Themes run through everything we do. One of those themes is “multiple points of contact.”
When I teach students or new PAs or whoever surgery, one of the first things I cover is “multiple points of contact.” I remember the conference I went to where a plastic surgeon teaching us to sew gave me this incredible piece of advice. You don’t want to have your arms up in the air when you sew.It’s best if you have your pinkies or your wrists in contact with the patient.
It’s the same even when you’re retracting. If you are holding something with one hand, you’ll tend to drift as you lose focus. Use two hands if possible, prop your elbow on something if possible; use multiple contact points and your brain gets a lot more feedback from proprioception.That makes you less likely to drift and much more likely to do a good job.
When we introduce students or PAs to surgeons, we push them into every opportunity to meet people.Multiple points of contact. The more times you’re seen around, the more you’re trusted. Even if someone doesn’t really know you, but they’ve seen you around, they’ll let you do more when you finally get to scrub in.It can make all the difference.
It works the same with the Physician Assistant Exam Scholar’s Newsletter.I keep thinking of putting a book together rather than writing a monthly publication, but a book can’t do one thing: multiple points of contact. You read a book and it goes on your shelf and then eventually into the garbage.Maybe you glean one or two things from it, but it fades. The idea behind the newsletter is multiple points of contact.The more you read, the better it gets. The ideas and the way of thinking builds over time. The best ideas take time for you to wrap your brain around and can’t get assimilated immediately.The easy stuff can, but the really good stuff takes time.
That’s why I love the monthly format.
December’s issue is focusing on some specifics of test taking and some very particular exercises (mental ones) that will have you reading and “seeing” the test better than you ever have before.The November issue was all about how to create an anxiety free environment for taking your exam and the December issue is going to bookend that with how to better understand what the test writers want from you.
Click here before December (wow, December already!): Physician Assistant Exam Scholars
Brian Wallace
