Fulbrighting

So the time is nearly upon me to pack up my stethoscope and the NHS and leave the UK for American shores.  After over a year of emails, phone calls, panic and excitement, I can't believe in two weeks time I will be calling the USA home for nine months.

This blog so far has charted the ups and downs of my final months at medical school and the whirlwind first two years as a qualified doctor.  I have decided, as many do at this stage in their training, to tag out of training.  I am trading my stethoscope for a lab coat.

I am not alone: A third of UK doctors take a 'gap year' between their foundation years and specialty training.  I have to say, from personal experience I'd say that statistic is even higher.  Why?  A number of reasons really.  The last time I made a radical decision about my life was when I was applying to medical school as a teenager.  OK, so I took a year out to live in London and do a science degree, and had to apply for my first doctor job, but these were very much with the tide of my peers.  Finishing foundation (the UK name for these first two years) is the first time you actually have to decide a) what sort of a doctor are you going to be and b) where am I going to live for the next 5-10 years?!  It's quite odd hitting that sort of milestone in your mid twenties having made few major decisions in the interim aside from 'how am I going to make sure I actually have food in the house throughout my 12-day work stretch'?  Plus job applications come just after you've finished your first year of work and I certainly felt it was too soon for the big commitment of geography in particular.  And for some people they are still unsure about which specialty to commit to; if paeds is your hunch, it's a minimum 8 years of training - yikes if you're not 100% sure!  I love my job, but I'm also exhausted.  Sure, being a doctor is tiring, but so are all jobs - I think when you are a junior doctor, there is the added emotional, inexperienced stress factor which is all the more draining.

A few from recent countryside runs.

Plus, frankly, why not?  There's a big old world out there and in an age where so many people seem obsessed with nationalism and national pride, I am quite content to have my own pride about being a citizen of Planet Earth.  Life is short and I am keen to explore...

Little English town...

So I am meandering Stateside to Yale University for the year, and was lucky enough to get a Fulbright scholarship to help fund a brain tumour research project.  Being a Fulbrighter has already been an incredible experience and I haven't even gone yet - my fellow scholarship people and I had an induction session a few months ago and I just couldn't believe what an awesome bunch of people they were.  I think we shared disbelief that we had somehow got through the application process and felt unbelievably lucky.  As a medic, it was also hugely exciting and refreshing to meet these inspiring people from such a range of disciplines, given that my world is so often just about medicine.  I am excited about all these new friends and colleagues I am yet to meet, and all that I will learn about in a new area of science.

I'm saying my goodbyes, packing up my things and preparing for one hell of an adventure.  Recent events have reminded me once more that you just never know what wonderful things are around the corner, and that's a hell of a blessing.  America, be nice to me!

I shall miss you!