Occasional Irony

As it should be in the hierarchical reality of medicine, the first years look up to the upperclassmen as the veterans who've seen it all and know even more. But once in a while I'd hear something just the opposite in conversations with my classmates: older residents and doctors telling us that we know more. It was something both difficult to believe and quite obvious. After all, we just had anatomy, we just did biochemistry, so it should still be fresh. All of this was basically anecdotal for me, until, that is, a few days ago, when an intern (1st year of residency) asked me some relatively straightforward anatomy question. Before I was able to register surprise, she added that I'd have a better idea since I just took the subject. The way medical school rolls along, we will end up remembering the most important details, which obviously will be repeated several more times in our schooling, but many things will fall by the wayside. Such is life and such is education.