AMSA Panacea 2023

PANACEA:
REFLECTION
AMSA 2023

CONTENTS
p a n a c e a
Acknowledgments .............................................................4
Graduation Lament by Henry Kocatekin......................5
Have Faith by Henry Kocatekin.......................................6
Panacea - Reflections by Sonya Yegorova-Lee.........9
Yingina by Elizabeth Hu.....................................................12
Lake Burrumbeet by Elizabeth Hu..................................13
Guide to Specialties...........................................................14
AMSA Rural Health: Frontier..............................................17

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
p a n a c e a
The 2023 AMSA Panacea publication theme is:
REFLECTION
Publication and Design Officer: Shani Nguyen
Publications subcommittee: Sonya Yegorova-Lee
(editor), Liam Spence (editor), Sophia Dang (graphic
designer)
“We do not learn from experience. We learn from
reflecting on experience"
~John Dewey

G R A D U A T I O N
LAMENT
BY HENRY KOCATEKIN
I recently learned about elegies: “it is often a melancholy poem that
laments its subject's death but ends in consolation.” Nearing
graduation, I realise that I’m far more qualified to be a medical
student than I am to be a doctor.
I feel desperately empty for the hole that I leave behind
Like a shadow that I’ve betrayed by stepping out of the light
It is not gone, merely invisible to the eye, seen only in my mind
In my memory, slipping, pulling away, despite me holding on so tight.
I hear the cheers and delight around but feel fraudulent on admission
It’s a candle I light to mourn a time I once enjoyed
A home not defined by place, but a shared expedition
And now I’m at the end of the line, facing an idea with which I’ve never
toyed.
That family, that home, they’re slipping away
Like a ship beyond the horizon line, or a child who doesn’t look back
I feel pride, and despair, and guilt about feeling betrayed
I want this candle to stop burning, to cool and lock us in our tracks.
I can’t bear the future for which I feel so wholly unprepared
I am becoming he who I have be trained to treat
Sick and broken as a gaze into the abyss, I am beyond repair
So I step but I do not fall, for the memories form a path beneath my
feet.

HAVE
FAITH
KOCATEKIN
BY HENRY
Blood doesn’t spray like I expected.
My heart doesn’t race.
There’s no adrenaline.
Just confusion.
And questions.
Endless questions.
They all sit between me and the Registrar.
Between me and my future.
How long will the incision be?
How long will I be standing here?
How many years will I be standing on this side of the patient?
When will I be where he is?
What steps do I need to take?
What does the path look like?
Two steps.
At most.
Two steps?
Surely not.
Despite only being on the other side of the patient, it feels
unreachable.
And then the nurse moves in.
She shifts her bench so it’s at the head of the bed.
Now I’m trapped.
There’s no way for me to make those two steps.
I look behind me.
Cords and tubes dangle.
Like a matted web.
Or a cell.

I’m never leaving.
I’m never holding the scalpel.
I look back at the patient and the room spins slowly.
My head feels simultaneously empty and full.
Empty of knowledge.
Full of questions I can’t quite articulate.
Like fog, they make the path ahead unclear.
And then a retractor penetrates the fog.
Effortlessly.
Without a quiver from the hand that places it in my own.
Mine shakes with doubt.
With fear.
With uncertainty of whether I am pulling too firmly.
Or perhaps not firmly enough.
I wonder if he, whose hands grace the patient’s neck, was
taught the confidence he exudes.
It seems so natural, so innate.
There is calmness in his artisanal skills.
Like watching a sculptor on a miniature figurine.
Whilst the slightest cut could be devastating, still he continues
with clear, deliberate strokes.
Like a master.
Like he who has not only read all the books, but written them
too.
No one has taught me.
No one has taught me how to hold the tool, which angle to
pull, or where to rest my idle hand.
Just next to me?
On the patient’s face?
That feels wrong.
I know she’s asleep and she can’t feel anything, but it still feels
wrong.
And I can’t put it by my side.
The nurse already evicted me for my lack of sterility.
So, I let it hover.
In mid-air.
In limbo, between the world I think I want to join and the one
of comfort.

