Over a month has passed. I need to quickly write this blog so that all of you know what I am up to! I know I left you more than a week ago, before my second block exams. So I will sum up what has happened since: I learned as much as I could about the arms and the legs, I wrote the exam, and I did OK, again. I think my biggest problem in that time was allowing the stress to get the best of me, and not sleeping enough. I am trying my best not to do that this time around.
I am still plagued with stress and guilt as I reluctantly, in some ways, go to sleep at 2am. My usually 3am bedtime beckons as I try to get ahead as far as I can in the next day’s lecture. I must be crazy. But I am sure I am not the only one. I have now had a couple of run-ins with the infamous student here who scores 100% on anatomy exams. He is quiet, respectful, and never looks overly tired. He sits in the back of the class on the side. Sometimes I look to see what he is doing, but I can never quite see. Not that he is an animal in the zoo, but we all want to know just how he does it!
My mandate these days though is to do as well as I can, focus on studying learning, knowing the human body. That is my responsibility as a doctor, to know my stuff. It scares me when I have run-ins with the upperclassmen though. For instance, today, in the study room, running into a 5th semester student who is one of 35 students remaining from a class of 85. I just want to make it out of this place alive, healthy, smart and strong to take on my clinical duties. I am going to be one of those students! I have the drive! I can do it! Sometimes you need to chant it to keep you going too....
We are learning the abdomen these days, lots of relations, “The ascending colon is lateral to the coils of the small intestine, and it is superior to the ilihypogastric and ilioinguinal nerves, as well as the right ureter and quadratus lumborum muscle.” Obviously I remember this stuff. I know it is important, and I revel in the power of my mind, picturing a curved pancreas or the coils of the jejunum, the naughtly appendix which has a multitude of positions. The power of the “ectomy” in the abdomen is strong, every clinical application for an organ tends to be some sort of removal, spelenectomy, colonectomy, etc. What else is difficult? Well just about everything. We just keep on plugging away, knowledge is power and I am gaining more of it.
I have started another method, yet again, for this block, involving note-taking and reading of both lecture material and the text book. We will see how this works out too, plus, I have a friend to study with too, and he has agreed to review with me frequently so we keep each other up to date and on our toes.
Still looking for a place to live here too for next semester, I am hoping to get one over the weekend.
Interesting things:
1. I am constantly running out of food. I can’t understand if I just eat too much, I don’t buy enough – or I buy the wrong things. I had a ridiculous snack this evening that I cannot even divulge because there was just not enough available. I think the only person I could tell is my sister! Haha.
2. There is a fly that lives in my room. I am so mad. I keep on thinking I get rid of it every day and I don’t.
3. The abdomen is pretty cool. At first it seemed like such a jumble, so much fat and mesentery. Much of the inner abdominal cavity is covered by a layer of mesentery (fat), called the greater omentum. Omentum means apron in latin. Beyond this fat layer, lays the stomach, liver, small intestines, large intestines, and on and on. I think the coolest thing today was holding a spleen. It was small and grey and seemingly insignificant, yet so important. I did some dissecting today as we reached the posterior abdominal wall, dissecting out the abdominal aorta! Cool!
4. I think if I had learned latin my life would be so much easier:
a. Cecum = blind sac
b. Pylorus = gate-keeper
c. Epiploic = to float upon
I am loving this Latin. It makes everything make perfect sense. Why is the lower sphincter on the stomach called the pyloric sphincter? Well because it is the gate-keeper of the foot in the stomach, allowing only a certain amount into the small intestine at one time.
The cecum is the blind sac in the intestine. There are also a set of “gastroepiploic” vessels, which I now know mean, “floating on the stomach”! Fantastico.
I am dead tired. I want to write more and I will try on the weekend after I attempt to find lodging in Windwardside.
I witnessed a crazy lightning storm on my balcony this evening. It was quite a sight!
I miss you all at home.
xoxo
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
A month and counting...
Hi everyone. Sorry for the lack of update, for those keeping up. It has been a crazy week. I instituted my new study strategy which entails never falling behind in classes, i.e. reviewing and studying every lecture before going to bed at night. That has kept me up late, combined with an evening run and attempts to do nightly lab sessions has prevented me from writing sooner.
