Nguyen Thi Trang, born in 1999, is a student of General Medicine at the Military Medical Academy. With an average score of 8.5/10, Trang became the valedictorian of the entire school and was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant. After graduating, Trang continued to study for the residency exam and was the one with the highest entrance score in internal medicine.
“These results are something I never thought I would achieve when I first entered school. But with effort and determination, everything becomes possible,” Trang said.
As a former student of the Biology class at Vinh Phuc High School for the Gifted (Vinh Phuc province), right after winning the second prize in the national excellent student competition, Trang decided to pursue medicine. Born into a poor farming family, Trang still had two younger siblings. At that time, Trang thought, "If they studied at Hanoi Medical University, they would not have the opportunity to study."
Therefore, the female student decided to apply directly to the Military Medical Academy to avoid tuition fees and receive a monthly allowance, reducing the burden on her parents. Trang's decision was supported by her grandfather. "He wanted me to study at a military school to train myself to become more mature," Trang recalled.
However, when entering the school, because she weighed only 42kg, Trang was not physically fit enough to participate in the 6-month new recruit training in Son Tay. It took Trang nearly half a month at school to be able to participate in training with her friends.
During these 6 months, the new students must participate in military and political studies. The training mainly takes place on the training ground. Trang and her friends participate in marching, shooting practice, and learn tactics...
“There were times when students had to march 5-6km, carrying a backpack of sand on their shoulders. Although tired, there were moments when a piece of dry food was broken into 10 pieces, I felt more mature and appreciated the camaraderie,” Trang recalled.
After completing 6 months of training and returning to school, Trang still studied politics and specialized subjects in parallel. The study of Military Medical students usually lasts from morning to night, even when going to the lecture hall or eating, they have to line up. Outside of class, students will participate in general hygiene, learn regulations - one of the basic exercises in the army and stand guard.
Apart from physical training activities and national defense subjects, according to Trang, the specialized program here is not too different from other medical schools. In the first year, students will study basic science subjects such as Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Biology... In the second year, students begin to approach basic subjects such as Anatomy, Physiology, Embryology, Biochemistry...
Always ranked at the top of her class in high school and receiving constant attention and guidance from teachers, Trang was disappointed when she entered university because everything was so different from what she had imagined.
“In the beginning, I didn’t know how to connect the subjects together, so the knowledge was quite vague and overwhelming. Meanwhile, the class was too crowded, up to 120 students, and the teachers taught very quickly. Therefore, there were times when the class ended and I still didn’t understand what I had just learned. In the first two years, there was a period when I often fell asleep in class and couldn’t take notes.”
Trang admitted that at that time, her studies were quite unstable, she was falling behind more and more, and sometimes even doubted her own choices. Luckily, thanks to the support of her seniors, Trang asked for experience in taking notes, preparing documents in advance from the beginning of the school year and finding study groups, thanks to which her grades gradually improved.
By the third year, when she started studying her major and going to the hospital, because she knew how to study better, Trang gradually became interested in the subjects. In addition, the female student also improved her ability to memorize and take notes, thanks to which she continuously won scholarships from the school.
These results motivated Trang to set a goal of passing the boarding school entrance exam. “Once I had a specific goal, throughout the entire learning process, I focused on collecting documents and taking notes so that by the end of the 6th year, I would have a variety of review materials,” Trang said.
In addition, the conditions for students to be able to participate in the boarding exam are that they must have a total score of over 7, not be allowed to retake any subject and not violate discipline. "I did not dare to be negligent for a moment and set a high determination from the beginning," the female student recalled.
This year, Trang's entire class had about 100 students taking the residency exam, of which the school only accepted 20 students. For the Nephrology and Dialysis Department that Trang chose, there were nearly 20 people applying but only 2 were selected. With the desire to study this major in depth after graduation, Trang determined to study hard, then passed the residency exam as valedictorian of Internal Medicine with a score of more than 27.
She decided to continue studying for another 3 years, which means about 9.5 years of studying at this school, but Trang said "it was completely worth it".
“When working at the Kidney and Dialysis Department, seeing patients who have to spend the rest of their lives on the dialysis machine, I feel that what I do is not significant. Dialysis patients are very hard-working and often have difficult family circumstances. When they have kidney disease, they also have many other diseases such as cardiovascular disease, endocrine and metabolic disorders... Therefore, I want to do something, especially for patients who are in the early stages of kidney failure but not yet at the point of needing dialysis.”
There was a time when I regretted my choice because I didn’t have much time for my family, but looking back, Trang believes that the military environment has given me a lot of things. “I have improved my health, become more persistent and now I can adapt to any situation. Therefore, I have no regrets anymore,” Trang said.
The female valedictorian of the Military Medical Academy hopes to successfully complete her three years of residency in the near future, then continue to stay at the hospital to develop her expertise.
Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/nu-thu-khoa-hoc-vien-quan-y-42kg-ke-chuyen-vac-bao-cat-hanh-quan-2331549.html
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