Internal Medicine Rotation Review

This post will highlight the core foundation of all the rotations in the 3rd and 4th year of medical school. Internal medicine (IM) is the rotation, which should not be taken lightly. According to a friend of mine, from Ross university medical school, and according to some doctors, the IM rotation in Jackson Park hospital is one of the best in Chicago. This does not mean that other rotations are as good but internal medicine rotation is one of the best. IM rotation is one of the most hands on experiences you will get if you are assigned at Jackson Park hospital. You will do all sorts of procedures and see so many things such as hernias, gangrenes, amputations, MRSA infections, lumbar punctures, etc. I have seen so many things and I learned a lot from hands on experiences. When I look at the lab I know what to look for and how to narrow down my differential diagnosis based on lab values and symptoms. Obviously, I’m not an expert in diagnosing patients but I learned a lot in the 12 weeks experience.

In Jackson Park hospital, the group of students is split up in six groups. Each group is assigned one of the 6 attending physicians and they rotate every 4 weeks. Each 4 weeks counts as a block and everyone has to have 3 blocks. The 6 physicians are Dr. Kumar, Dr. Murthy, Dr. Iyengar, Dr. Ali, Dr. Hussain, and Dr. Khan. You will be assigned three of the 6 doctors in the 12 weeks period.

Dr. Murthy
He is the medical education director and he gives a final say on your IM grade. It’s very important to get on his good side because of the letter of recommendation that he will give. He is not aggressive like other doctors but he can put you on the spot if you ask him to leave early. He is known to tell his students to “Google” everything. His students will have their smartphones battery drained after rounding with him because he expects everyone to look up answers to questions he asks. A friend of mine told me that Dr. Murthy had one student who didn’t have a smartphone, so for that Dr. Murthy told him to leave; lol.

Dr. Kumar
He is one of the hospital’s cardiologist who prefers to have 8 students per block. He is not the happiest physician you will meet, but he is extremely knowledgeable. Dr. Kumar will put his students down if they answer wrong questions. He is famous of making a large “0” with his fingers in front of the student when that student gets something wrong. And he will pronounce it in an Indian accent “jeero”

Dr. Khan
This guy you would describe him as a G. He’s ballin with great hair and a smooth way to talk. He didn’t even know me and he randomly sat me down with few other students and started giving me advice about life. He’s an easygoing doctor but he expects you to try to do some research when he asks you about a certain medical question.

Dr. Ali
He is a very polite and humble Indian doctor. All his students like him because of his gentle attitude. If you make a mistake, he will forgive you and advise you to try to avoid it next time. He is the most wanted attending physician in the internal medicine rotation because of his easygoing ways. However, sometimes he seems to be intimidated by multiple things in the hospital so he may mumble while he’s speaking.

Dr. Hussain
He is a polite physician but it is very irritating when he doesn’t show up on time. Dr. Hussain is not the best when it comes to showing up on time.  He wants everyone to send emails to him regarding what he taught for that day so they are on point on what they learned.

Dr. Iyengar
Rotation under this physician is new so I can’t say anything about him.

Presentations
The presentations in IM are so exhausting. We have to present to Dr. Kazmi and he is not the most polite or easygoing doctor you will meet. This doctor will come off as someone who will tear you apart on the first day but through the IM he calms down if you do your presentations on time. At the end of IM you will have to take a test on all the presentations you and your peers presented. The test is insanely hard because no one has time to study for it due to on-calls and rounds, which are tiring.

On-Calls
On calls are usually fun with moderate number of patients but other times it’s irritating when there are a lot of patients coming in the middle of the night. During the previous IM batch everyone had to do 24 hour on calls with breaks within those hours; however all that has changed with the new batch. Nowadays, there are 12 hour on calls which was changed by Dr. Kazmi. And if anyone intentionally is absent during presentations, then they are penalized with an extra or two on calls. It got brutal each time a new batch starts.

I hope this post helps in your preparations for Internal Medicine rotation at Jackson Park hospital. I wish someone had posted something like this before I started internal medicine, it would have helped me a lot.


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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Can you shed some light or do a separate post on the topic of Green Book VS. Blue Book rotations? Are all these rotations at JPH considered Green Book and how do they help when time comes to apply for residency? Do you also know about the other hospitals SJSM claims to have ties with i.e. Mercy, and what is the process to get into those?

HK said...

Hi, I sent you an email almost a week ago, as I know you must be very busy but was wondering if you got it.. I needed some advice regarding step 1.. Thank you and good Luck!!

Dr. J said...

@Anonymous: Green book is considered to be rotations in hospitals with ACGME approved residency programs. And blue book rotations are basically in the umbrella program. For example, Jackson Park hospital has only Family Medicine as a green book status. All other core rotations in Jackson Park Hospital are blue book. Some states, such as Texas, require all core rotations to be in a green book hospital. Overall, try to do all your cores in a Green Book hospital. SJSM has Mercy Hospital as a green book hospital for Internal Medicine.

@HK, I did not get your email. Please email me at medstudent786@gmail.com

Anonymous said...

Hello! Thanks for the very helpful review! I was wondering what the schedule is like for this rotation; days/week, hours/day. Your time is greatly appreciated.

All the best!

Dr. J said...

@Anonymous: the schedule varies..but we had to be there every single day, even in the weekends because it's "inpatient" care. We were there from 8 AM till we were done which can be from 3 PM to 5 PM...the weekends are more relaxed but we still have to show up everyday unless the doctor tells us not to come.

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