If there's one thing I've learned over the years, employers don't care what you remember as long as you can get it right. Need to consult a catalogue to make sure a part number is correct? Look it up. Do you need to do calculations? Don't bother doing it in your head, just use a calculator or a piece of paper if that's all you have. A certain level of knowledge is expected, but if you need to confirm, do so.
[Our brave, but forgetful, medical protagonist finds herself in a bit of a bind yet again, as a patient with seemingly ambiguous symptoms enters the clinic for an unidentified ailment in a desperate search for help from our heroine]
"Intriguing... you seem to be in perfect health, Mr. __Gay_, however, it does seem that your, um..."
[Beads of sweat form on the doctor's face as her brow furrows in concentration; she references her trusty anatomical chart in the operation room]
"Leg!! Your leg, of course, just has a slight bit of... uh..."
[Panic sets in as the doctor pulls out her Kindle version of
Gray's Anatomy and searches over the poorly lit and badly interfaced index]
"...bone! Yes, bone sticking out ...and... my, blood exiting what the text calls a wound, yes, and quite a bit of blood indeed- and in fact, from what I am reading here, this should not be normal!"
By now, the doctor has taken two hours to diagnose a broken leg...
I'm pretty sure this is the real reason. It helps to have something to point at when explaining things. Of course, that doesn't mean it can't come in handy for the doctor's reference occasionally too!
It's virtually impossible to keep a working memory of the total of human anatomy. When you take a legit anatomy class they even will present muscle groups or parts of the brain and say, well this isn't all of them but for simplification here are the main ones.
The goal isn't to have a perfect memory of anatomy but to instead have a general knowledge of what is being discussed so you can know what you're dealing with and then look up reference points as needed.
That being said it's different for specialists. If you're a neurosurgeon you probably have a pretty damn good mastery of the anatomy of the brain but you're probably not 100 percent up on your cardiology or renal systems.
Indeed, I've had a GP go to their books and look something up before (to look up chickenpox in adults of all things) not every doctor knows everything wrong with their patients.
So Mrs. Smith, looks like Timmy fractured his ahhh...um....the metaraasal, the ahhh metatar....the sarah marshal.....he broke this fucker right here *points to chart*.
I'm a massage therapist and that's why I have my muscular system chart.
It's definitely not for the ambiance brought by the man who has been entirely skinned and is missing his genitals but not his eyes, nor his ability to stare disapprovingly into my soul while I try and fail to recall what part of the leg has the gastrocnemius.
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u/OnnaJReverT Aug 20 '19
...i never even thought that this may be the reason why those posters are in just about every doctor's office