Today I graduated from medical school. It should have been one of the happiest days of my life. And in some ways, it was. I earned this moment through sleepless nights, years of sacrifice, and an unshakable drive to serve and heal. I walked across the …
“We are sorry, you did not match to any position.” That sentence alone is enough to crush someone who has spent over a decade chasing the dream of becoming a physician. But what came next was a blur of rushed decisions, emotional exhaustion…
For years, I cared for patients as a nurse practitioner—managing chronic disease, guiding them through acute illness, counseling them through the often messy realities of life and health. I loved my work. I loved the relationships I built with patients…
Compared to urban areas, rural communities had a 21 percent higher rate of deaths due to heart disease and a 15 percent higher rate of cancer deaths from 2001 to 2019. The per capita number of general surgeons decreased from 6.4 to 5.2 per 100,000 popu…
Medicine demands precision. However, we overlook one of its most critical variables: physician cognitive load. As a medical student, I see both sides: how deeply patients trust their doctors, and how invisible that mental toll often is. Each day, docto…
Everyone talks about the pride of earning that “Dr.” title. But few speak about the ugly journey of medical school: the isolation, exhaustion, and invisible battles. There’s never a shortage of people telling you to work hard. What th…
Last fall, more than 20,000 first-year medical students donned white coats, pushing total U.S. medical school enrollment to nearly 100,000. Yet despite this surge of new trainees, the American Association of Medical Colleges projects a shortage of up t…
I am a first-year medical student in South Korea. I wrote this essay to share what it feels like to enter a system that demands so much and still receives so little understanding in return. I haven’t even worn a white coat yet, but I already feel…
In the race to get into competitive medical residency training, today’s medical students are chasing something that may surprise you: scientific abstracts, posters, workshops, and research papers. Lots of them. Not necessarily new ideas or meanin…
The field of emergency medicine (EM) is at a crossroads. Faced with rising burnout, a constantly changing health care landscape, and an evolving trend in unfilled residency positions, the specialty is now grappling with another proposed structural chan…
