Origin of GAMT
GAMT Origin : ​
In this origin story, I aim to shed light on the development and evolution of GAMT. Along the way, I have mentioned some of my achievements. While these achievements may not be extraordinary or out of this world, I have included them to illustrate how GAMT played a crucial role in helping me manage my memory challenges. I am excited to share this powerful learning tool with as many people as possible at no cost.All the information one needs to fully understand the GAMT methodology including videos and a basic GAMT course, is offered free on the website. I strongly believe that learning should not depend solely on one's ability to memorize. By enabling equitable information retention, I firmly believe that GAMT can revolutionize the educational landscape.
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Early years:
I was born in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, South India, in 1980. When I was three, we moved to Sirumugai, a village that became the canvas of my stable childhood, after my father secured a job at a newly established rayon factory. My mother worked in telecom department. Both of them exemplified the virtue of hard work.My brother, six years my senior and notably popular in school, shared many fond memories with me. Our school, conveniently close to home, both primary and secondary, instilled in us the rigor typical of South Indian education—ample homework and a deluge of exams. My friends and I, a merry gang from the large staff quarters, would immerse ourselves in a plethora of games - cricket, football and almost everything else that was in season!
From a young age,I considered myself diligent and adept at grasping concepts, but memorization was a Herculean task for me. Becoming a doctor had been one of my childhood ambitions, among many others. Even at a young age, I was acutely aware of this limitation, to the extent that I thought I could never become a doctor. "How can I remember all the drugs to prescribe if I have a sieve-like memory?" I wondered. This insecurity was so profound that I even brought it up with our family doctor during a visit when I was about 12 or 13 years old. He laughed off my concerns and told me not to worry about it, but his reassurance did little to alleviate my fears.
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Entering medical school:
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I toiled along in school. My desire to do well combined with hard work got me into Madras Medical College - one of the best medical colleges in Tamilnadu. I got away mostly with multiple revisions (sometimes more than half a dozen times) to compensate for my lack of memorisation skills till this time. Medical college was altogether a different ball game . The amount of information that I needed to retain exploded exponentially. There was no way I could revise all the information half a dozen times before the exams. My peers had memories like steel traps, and one, in particular, could effortlessly recall information from '"Harrison's Textbook of Medicine" ( a bible for medical post graduate students during my time and notoriously detailed) just days before exams—a feat I could never dream of. It was then I began experimenting with different memory improvement techniques. Initially, I crafted stories from keywords, a strategy that soon became cumbersome as I struggled to recall the sprawling narratives I had created.
Techniques such as mnemonics, peg system, memory palace etc worked for small chunks of information but was barely sufficient for all the information that I had to retain. Transitioning to drawing simple diagrams marked a turning point, and my process evolved into what would become the GAMT technique during my college years.I started off with line arts initially focussing on small chunks of information. I experimented to expand it further to include most, if not all of the information in a topic.This process evolved over a period of few years.
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After medical school came the obligatory internship, a year where we were doctors in training but not yet fully qualified. It was during this period we all began preparing for the postgraduate entrance exam—a comprehensive test that encompassed the entirety of the medical curriculum. . My study technique improved incrementally, and by the time of the entrance exam, I had honed it to such a degree that I achieved a respectable rank for my first attempt and was accepted into the M.D. Anesthesiology program in 2003. These are some of examples of my GAMT's from this time.The first one is as crowded as it can be. The second and third examples are a bit more clearer.
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Post graduate and beyond:
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As I neared the end of medical school, I began to rely exclusively on the GAMT method for my learning. This approach rapidly evolved during my postgraduate years, and its benefits became increasingly apparent. Learning became much easier. During this period, we often had to refer to multiple books for various topics, and GAMT served me well. From there, I went from strength to strength. I gradually started to apply the principles of comparing, contrasting, making associations, applying the learned information, analyzing past exam questions, and focusing on figures to enhance the GAMT approach. This approach fortified my learning and made the process much more enjoyable. Even now, when I need to learn a new topic, I don't feel stressed but rather excited, as it allows me to create another GAMT—an artwork in its own right!
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I moved to Ireland and subsequently aced my anesthesia fellowship exams on my first attempt, taking both the Irish (FCARCSI) and UK (FRCA) versions, each consisting of primary (MCQ and VIVA) and final (MCQ and VIVA) steps. Anesthesia fellowship exams are among the toughest in postgraduate training, with a failure rate of 40% or more among highly qualified doctors whose careers depend on passing these specialty exams.
During the same period, I also cleared all four steps of the USMLE (Step 1, Step 2 CK, Step 2 CS, and Step 3), scoring in the 99th percentile in each one of them (except for Step 2 CS, which is scored as pass or fail). Achieving triple 99's in the USMLE is a rarity. The USMLE is a medical licensing exam required to practice medicine in America. Clearing all the USMLE exams allowed me to do a year of subspecialty training in regional anesthesia at Duke University, North Carolina.
Until the late 2000s, I primarily used paper, pencil, and pen to create GAMTs. We had bundles of paper lying around the house, which I began to spiral bind. It wasn’t until I moved to Ireland that my wife helped scan all these bundles of paper onto a laptop. This allowed me to upload all the scanned notes into OneNote, greatly enhancing the portability of my GAMTs. Just like that, I had access to all the information I had gathered over two decades right on my phone!
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A decade after entering the subspecialty of anesthesia, I passed the three steps of the medical membership exam in Ireland (MRCPI) in 2013. Medical membership exams are also very challenging, with average pass rates of 36% for the first step (55% and 71% for the other steps). This exam was particularly challenging as the syllabus focused on internal medicine, a specialty different from anesthesia, although there were some common elements between both. In essence, I cleared an exam from another medical specialty. I also completed my PhD from University College Cork in 2015.
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As mentioned earlier, I list these achievements not to boast, but to demonstrate the opposite: if I, who have always struggled with memorizing facts, can achieve all this, I am confident that anyone can! All the exams I mentioned are notoriously difficult and fact-heavy, except perhaps the PhD, which required more research than memory. The following in one of my most recent GAMT's.
Light bulb moment:
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Throughout the years leading up to my final FCARCSI exam in 2010, I hadn't considered the broader potential of GAMT beyond my own use. My "light bulb" moment occurred during the clinical part of the exam, which included a case discussion in the morning and viva session in the afternoon. After finishing my morning session, I found myself in the waiting area with my laptop. I began to revise the GAMTs of topics that might come up in the afternoon viva. Surprisingly, I was able to review the entire final fellowship syllabus in just a couple of hours before my afternoon session. My GAMT notes contained all the information I needed, summarizing everything I had learned from multiple books on each topic, all in one place. I was thrilled. This experience made me realise the true power of the technique. Life quickly resumed its pace, and it wasn't until a decade later that I started thinking about sharing this method with others.
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If someone had told me back when I was 12 years old in Sirumugai that I would accomplish everything I have in the past three decades, I wouldn't have believed them at all. I won't claim to have a poor memory, but without GAMT, I couldn’t have achieved what I did. That's no exaggeration. I sincerely hope that all readers will fully explore the potential of GAMT and enjoy its complete benefits.