What to expect from CBM: Third Year

Written By Kainat Nawaz Fourth year Medical Student

Third year is the year where you can get a real feel for GP, through seeing patients in your own the student surgeries. Your experience will vary greatly depending on the practice you are based. Also, the history taking itself varies quite a bit from taking histories at hospital placement- first of all, patients would come in with anything and often weren’t able to tell you their diagnosis! This meant there was always a unique experience to refine your history taking skills and put knowledge into practice as you try to come up with differentials. I found, in comparison to histories at hospital, considering the patient came for an actual appointment they would tell you everything - it was only here where I realised the true importance of the golden minute in history taking! Where in the first minute of the consultation you can gather so much information by just letting the patient talk.

Student surgeries allow you to ask open and closed questions to narrow down the diagnosis, and even if the same condition came up, there would always be a new twist as every patient is different. I remember taking a history in Urdu, and more so how grateful the patient was.

Aside from student surgeries, in third year you will follow a baby for the year - actually visualising the process of childhood development really helps with memory compared to endless reading like we did from the medicine in society lectures (plus its all a lot cuter). You get to ask the mother important questions about her experience of pregnancy, labour and then follow the baby including seeing their 6-week checks and how they develop in the first few months of life. Nevertheless, the child development lectures delivered in 3rd year CBM were great revision aids for MCQs.

Another new component introduced last year were symptom analysis, these would include making presentations on common presenting complaints. Even on retrospection, these were so useful to prepare for the 4th year teaching and learning SSM assessment. Additionally, the presenting complaints are genuinely common presentations, so these activities helped in forming differentials and improving our history taking skills.

All in all, I found third year CBM the most enjoyable so far. It's so varied and a lot more applicable to how we would work as doctors. I would say enjoy the experience (as much as you can despite the Covid restrictions) and know that this stuff will really help you become a better doctor for the future.