A Long Day for Me ... An Even Longer One for the Candidates

I was involved in the examination for the afternoon session and the whole process went well. I only realised how tiring it was after I reached home. I can imagine how exhausted the students were, having firstly to wait for their turn, then suffer the agony of being quarantined.

Toad doing some online shopping. Oi! Stay off my wallet!Judging from the postings on Facebook, everyone had mixed feelings about how they did during the exams. Usually apprehension is healthy. There's not much else anyone can do after the actual exam. We can only wait and watch, and wish our friends still waiting for their turn all the best. I must say that I was very impressed on the quality of the cases on show. They are all very fair, and not out to trick their candidates. Some of the cases can even allow them to shine. Those waiting for their turn tomorrow and Saturday don't have anything to fear.

I also spend today reorganising the way things are posted on the site. I have added another journal stream, called themed posts. This is where the post according to the themes I selected yesterday will be put onto. Hopefully it will prevent the blog from getting clogged up. Today, I looked into three articles from NEJM. I thought they are pretty useful, and hopefully help my Medical Officers and students interested in current medical updates.

The best of luck for those still waiting for tomorrow and Saturday. It will be over soon.

A Brand New Month ...

Toad eyeing my dinner last night. Maybe he is protesting as I have some mushroom in the noodle

So, did anybody got hit by the conflicker.c virus so far? Hopefully it stays as an April Fool prank, even though part of me being a Mac user would like to see that one coming ....

I started blogging proper only since Friday the 13th last month (March). It has been fun, and the support and encouragement I received from readers have been great. When I started, I planned to give it a couple of months, before I find a topic I am relatively good at and only blog exclusively on that. 3 weeks on, I am still uncertain, not because there were no topic of interest, but it is just that I feel I lack focus at the moment.

This morning, sitting in a lecture about sleep, how appropriately, I drafted myself a timetable. I will still write daily - I feel that it is getting easier compared to when I started. I have assigned myself a topic to chew on everyday, selected on a theme. 

So here it goes;

Monday - Haematology/Oncology News

Tuesday - Tech update, about gadget and stuffs

Wednesday (today) - Anything photography, hopefully posting some new pictures taken during the week etc, and looking at latest camera gears

Thursday - Medical news, coinciding with the current issue of New England Journal

Friday - Sports, especially my beloved United

Saturday - undecided because usually I take my boys out that day

Sunday - roundup of news of interest for the week

It's gonna be hard work, but I am sure I will learn a lot as time goes ...

Prof David HuiAs for this morning lecture, it was delivered by our Final MBBS external examiner from Hong Kong, Prof David Hui. He is an eminent pulmonalogist and currently sits in the WHO advisory board for avian flu. He talked about the 'Cardiovascular Effect of Sleep Apnoea'. Unfortunately, I was in the cloud dreaming about this blog!

Told You This Stem Cell Thing Will Lead Somewhere Someday

Hello! Is it me you're looking for?Part of my work in UMMC involves stem cell transplant as part of the long term consolidation among my unfortunate leukaemia patients. Oftentimes, we never even got to it, either due to patient not having a good enough response to initial chemotherapy, patient being too old for the procedure, have problem with their internal organs or carrying infection that will render the transplant process too risky. However, all this are meaningless if they don't have potential donor in the first lace. As a rule, we look amongst their siblings to donate. Failing that, we may be looking at the various stem cell or cord blood registry.

I stumbled across this article yesterday which I found interesting enough to blog about. Conventional stem cell transplant are not alien to us. There are now new avenues being explored for it's use, from the conventional to the bizarre. The success of autologous (source being patient's own) stem cell infusion into Mr A Allagra's in September 2003 in IJN captured the public imagination. I was fortunate enough to be part of the team to perform the first adult unrelated transplant in Malaysia, although my boss my not be impressed to be quoted as a Medical Officer.

Now, breast augmentation from stem cell? Hmmmm! Now, that's a thought. I am not sure how to response should a member of public ask me about it - hey! I am a stem cell expert after all!. And for the students, should I ask you the indications for stem cell transplant, please don't mention to grow breasts!

Oh! My Arm's Aching!