Between his world and mine.
The tension radiates through my forearm.
Aching, but imperceptible.
I hide my winces behind the mask.
Alongside my other questions.
I’m not thinking about the patient.
I don’t even know her name.
All I’m thinking about is me.
And how painful my legs are.
And how I desperately want to move.
How my insignificance is killing me.
How this career feels like a black tunnel that I haven’t even
entered and somehow, I’m still surrounded by darkness.
How I want a recipe to follow.
I want assurance that there’ll be an end.
That I’ll make it to the other side of the table.
The side where you operate on people, not anatomical
landmarks.
The side where your questions pertain to how you can improve
the quality of life of another human.
Of someone who has gifted you with a blessing, laying himself
bare.
The side where you hide your fears to give your patients
confidence.
That world feels so impossibly far from the one that I exist in.
Too far away.
Retractor.
Through my fog, appears a second as steady as before.
Suddenly my right hand has a function.
And I’m lifting.
And this tension is right, because his blade passes just a little
bit more effortlessly than before.
And I realise that the tunnel is still dark.
No one is shining a light or making promises.
But my eyes are adjusting
And there’s another stepping stone.
It’s the stepping stone from one retractor to two.
It doesn’t look like much, but it’s the next step I’m going to
take.

P A N A C E A
REFLECTIONS
SNOITCELFER
BY SONYA YEGOROVA-LEE
I’ve spent the better half of my year travelling, and people often ask
me where I’m from. Despite having the question come my way dozens
of times, I still hesitate before replying. The hesitation is in part
because I don’t know how much of the truth the asker wants to know,
because the truth is not quite so simple. I was born in Korea, but my
mother is Russian and my father Korean. The Russian side of my family
lives in Kazakhstan, but I moved to Australia when I was eight.
Sometimes I look at myself in the mirror I scrutinise my features, trying
to perceive myself from the perspective of a stranger. Your features
tell a story of your heritage, and I wanted to know how others would
read me. When I was six years old, I had asked my grandmother while
pointing to parts of my body, “which half is Korean and which half is
Russian?” I’ve always felt at odds with what was reflected back at me,
and I am still trying to parse together my identity.
I’ve spent the better half of my year travelling, and people often ask
me where I’m from. Despite having the question come my way dozens
of times, I still hesitate before replying. The hesitation is in part
because I don’t know how much of the truth the asker wants to know,
because the truth is not quite so simple. I was born in Korea, but my
mother is Russian and my father Korean. The Russian side of my family
lives in Kazakhstan, but I moved to Australia when I was eight.

Sometimes I just leave the answer at “Australia”, because it’s where my
home is and also where I’ve spent the majority of my life. But this
answer always raises suspicion in the other person’s eyes, because it
doesn’t address why I look the why I do, and it makes me question if I
have a right to call myself an Australian.
The other reason for my hesitation is that frankly, I’m not sure who I am.
I look Korean, but living two-thirds of my life in Australia has made me
feel divorced from my birth country. Walking through Seoul, it’s
comforting to blend in with the crowd, knowing that my features are
reflected in so many other faces. I walked with anonymity. But this
belonging is only superficial, because I have long since forgotten the
language, I don’t know the cultural norms, nor am I connected to my
Korean family. In high school, I was friends with a group of Korean
girls, who’d talk in Korean during breaks. I’d sit on the outskirts of their
conversations, desperately wishing I could be a part of it. Although I
looked Korean enough, I lacked the heritage that brought the other
girls together. I fell out of touch with them when school finished.
With my Russian family, I feel slightly more at ease. My mother has
tried her best to impart her culture onto me. We speak Russian at
home, make regular visits to the Russian deli, cook Russian meals and
have a tight-knit Russian community in Australia. I had a Russian tutor
during high school so I’m able to speak Russian fluently. But despite all
this, I still feel like a misplaced spoon in a drawer full of uniform
cutlery. My grandma used to buy and dress me and my cousin
identical outfits (to avoid any bickering between us) and I can only
imagine what an incongruous image we would have made. No one
would have believed that we were related; one girl tall and blond, the
other stout and brunette. And in family photos the difference is even
more apparent. People regularly ask my mother where she adopted
me or if we’re friends (she always accepts the latter with glee
because she views them to be compliments that they don’t think she is
old enough to be my mother).

