who knows the next time I'll have some time just to do bits and pieces, but then I also feel uncomfortable, the new house doesn't really feel like home yet. Hopefully this will pass in time.

Medicine-wise I think my personal statement is finished. Comments from people have changed from "you need to put this in, and rewrite this" to minor phrasing tweaks. I'm pretty happy with it, and think I wont tweak too much more because then it turns from being my statement into a generic statement, everybody is going to have different views on quite how to phrase a sentence so I think you get nowhere. I do need to cut out about 500 characters though, erk!

Last week my dad, being quite an awesome dad brought home a needle holder an atraumatic needle along with some thread just for fun so I could have a go at doing sutures.
I dont know how easy it is to attach pictures, but if I do this right, see below for a picture of my handiwork.

I did find it hard to get the knots to line up in a straight line. As I was pulling them tighter they seemed to have a tenancy to slip left or right. I dont know if thats because of the material I was suturing (!!) or just my bad technique! It was fun anyway!

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So I feel I've neglected anybody who reads this so here's an update.
I've been going at my training contract at A Lawfirm for a few weeks down. Its been hard work, but mostly interesting. I've drafted wills, contracts, registered land, phoned clients, been to meetings etc.
My supervising partner is jolly nice and good at the supervising thing. My secretary too is lovely. So work is good fun, hard, but damn it really is nice not having to do work in the evenings and weekends. Does kinda suck not getting home until 7 ish and being knackered.

This week is freshers week where I live and I'm getting pangs of jealousy wishing I was still a student. Played tennis today in the sun which was good fun and piled on the bus back home with about 5000 students. Good times! ( I will confess to wearing my uni hoodie so I could feel all smug around all the petrified freshers - I even shouted down bus for people to move down in a distinctly authoritative manner!)
Tonight a few drinks on campus I think before I go back to my other life as a trainee solicitor. - Already planning on going to freshers week nights out so this week could be messy! Oo

Applications wise, I'm having a bit of a nightmare, I've been ready to apply since the last week of August, but my referee is being a complete pain. He still hasn't done my reference, I know he's busy and all, but I feel aweful having to keep chasing him for it. I am really quite worried its going to get to a week before the deadline, I'll still have nothing and I'll have to get an alternate one.
For that I have a choice between my old biology teacher who hasn't taught me now for 4 years, or my real tutor at uni, but who I know will probably disapprove of the law-> medicine choice. Argh!
I had a chat with my referees PA on friday at 6 and he was still at work, with my stuff at the top of his to-do list, so fingers crossed he'll have found time to do my thing this weekend!
I wish it was possible to submit without a statement and then add that later. Meh!

Right, I have ironing to do before dinner so onwards I go

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Holy Crap, I'm officially a 2010 applicant!
Nothing new on the Law front, work has slow today due to the following:

Phoned my referees PA this morning as I was told to last week.
She hadn't spoken to him this morning so went to ask. And shock horror, he had actually emailed it to me 20 mins earlier but still wanted a chat.
I apologised for harassing him mercilessly, he apologised for being slow. It was a good chat.
I then (I was at work and didn't want to just open up a medical reference on my work pc!) opened up my emails on my phone.
What I read was one of the nicest, most complimentary references I have ever read. (I'll omit here that I haven't read many references, but since speaking to a few people in the know about it, this still holds true.) It almost bought a tear to my eye. I was suddenly extremely hyper, and couldn't wait to get home.

Eventually the day passed and I got home, and reread the statement about 3 times. Its still damn good!
It was certainly worth the wait.
So now, I have paid my £17, clicked Submit Payment and am now officially a 2010 Medicine Applicant.

Another hurdle down.

*extremely happy*

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So I figured it was time for a bit of an update before I fall off the front page!

Law/Work is going fine, its interesting, challenging and its amazing just how quickly you pick things up when you do them every day compared to just having a lecture on them. I did my first exchange on a house last week which was as cool as it was scary. While to me it was my first exchange, to our clients it was their whole house and life. I'm just glad it went without a hitch!

Out of work I've been playing stupid amounts of sport and generally getting pretty tired. I come home from work and have training of some sort. Weekends too I usually have a game or two! Its great fun, but often I feel tired and just slump into bed. Life in general is very good though.

On the medical front, I've had acknowledgements from my unis, nothing else. I guess no news is good news. Especially as soton say they'll probably keep me waiting till February/march! Argh!
Still so far I haven't fallen into the addiction of checking Track every day! Woot!

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Exciting news!
Had a call today inviting me for interview at UEA! Whoop!
Bit of a wait till feb, and will hopefully have heard from soton and hyms by then, but jolly exciting.