That guy in red is proper lethal! Watch out!I went down for the first time to join a few of my ex-Terendakians for a game of badminton as mentioned last night. Instead of catching the zzz very quickly after the game, I had insomnia! I just cannot sleep! I only finally managed to doze off around 3.30. I tried everything, glass of milk, even reading articles, but I was just wide awake! Must be extra adrenaline.

Woke up this morning slightly late as a consequence. Luckily it is Tuesday, when ward activity is lightest. Edmund led the ward round, so I just joined up halfway. My whole body is aching! I need some urut I think! How am I going to survive another session next week?

Deep down, I really enjoyed hooking up with the lads. They are all grown up. When at MRSM, I have a badminton partner from the opposite end of the spectrum. At school, I was the bookworm, very enthusiastic in school programs, holding posts and stuff, while my partner is a typical rebel in the year. Nobody believed that we clicked together on the badminton court, and we remained unbeaten during the school sports competition. He is now a teacher and happens to live near my Mum's house in Bukit Antarabangsa, married with four kids. He is the last person I would have thought to turn out to be a teacher. But a teacher he is. The pic on top right is me playing with Hasni (or Payut as we liked to call him, and I was called Asap, not because I smoke but due to part of my facial anatomy). He now works for Bank Negara. He will be giving me the lift this weekend to Malacca.

So I am off for my massage then ..... wishful thinking!

Are My Boys and Girls Marketable?

Toad updating his blogI came across this article in the Star today. It states that 98.5% of graduate from University Tunku Abdul Rahman is employed within 6 months.  It got me thinking, what is the figure for UM? It was however not backed up by the quality of the employment obtained. Are they being employed by McDonald's or Price-Waterhouse-Cooper? Obviously it was a concern back in 2005 about the marketability of our UM graduate. The observation then, and I think a valid one still is not about their academic prowess - if you call it that - but their lack of marketability. The extra 'X' factor was deemed lacking and we as a university need to instill and develop it in our products, our graduates. 

There were many observations put forward during the discussions. Is it a problem of selection of students into the university? Is it the problem of the UM curriculum? Is it the the lack of exposure to the mainstream culture and nuances? Is it a problem from employing the previous crop of graduates that detracted major corporation from taking a chance with the current ones?

I am not the pondering type, and even if so, I am not going to pretend to be able to articulate them succinctly as not to bore the life out of any readers. One of my old schoolmate from MRSM Terendak had the bright spark to ask me to join a 'career's fair' at the school. These are for the students waiting to take their O-level equivalent (the SPM) later this year and in six month after that will need to make a decision about higher education. Being a doctor obviously the expected theme is how great a career in Medicine is, even though I suffer from a daily basis being overburdened with work. It is more interesting to talk about marketability. What soft skills that are important for these young boys and girls to be a success in life whatever their interest are.

I have a choice to make. Will I start telling them the ugly truth, or just give the plain old 'being a Doctor is great' type talk? I am keen for the former, but it might not go down well with the organisers because after all, the reason for such meeting is to inspire these young minds. I thought I might just do a little bit of both. I will first tell them my first hand account of  the path I took after SPM, my university life, getting married in my final year with a lady that also came from the same school (Anita, my childhood sweetheart), working in the UK, then now in UM. I will then talk about my observation of my students, the pressure they are under from their family to become Doctors, sometimes to a disastrous end. The soft skills that differentiate a good and a great Doctor. The perks of being a Doctor in my position. We shall see after what it will lead to, and it is happening this Saturday. There is a risk I will not be invited again the second time.

Update on Tuesday, March 31, 2009 at 12:33AM by Haris Abdul Rahman

About to go to bed after playing badminton with some ex-Terendakians. Don't worry, I have already had my shower. About 20 of them turned up and we booked a couple of courts. First time I played after a couple of years. Brought my 2 rackets that are in desperate need for restringing, and believe it or not, the strings were still covered with cobwebs. Nasty! Mid-game, we need to get the cleaners not to mop the floor, but to vacuum the webs off! Great fun and will likely be playing again every Monday night. The courts are just 10 minutes drive from my house.

Managed to talk about the coming Saturday trip to Malacca. They were planning to sit the students down into small groups, depending on their interests. As I said, I was not really keen to talk about the rosy side of Medicine. The problem that most of us Doctors have is just seeing the end product, and not realising the hard slog to get there. If nobody else wants to say it, then it will have to be me!