Zain Chunawala, Seth GS Medical College (India)
MEDI 406 – Cardiovascular Critical Care
Tell us about your elective experience.
It’s been a fantastic experience at UNC. The fact that it’s complete hands on makes it special. I’ve got so many different opportunities to learn different things. On the very first day when I arrived, I was allowed to present cases to the attendings. That’s something you don’t expect generally. The amount of exposure I’ve got to the cath labs for the various procedures and the clinics was something I had never expected from this elective.
Even though I have a CICU elective, I was allowed to attend the clinics on request. I wasn’t just shadowing the attendings but I was also allowed to go interact with the patients one-on-one without the attendings. That was a really good experience as I was literally allowed to play the role of the residents even though we’re medical students.
Moreover, the attendings are extremely helpful. I think I’ve had 4 attendings till date and every time its been such a great learning experience and they have always appreciated every question I have asked.
In my opinion, if you are interested to practice cardiology in the future, you definitely should give the UNC CICU a try. You get to learn a lot of new things that you’ve never known… But the learning comes up only if you show interest. There’s no spoon feeding. I’ve learned quite a few advanced therapies to which we aren’t much exposed to back home. This has been a perfect place to chase my cardiology ambition.
From the schedule perspective, it is surely a little hectic. I never expected to wake up at 5 am in the mornings and reach the CICU at 5:45 am for the pre-roundings. But you just tend to adapt to the cycle once you are settled.
Do you have any advice for future students?
If you are interested in cardiology, this is a must-do elective. Besides the CICU, you are gifted the clinics and the cath lab experience which makes this elective special. At home, we don’t get much exposure to cath lab and don’t get to watch many procedures. Here, we were allowed to watch a number of procedures. We just had to request the attending and it was always scheduled.
From the CICU perspective, keep your basics strong. It’s not a difficult elective, it’s just the basic knowledge that comes to play. Be thorough with topics like heart failure and EKGs. You’ll definitely come here and learn a lot of new exciting things which will make sense if you have a basic idea about the subject.
Try making some good friends too! Hang out over the weekends. Its always good to have some time off in that hectic schedule. Moreover, Chapel Hill is very student friendly and you’ll surely have a good time.