site banner
PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   4088 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for January 14, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

3
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

I've finally finished the exam I've been crying about for months, and I feel.. empty.

I'm not even relieved, or depressed, I just feel like I'm about to break into a fever or come down with the flu, which very well might be the case given how many people on my cattle-class flight were coughing their lungs out.

The exam has two parts, a Situational Judgement Test, which is supposed to be a test of your ability to adhere to the standards of ethics and probity expected of a doctor, but achieves nothing like that at all, and a Clinical Dilemma section, which is about what you'd expect.

Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says, "Treatment is simple, for undifferentiated anxiety or mild depression, NICE CKS guidelines suggest low intensity psychotherapy first line. The only clown 🤡 here is me for studying my ass off to get here."

The worst I could say about the CD is that the questions were fucking vague. As in, when you ask me the "most appropriate" test to order for someone, do you want me to order the first fucking thing I'm supposed to or, or are we imagining a spherical cow in an MRI? For that to mean something, you need to specify the setting, at the very least, which many questions didn't, and ideally ask specifically what the first test should be, then what you might use to screen further, and finally the most specific/confirmatory one. Not just "most appropriate".

But the SJT? I was inclined to believe that the UK doctors bitching about it were slightly exaggerating when they called it a random number generator that also counts for half your score. They weren't wrong, not one bit.

The dilemmas ranged from headscratchers to utterly psychotic. The funniest, which had me chuckling out loud, involved a fellow doctor who was wheelchair bound due to motor neurone disease complaining to you how sad he is that he can't access the doctor's mess that's up a spiral staircase, so he's forced to have lunch in the public mess.

Like, all well and good Dr. Stephen Hawking, how is that my problem?

I was still presented with a list of options, from the profoundly unhelpful like telling him, dawg, you're a cripple, dafuq do you expect? to telling him that it is beyond my capabilities to physically move the mess somewhere else.

Since I was expected to rank the options in order of good to bad, I ended up picking "accompany him for lunch in the public mess" as my top pick. Why. Am I expected to do that indefinitely?Second pick was "ask him how I could help", which brings to mind me dragging him up a flight of stairs.

There wasn't even any option for something half sensible, like going to HR or Occupational Health and asking for disability accommodations for the poor bastard, or even telling him to ask for it instead.

Hell, I'm not sure why a doctor with MND is employed in the first place. If I ever become brain dead and on indefinite ventilator support (more exams like this risk an aneurysm anyway), then I'll ensure my next of kin demand I get my standard wage for the valuable job I'm doing lying there and keeping a bed warm.

how sad he is that he can't access the doctor's mess that's up a spiral staircase,

Is the NHS so poor that they are using medieval castles as hospitals now? I'm pretty sure spiral staircases have been illegal in new-build private dwellings for like 50 years, and don't think I've been in a hospital that doesn't have, um, elevators? Like, really big ones -- it's kind of a hospital thing IME.

There are still some very old Victorian hospitals in use, and while wards are certainly accessible with elevators I suppose some rooms used for staff rest might not be.

Look dawg, I don't make the rules. Or write the questions. Or have any defense for the utter insanity on display.

But knowing what I know about the NHS, such a situation could very much be Based On A True Story.

The least believable part is a dedicated doctor's mess, those have been going out of vogue for decades, and fuck what the clearly written contracts state.

Obviously the doctors have a secret stateroom on top of a castle tower in the UK; looks like you are entering an exciting new world.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats