Well folks, orientation week is about to wrap up. Meeting my 200 new classmates throughout the week has been exhausting and fun, but next week this gets real. No more 'for fun' quizzes or lectures about dealing with stress--on Monday at 9am we crack our phone book of a biochemistry syllabus and there's no turning back!

Yesterday, my classmates and I were cloaked in our first white coats in front of 1,000 of our parents and friends. I felt the pressures of being a pre-med melt away as the new pressures and responsibilities of being a student doctor and future physician were literally placed on my shoulders. During the ceremony we took the Oath of Hippocrates:

I do solemnly swear by that which I hold most sacred,

That I will be loyal to the profession of medicine and just and generous to its members.

That I will lead my life and practice my art in uprightness and honor.

That into whatsoever house I shall enter, it shall be for the good of the sick to the utmost of my power.

That I will hold myself aloof from wrong, from corruption, from the tempting of others to vice.

That I will exercise my art solely for the cure of my patients and will give no drug, perform no operation, for a criminal purpose, even if solicited, far less suggest it.

That whatsoever I shall see or hear of the lives of men and women which is not fitting to be spoken, I will keep inviolably secret.

These things I promise and in proportions as I am faithful to this my oath, my happiness and good repute be ever mine, the opposite if I shall be forsworn.