You Know You're a 4th Year Medical Student When...

You know you're a 4th year when you decide that you're cool enough to pimp your resident. And yes, folks, that's precisely what I did on my 1st day of OB-Gyn, while on the intake service. There were two residents in that particular area, that serves as a sort of OB emergency room. One was an OB-Gyn intern, the other a family practice resident. The family practice resident was very impressive to me. He was doing a lot of teaching and explaining, which is always well appreciated. And then... he started pimping me.

For those of you who are non-medical people, "pimping" refers to when someone above your level tests your fund of knowledge by asking you questions. This can range from "draw me the carbon skeleton of the neuromuscular blocker, succinylcholine" (this happened to me on anesthesia... i'm not kidding) to "which side of the heart is the right atrium on?" (this did not happen to me, but i think it would be amusing if it did... especially if i got it wrong).

Anyways, he was pimping me on UTI's - urinary tract infections. What do you see on the urine dipstick, what would you look for on the urine culture. Then, he started asking me about vaginosis... what's the treatment?

Metronidazole I say.

Why wouldn't you give this medication to an alcoholic? he asks.

Cuz it causes a disulfiram reaction, I say.

Then, I start to get irritated, for no particular reason. I began to develop an unnecessary mentality that kind of went like this: How dare you ask such menial questions to a fourth year medical student? Don't you know who I am, and how superior I am? Leave me alone!!

And then, it happened, before I figured out that it was coming.

Do you know the mechanism of action of metronidazole? I ask.

He pauses for a minute. Leans his elbow on the counter. Ummmmmmm... lemme see. Does it work on a protein?

Nope, try again, I say.

I dunno. What is it? he asks me.

Forms toxic metabolites in the bacteria, I say, withdrawing this very miniscule piece of information that was somehow acquired during the process of studying for the Step One.

Ohhh! That's really good! Thanks for letting me know, He says.

Dammit. He actually was happy to learn. He had a much better attitude at getting pimped by a medical student, than I would have. In retrospect, I think this may have been a dangerous thing to do, to pimp my resident, especially since I was asking him a question that I was almost 100% sure that he wouldn't get correct, but I really do feel it was an accident. Maybe...