Fourth-year student Ikaneng Yingwane shares a personal journey as he transitions into the next stage of his medical training at Sefako Makgatho Health Sciences University, South Africa.

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The past three years of medical school have not prepared me adequately for the remainder of the journey as I had not anticipated the switch-up in how teaching is conducted in the fourth year. The switch went from having clinical blocks once a week to attending daily in the morning, moving away from the classroom to rotating daily in the hospital wards. The shock was having to do all the ward work and having to attend classes for other modules we still take.

The displacement came when I had to deal with the crisis of academic registration and accommodation in the early weeks of the year while having to show up for clinicals in the morning. The experience made me question my place in medical school as it felt like everything was being thrown at me all at once and I had to scramble to prioritise my issues, though it proved to be somewhat ineffective.

Attending classes without registering and accommodation took a toll on me because I was not prepared to go two weeks queueing for academic clearance and another week to get allocated a room. In those weeks, being without accommodation meant that I had to hop from room to room with my luggage almost every day because temporarily allocated ones were being allocated to other students who had gone to the student centre before me. It took me three weeks to get a sense of stability, and as a result I ended up being behind with my schoolwork.

Finding myself playing catch up with my clinical work as end-of-block assessments were fast approaching, threw me further into a psychological tailspin. However, the spiralling was less severe because I had group mates who assisted me with easing the load by explaining some concepts. The helping hand further affirmed the notion that one needs to network and build relationships in order to survive university.

In all the turmoil of starting my clinical years and the delays I experienced in registering and getting accommodation, I have managed to temporarily acclimate to my new circumstances for the sake of being able to cope with the school load. Thus far I have not fully settled in my allocated room because I am barely in it due to hospital rotations and being at the study centre thereafter catching up with coursework. The daily hospital rotations have taught me to channel my headspace especially when having to interact with patients. Two months into the new year and I temporarily became deterred from my journey and goal of becoming a medical doctor. However, that only equipped me with strategies that I may employ should any similar situation arise along the way. I am eager to discover what the rest of the fourth year of medical school has in store for me. 

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