Whether you’re attending a two-year nursing program or medical school to become a doctor, once you’ve chosen the career path you want to take in the health field, things start to get a bit stressful.
One minute you’re a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed college student, and the next, you’re being told to start preparing for your peds test, as it is an essential part of becoming a medical professional. While all of this is true, just being in medical school can be stressful beyond belief. In the following words, we’ll give you a few tips to help you navigate medical school as painlessly and stress-free as possible.
Plan Your Time (Even on Peds Test)
Not having time to get an assignment done is a big part of medical school because the pace is so fast, and the work is extremely hard. After all, you’re going to be responsible for people’s lives, so it shouldn’t be a piece of cake.
So that you don’t have the stress of an incomplete assignment or having to stay awake for 24 hours to get it done, you need to plan your time. As a med student, you will quickly find that a study schedule is imperative if you’re going to be less stressed and graduate with your class, or at all for that matter. Remember, the number of students dropping out of or failing out of medical school is extremely high, so don’t become a statistic.
If you have study buddies, sit down with them, and come up with a study schedule, including extracurriculars together, that you can all live with, then stick to it.
Get Enough Sleep
Yes, you’ve been hearing this since the day you started kindergarten but getting enough sleep at night is essential to relieving stress, making good grades, and surviving medical school. While late nights come with the territory, too many late nights will begin to tell on you.
While it may be tempting to go out on Sunday night and party with your friends, then cram all night Monday night for that big exam, it’s going to hurt you in the long run. While you do need to have fun while you’re in school, you’ve got to keep your priorities straight and get enough sleep to function to be less stressed and successful.
Take a Step Back
When you have two papers due, a clinic to prepare for, and three tests coming up, it can be easy to wonder why you ever chose to go to med school in the first place. This is when you’re the most stressed and need to take a step back and remember why you’re doing this.
Take a break, get a cup of coffee, and think about the big picture. One day, you’ll look back on your days at the university fondly and laugh at the papers you don’t even remember doing.
Seriously, taking a step back can help you reaffirm your decision and desire to graduate and become a medical professional.
Don’t Shut Out Normal Life
While you don’t need to put off sleep, classes, and studying to go party, you don’t need to shut your normal life down, either. You need to make time to hang out with your friends, go to movies, read a book, or even just take a walk with someone you love in the evenings after dinner. Shutting out normal life and never having any fun will end in burnout, and you’ll be more stressed than you’ve ever been before.
Entering the medical field is an admirable thing to do, and they need people desperately. However, if you don’t lower your stress levels, you’ll easily become burnt out and never make it through.
The post Tips for Dealing With Stress as a Medical Student appeared first on Enterprise Podcast Network – EPN.
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