Being part of CARER this year has been quite the adventure. When\nI was dragged to the lecture advertising it by Callum and Alice, I was\ninitially very sceptical. Why give up the life I loved in Cardiff to go\nsomewhere I\u2019ve never been before, where I know no one? Yet, as I closed my\nlaptop lid and actually began listening to what Francis Gerrard had to say, I\nbecame more intrigued. Fast forward to now, where I am sitting in my gorgeous\nsuburban garden, in the sunshine with the birds singing away, my supposed\n\u2018lockdown location\u2019, boy am I glad I started listening. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I joined CARER because I thought it would be an investment\nin my learning. A sort of deliberate self-sabotage of my social life, or so I\nthought. A year to really knuckle down and give myself the best head start for\nfourth year ISCEs, particularly as the second-year ones alone scared me enough.\nI wanted to build my confidence with patients, become more proactive in my\nlearning, and really to just throw myself in at the deep end. Having found\nmyself getting side-tracked in Year 2 by all the fun opportunities in Cardiff\noutside work life, I knew this was a way to refocus on what I am really here\nfor and why I came to Medical School. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
And most of the above stands true. This year has been a huge\nwake up call for me as to what it looks like transitioning the knowledge we\u2019ve\nbeen taught through lectures and tutorials (that at times seemed merely an\nabstract concept I needed to cram for S2\u2026) towards a human being who is sat in\nfront of you asking why their urine is frothy or what this lump is on their\nskin. Especially when your GP is sat comfortably in the next room leaving you\nto it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet, I personally have found the increased responsibility-\nand at times expectation- really helpful in order to spur me on in my\nindependent learning. I now WANT to know things, so that when they face me in\nclinic I can tackle them, and can direct my questions in the history\naccordingly to come up with some sort of idea for management (even if it is\nnowhere near correct).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I am able to present my findings to one of the GPs- who can\nthen either agree and allow me to prescribe the appropriate medication or write\nthe needed referral letter, for example, or in fact tell me very kindly if I\nhave gone down the wrong path completely and then re-direct me. Now is the time\nto make mistakes! I have learnt more this year from the discussions I have had\nwith the GPs as to why I thought it was X, and how it is instead Y for these\nvarious reasons. Having the freedom to make these mistakes on my own, without\nanother student jumping in and immediately making the correct diagnosis before you\nhave even processed the information, has been exceedingly beneficial for me. Therefore,\nI would highly encourage anyone who thinks they might benefit from this more\none-to-one teaching to seriously consider applying for the CARER programme.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Nonetheless, I can also inform you that it will not be the death of your social life! I have thoroughly enjoyed being a part of the Aberystwyth University Netball Team (yes there is a university here, and yes, it is a normal one; shock). \u00a0Along with my housemate, somehow our attendance to socials has been greater this year than the last two combined- although for any lecturers reading this not at the detriment of our studies of course! In addition, I have been able to get to know a lot of students through the church I attend here too, and my involvement with the church has really helped me feel embedded in the community. Fran, Emanuele and I all took part in the Christmas Light Switch on parade through these connections, and I must say no one in Aberystwyth will forget the giant shark they saw marching down the high street (okay they probably will\u2026 but still). We have all felt incredibly welcomed by the students and community here and, as cheesy as it sounds, have made friends for life. I now even have a friend who regularly brings round baked goods for me- result! I\u2019m hoping that for next year she delivers to Cardiff too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As much as I still love Cardiff and everything I have there,\nit is going to be much harder than I thought it would be to leave the beautiful\nsetting of Aberystwyth. It will be a shock leaving the rolling hills that are a\ntwo-minute walk from my house, and the gorgeous beach that I can escape to the\nsecond the sun comes out to watch the starlings dance. Nevertheless, it will\njust make me appreciate how lucky I am that on that rainy day in Cardiff when I\ndidn\u2019t want to sit in the library by myself, I went to the lecture on CARER, put\nmy application in, and got to escape to the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Being part of CARER this year has been quite the adventure. When I was dragged to the lecture advertising it by Callum and Alice, I was initially very sceptical. Why […]","protected":false},"author":1761,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[14,6],"class_list":["post-531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-aberystwyth-university","tag-carer"],"meta_box":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1761"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":534,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531\/revisions\/534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cardiff.ac.uk\/carer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}