All of the above comments are excellent. I'll add the following:
1. Some Essential Items.
1. Your white lab coat and medical student ID badge.
2. Your basic medical equipment (e.g., stethoscope, watch to tell time).
3. Two sets of scrubs (unless house scrubs are provided to you - and hopefully they are).
4. Some civilian clothes (e.g., pair of casual pants, socks, few shirts, workout clothes if you have time to workout ... you get the idea). This is an away rotation and not a vacation.
5. A set of dressier-appearing clothes (because you might be attending some professional conferences or you might get an interview with the PD; you should look professional for these types of things).
6. Notebook and pens (to fit in your lab coat pocket for scribbling notes).
7. Phone and charger (phone doubles as alarm clock).
8. Laptop and charger.
9. Personal toiletries (your choice) and your prescription medications, contact lens cleaning gear and extra contact lenses (if you wear contact lens), plus regular glasses (if you wear eyeglasses), and sunglasses (if you're allowed to go outside at all - hahaha ... just kidding ... well, sort of).
10. A printed list of your emergency "people" contacts (including their telephone numbers, relationship to you, and email addresses). You can place this list inside your suitcase.
11. Copy of your important documents (e.g., driver's license, auto insurance policy cards). You may need a copy of these items if you lose them or they're stolen. You can place a copy of these items inside your suitcase.
12. Some emergency cash (you never know when cash will come in handy) - especially if you lose your credit cards/ATM card or your credit cards are stolen.
2. Some Cost-Effective Suggestions.
1. Prepare a "go to" grocery list for yourself (to save time and to budget food costs). Prepare nutritious meals ahead of time and leave them in the freezer or refrigerator of your home (then later warm up in a microwave, oven or stove). If you're fortunate, your home, flat, student housing, or hotel will have a crockpot for you to use. [Note: I don't know where you will be living during your away rotation (e.g., a flat, relative's home, student housing, hotel, or somewhere else).]
2. Buy some convenient snack foods to carry around in your lab coat pocket (e.g., healthy energy bars). At times, you may not have the "luxury" of dining in the hospital cafeteria or anywhere else for that matter. Then, when you're ravenous, you'll have something readily available to eat. Seriously, a snack package is better than nothing. If you're lucky, you might find some edible (packaged) goodies left in the on-call rooms, but don't take them if they're not "free" for the taking, or if you're not sure who left them there anyway. Ask first, before taking food or goodies that might belong to someone else, or of unknown origin, etc.
3. Some Words of Wisdom.
1. Be available, accessible, passionately committed, and willing to work very hard (be first to arrive; and last to leave).
2. Don't try too hard to be everyone's new friend-on-the-deck. They don't know you, and vice versa. If they like you, they'll probably invite you to join them (e.g., hang out and get pizza) over time.
3. Avoid drama and hospital gossip.
4. Do not start text-messaging with your friends or checking your social media non-stop. If you're bored or sitting around with nothing to do, ask what else you can do. Be willing to help; and be appreciative to help - let them know that you're a team player. Everyone is busy, so extra help is appreciated. They may not be able to invite you into a first-of-its-kind phenomenal surgery, but they can surely find something useful for you to do, even if it's scut work. After all, they did a lot of scut work when they were starting out, too. We get it ... no worries.
5. If you don't know how to do something or can't remember how to do something, don't try to bluff it or wing it: ask someone "in the know" instead (e.g., ask an intern or experienced RN, or whomever you need to ask).
6. Whenever I arrive at a new venue, I like to scope things out ... you know ... familiarize myself with locations, hospital floors, EM, OR, Radiology, on-call rooms, labs, pharmacy, etc. In other words, I rely on myself to navigate around the medical center (and not on my pda).
7. Take good care of yourself - physically, mentally, and emotionally. Stay hydrated. At times, you will probably feel sleep-deprived and possibly even discouraged or anxious because medicine is hard work. It happens ... and you will develop good coping mechanisms.
8. Absorb as much learning, knowledge, training and experience as possible (be an enthusiastic sponge).