Looking at my mother with her green eyes and willowy limbs, I also find
it hard to believe that she’s my mother. You’d have to have a
discerning eye to see the subtle similarities between us, in the curve of
our jaw, the bends of our knees, the shape of our hands. Many
strangers don’t have time for much more than a passing glance at us,
and see only the stark differences. When I am visiting my family in
Kazakhstan, no one assumes I am Russian. The Kazakhs have taken me
on as their own, and speak to me in their language, only for me to
reply sheepishly in Russian that I didn’t understand what they said.
Growing up in a Western country has also moulded my values to take
on a different form than the ones that my Russian family hold. This
difference becomes more and more apparent the older I become
and I struggled to bite my tongue during my last visit. I couldn’t join in
on the discourse during dinner because I knew my opinions differed
from everyone else’s and my Russian wasn’t sophisticated enough to
argue my case coherently.
Right now though, when I think of home, I think of Australia. I picture
early morning runs along the Spit, surfing at Currumbin, driving to work
at Chinderah. Home is where home cooked dinners with friends are,
home is where my mum is, home is the hill in Kirra that I sat at to journal
as the light faded from dusk to night. I am not sure of my identity. But
these mental images have brought me so much comfort over the past
six months that it’s hard to deny that Australia has become my home.
And for now, maybe that is all the confirmation that I needed.

TAKEN ABOVE TAKAYNA COUNTRY (TASMANIA)
YINGINA
BY ELIZABETH HU

Lake
Burrumbeet
W A D A W U R R U N G C O U N T R Y
BY ELIZABETH HU

Ricci, Charmaine the University of Newcastle Medical Society
have created an exceptional guide introducing students to
medical specialties that they can consider pursuing a career
in. Here is an excerpt of the guide, and you can access the full
text from the following links:
Facebook Post:
https://www.facebook.com/100063757262332/posts/73699
4565102446/?mibextid=rS40aB7S9Ucbxw6v
UNMS Website:
https://www.unms.org.au/guide-to-specialities
FOREWORD SNAPSHOT
As medical students, we all at some stage face the challenging
decision of what area we want to specialise in, but how do we
even begin to decide? Even if you are able to narrow it down
to a few favourites, it is still incredibly overwhelming trying to
wrap your head around what each specialty’s training
program entails, what each training program application
requires, what the lifestyle involves etc. I started this initiative
in my role as Academic Officer for the University of Newcastle
Medical Society (UNMS), when I realised that not only did I not
comprehend the variety of specialties that exist, but even at a
basic level I did not understand the specialising pathway for
each. I found that when I was researching one specific
specialty, it was still quite difficult to find the answers to simple
questions I had about the specialty, such as the
positives/negatives of the specialty, the degree of difficulty to
apply and get on to the training program, the duration of the
program etc. I realised that if I was having trouble when I was
specifically researching just one specialty, then this would
probably be an issue for most medical students: A) For the
students who have no idea what they want to specialise in:

it is so tough to get basic information on lots of different
specialties or just an overview of the specialties because the
information out there online is so detailed and dispersed
across multiple different websites. B) For the students who think
they know what specialty they want to pursue: these students
may be able to do some extensive research and find the
answers to their questions , however they may become too
narrow-minded and never explore or consider other
specialties that they don't necessarily come across or have
placements in during medical school.
I hope this document will be useful in navigating through the
specialising process by helping to: 1) Know what options are
out there 2) Give an overview of what each specialty entails
3) Narrow down which specialties you are interested in 4)
Gain an initial understanding of the specialising pathway for
your chosen specialty/s This document was compiled with the
help of many dedicated students, as well as some amazing
doctors who work in various specialties and generously shared
their lived experience, opinions and advice regarding their
specialty.. A very special thanks to Charmaine Lye, who took
on the role of designing this document and turned my vision of
this document into a reality, one far greater that what I could
have ever imagined!

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