My family practice clerkship ended today, and I'm very glad to be moving on. I enjoyed an increased level of responsibility and patient interaction, and got some much-needed practice walking through the therapeutic paths for which patients present to their doctors. I didn't learn a whole lot that I didn't know; the practice was the real benefit to me.
The shelf exam yesterday went relatively well - I haven't gotten my scores back yet (obviously), but it was certainly easier than the step. There were of course some things I'd never heard of, and some things I simply hadn't thought to study, but overall, the difficulty of the questions seemed commensurate with my knowledge level at the end of 5th semester. It was held in Ross' building in South Miami, so Nicole and I had to drive all the way across town, and being back in the old neighborhood certainly brought back memories.
After the exam, we went over to Sports Authority to pick up some new running shoes for me. The cushioning in my old Nikes is as flat as cardboard, and running had just gotten to be painful (I guess I don't replace them soon enough). Then we headed out to Havanna Spice Cafe for the Cuban food Nicole's been craving since we returned to Miami, and sat down for a quick lunch of ropa vieja, arroz, maduras, y frijoles negros. Then it was off to the real goal of the shopping trip - Macy's tie sale. I found out a few weeks ago that all Macy's are nowhere near created equal, when, as Nicole was looking for shoes in the South Beach Macy's, I realized that I couldn't find single tie I liked. The Macy's at Dadeland Mall is supposed to be the largest in the state of Florida - their selection was, of course, fantastic. I picked up a few Tasso Elba ties that I simply couldn't part with, and we headed back to Miami Beach.
Nicole wanted to drive the long way home, so we could see all of Collins Avenue at night, but forgot that it's the middle of spring break, so we found ourselves snarled in some gnarly traffic as soon as we hit the causeway. Once in the heart of downtown, there was nothing to do but crawl along at a snail's pace, staring at all the drunken college kids and very expensive cars.
Something I ate at Havanna Spice must have really disagreed with me - I thought initially that I'd just eaten too fast and so felt uncomfortably full, but half-way through Gray's Anatomy, the food poisoning kicked in - and didn't let me rest until 6 in the morning. This isn't something that happens to me all the time, but there's nothing that sucks like night-long GI distress. It must have been the maduras (plantains), because Nicole didn't have any - that was the only obvious difference between our meals - and she was fine. The last time I remember feeling that bad, I was stuck on a fishing boat with my father and uncle out on Tampa Bay. This wasn't as bad as that; apparently, seasickness hits me just a tad harder. Anyway, I got an hour of sleep and just decided to suck it up and go see patients, finishing out the clerkship on a strong note, and sat around with the other med students discussing various types of preformed enterotoxins. Fortunately, today was relatively light.
If I'm feeling up to it, we'll head up to Sawgrass Mills Mall tomorrow - it's supposed to make the Simon outlet malls near my home look like a run-down flea market. And then there shall be reading on the beach. Life is good!
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