Moving Up the Totem Pole

I'm now on my 4th elective, but it's my first one in a hospital setting after several rural or exclusively clinic-based electives. That means, in addition to triggering some lingering anxiety about hospital work, that I'm working with some 3rd year students. For the first time in my medical career, in a clinical setting, I'm not the low man on the totem pole.

As I'm a still a medical student, my role has not appreciably changed and the expectations have only increased marginally. However, it is a very different feeling, having that extra year of experience in medicine and, because I'm doing an elective at my home hospital, familiarity for the system I'm working in. It is a far less stressful set-up than 3rd year.

I'm also being given some authority and responsibility over my slightly-more-junior colleagues. I get a very small amount of control of the daily schedule as a result, which provides an amazing sense of liberty after a year of having zero control. I get to do a little bit of teaching, which I love - wherever my medical career takes me, I would like to be teaching for at least part of it.

Despite my supposed seniority, what has struck me is the capabilities of the 3rd year students I've worked with. Maybe I'm just meeting the best and brightest, maybe I didn't give myself enough credit back when I was a 3rd year, but they seem a lot more able than I felt back when I was in their position. In short, I'm impressed. I still have some information to pass along - I didn't get through that whole year without learning something - but it's not as wide of a gap as I thought it would be by this point!