Our last month in Buffalo

Our last month in Buffalo (wow the time flew by so fast!) began with an awesome weekend road trip to Boston, Massachusetts. We rented a family van and loaded it up with all our gear and set out East on the interstate I-90. This was a particularly awesome time for us because we had just completed our Neurology rotations and finished our mock “shelf exam,” so this weekend trip was a perfect way to relax and reward ourselves a little.

          Boston is approximately an 8 Hour drive from Buffalo so we decided to make a stop on the first night in Gansevoort, New York. We found an awesome little log cabin in the hills of upstate New York that overlooked the forests of Vermont (it was beautiful!). The cabin didn’t have water or electricity so we were left to cook dinner over an open fire in this great big fire pit that was out front of the cabin! This was fantastic! We spent the night by candlelight around the table playing Gazdálkodj okosan (Monopoly) and sharing a few beers and stories from Hungary.

          The following morning we woke up early so we could arrive in Boston at a decent hour. We spent the weekend touring the city and snapping photos of the sites. Boston is one of my favourite cities I’ve ever visited in North America. The early Irish settlers have had a strong influence on the culture for many years and architecture itself reminds me a little of Dublin itself. Without going into too much detail, the local food markets (The Quincy Market) are an absolute must see! Balint and I enjoyed our first ever lobster rolls while we were there! They were expensive but they were worth it!!!

         

          My clinical rotation during the last month was in Oishei’s Childrens Hospital. I spent most of my time with the Pediatric Neurology team where I learned about the clinical presentations of various forms of seizure disorders. Pediatrics is an incredibly complicated field of medicine and each and every treatment plan has to be thoroughly thought out as to not harm the further development of the child. They say that the human brain (and therefore the mind) isn’t fully developed until a person reaches the age of 25…so it is easy to understand why such careful consideration must be taken when prescribing medications that can supress the central nervous system. Other than spending time at the in-patient children’s clinic during the last month, I also had the amazing opportunity of shadowing Dr. L.M. at the DENT Neurological institute for a few days each week. DENT is one of the premiere headache / concussion / chronic pain / neuro-oncology research centers in the United States and I was very fortunate to be able to learn about the intricacies of chronic pain management. Dr. L.M. was an incredible teacher and working with him really sparked a drive in me to pursue a career in Neurology.

          Our last weekend in Buffalo was one of the best weekends we had all summer. During early September it had started to get cold so we were extremely fortunate to have one last weekend where it was hot and sunny. We spent Saturday with Dr. I.M. playing tennis at Orchard Park and taking a short hike through the woods to the “eternal flame.” The flame itself is a natural gas leak coming up from the rock in an old gorge just outside of Buffalo which a freely accessible park where people can hike on weekends. We had gone for a late lunch with Dr. I.M. We bid farewell to him and thanked him for all his help over the course of the last three months.

The grand finale of our time in Buffalo for Bálint and I was on the Sunday of the last weekend in the city. We had found some excellent tickets online to the Buffalo Bills NFL game; it was the Bills home opener for the 2018/2019 season! I remember it was EXTREMELY hot that day without a cloud in the sky! Bálint and I went to New Era Field a little early to walk around to enjoy the tailgate-party. We had an awesome time and I highly recommend going to see an NFL football game to any of the students visiting Buffalo!