How Literature Transformed an Engineer into a Doctor
Medical student Bassel Salka finds opportunities to improve health care by reading works of humorists, fiction writers, and philosophers.
Journeys in Education
This category contains student reflections on key moments in their education that gave them new perspective and deeper insights to healthcare.
Medical Student Contributing Writer
University of Michigan School Medical School
Bassel is a fourth year medical student at the University of Michigan Medical School. He aspires to synthesize the technical skills he developed as an engineer with the clinical skills he's learned as a medical student to improve patient outcomes.
Medicine on Skids
Rural Health is an important but often overlooked sub-specialty in medicine. This piece gives insight to the intricacies of patient care and transport, rural health policy, and the rich, long-term relationships developed in the lives of current practicing rural health physicians.
Orders, Consults, Notes
Intern Ervin Anies assesses the expectation versus the reality of the responsibilities medical students and residents are expected to manage.
Yearning for Yesterday
Shivani Sundaram, a third-year medical student, explores the need for humanity and patience in the face of algorithms and checkboxes.
Fight for Freedom
Having been born and raised in Iran, Negin Khosravi has experienced horrors that are untold. As ongoing protests happen in Iran and as an aspiring physician leader, Negin hopes to shed some light on what is happening and advocate for people. It is time for racism, discrimination and lack of freedom to end.
All-American Reject
In a spoken word piece, medical student Hannah Clarke writes about her experiences being a medical student in an unjust healthcare system run by unjust hospital corporations.
The Medical Student Behind the Mask
Rachel Lawson describes her challenging experiences during her first year of medical school at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and how her experience was profoundly impacted by a vaccination clinic.
Changes
Medical student Saud Rehman has written a collection of poems focusing on the lockdown of March 2020 with artwork to give a visual representation of how he felt. Often times the manifestations of moods unrelated to coursework go overlooked, especially in medicine, and Saud hopes that these provide a representation of the humanity behind students going through difficult times.
First Dissection
Dyese Moody, a medical student, reflects and expresses appreciation for working with a human cadaver for the first time.
On Stages
Resident physician Raihan Noman, reflects on his ERAS residency application process and leaning on his faith.
An Understanding
Medical student MacKenzie Adams reflects on her experience with a patient who received news that he was dying via an interpreter. She addresses the importance of improving care for non-English speakers.
SIRS
Dr. Evin Anies utilizes haiku about systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) to reflect on his journey as a newly-minted physician.
Resident Physician Contributing Writer
Walter Reed National Military Medical Center
Ervin (Erv) is beginning his general intern year at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and recently graduated from the Uniformed Services Univerity of the Health Sciences in May 2022. While in medical school, he was the co-director for the on-campus peer-led curriculum aimed to foster conversations about diversity, bias, discrimination, and inclusion in both medicine and the military. His interests include medical education, promoting diversity, and utilizing the arts to augment the healing nature of medicine.