Year 3 MBChB student Luke O’Kane reports on starting intercalating in Bioethics, Law and Society.
Going into third year, it’s hard to know what to expect. Depending on which degree you intercalate in, you can be put into a completely different environment to what you are used to in first and second year.
For myself, this was apparent as soon as I walked into my first seminar. No X-rays, no blood results and no drug names with approximately two more syllable than legally allowed. Instead, I was greeted with statutes, neuroethics and social constructs, a far cry from the anatomy labs and GP placements I was used to. I wasn’t in Kansas anymore and yet I was excited.
I am intercalating in Bioethics, Law and Society, a degree I chose because it was the furthest thing from medicine that I could find. Not because I hate medicine but because I recognise that medicine will hopefully be the rest of my life and so when the rare opportunity arose to do something different came about, I took it.
The skills intercalation has taught me have been innumerable. For a start, unlike the slow build-up to exams I’ve become accustomed to in medicine, intercalation requires steady work throughout the whole semester. The increased number of deadlines has forced me to time manage and organise my life better. Although I have managed to fit in more than a few nights out as well.
It has also thrown me back to first year in an odd way. Meeting a whole year of new people has also been a refreshing change and allowed me to bust out some fairly rusty social skills which haven’t been used since trying to make friends at the first Pollock dinner.
Third year is a steep learning curve but not one that you should be afraid of. There is a sense in third year that you’ve been here before. You’ve faced challenges you thought were insurmountable, like in first year when nobody held your hand and independent thought was first thrust upon you for a HESsay. This is no different. Third year will be one of my biggest challenges yet but one I am hopeful and confident towards.