Block exams are in just over a week so it will probably be another week before I write again. In retrospect, noticing that it is now a month since I have been here it is kind of unbelievable. What would I have done on any other June 1st? Would I have been working, been in summer school? Revelling in the newfound Canadian warmth? Meanwhile, it is quite hot and has been this way since I have arrived. I never check the weather; I am not sure how accurate it would be anyway, I just assume that it will be hot and perhaps rain. Bu t you can easily wait out the rain spells here.
Now to what’s going on with school. We have finished the arm, and now I can tell you all the muscles, where they originate and insert, the nerves, their course in the arm, which muscles they innervate, what part of the skin cutaneous nerves receive stimuli from, joints and their accompanying ligaments, movements, and arterial supply and venous drain. This along with an assortment of other anatomical features. After an initial struggle with the number of muscles to learn, I have found that most anatomists are not actually crazy, they at least try to name this logically. For instance, flexor carpi ulnaris, is a muscle that assists with flexion of the elbow, it attaches to the carpal bones, the wrist bones, and it runs close to the ulna and is innervated by the ulnar nerve. I feel like I am learning some latin and it is fun how they name things. At least I enjoy some of it!
In histology we have moved from hemopoeisis (the formation of blood cells), to cartilage, and today we will begin bone and bone formation. I have been relatively good at keeping up with the class this block, though I wish I spent more time on it this past weekend. I was pretty tired out from the week, and spent Friday catching up on lecture reviews, Saturday I spent concreting my arm knowledge and Sunday I was out of steam, slept a large chunk of the day to make up for during the week, and worked on getting reviewed on the leg for Monday (including some muscle memorization). So the weekend was a bit of a mix-up of things. I really hope I have kept up with what I have needed to, and that this week will not be too bad. The way things are starting out today is not good though – 3 ½ hours of sleep due to going to bed at 2:30am, and not being able to sleep past 6am.
In running matters, I have been running in the evenings every day pretty much. The best time of my day, as I am sure I have mentioned. I constantly want to be taking pictures, but I feel like there is no way that the picture could possibly convey how beautiful the landscape is on the island. I saw a giant lizard too the other day, the wildlife is pretty varied! I feel like Saba could maybe be like another Galapagos island because it is so isolated and the wildlife can specialize here, perhaps like the birds in the Galapagos. I have almost increased my route to the point where I can get to the beach. But – the thing is – there is only a beach here about 6 months a year. It depends on the tides, and every June it disappears until October. I think by the time I am able to reach that distance that there will be no beach left. I have heard there is hardly any at this point!
Anyways, my running is going fantastically, and it is a great way to see the island. I love it. I think training for a marathon here would be impossible though due to the terrain. It looks like my marathon goal is going to be delayed at least for a couple years. Well – you never know, but it looks like planning for training here would be difficult. If anyone has tips in terms of training on very hilly terrain let me know!
Interesting things for the day:
1. I love it when anatomy is easy, while reviewing the femur last night and fractures I learned about the Bumper fracture, which has to be the simplest fracture to remember. Aptly named, it is the name for a compound fracture that occurs when the bumper of a car hits a persons’ leg.
2. Histology is getting really complicated – I knew bone was difficult from the complicated presentation during studying for my MCAT. But the understanding of the cells in that context was quite simplistic, simply an understanding of osteoblasts and osteoclasts (different types of bone cells) was necessary to understand the constant breakdown and creation of bone. Now identifying the more complex parts of bone is more challenging. Also contrasting to other connective tissue will be difficult.
3. I feel like I go in and out of feeling comfortable with material. It’s such a roller coaster. I loved in undergraduate courses to feel confident about the material that I am being tested on. I feel like I cannot ever master anything! As soon as I do, I have spent too much time on something, or I am falling behind in some respect on another concept or class.
4. The vending machine here is terrible. It took my money on one occasion, and then yesterday, the dollar change machine ate my dollar. I would stop using it, except for the fact it is the ONLY food source on campus past 4pm. That is just ridiculous. They need a cafeteria expansion, or at least a better vending machine!
5. Block exams in a week and I am so scared. I really want to do well. Let me be clear, I want to be a knowledgeable doctor – and I want to know as much as I can! Learning more will help me be the best I can be at what I do.
Have a great week everyone!
Block exams are in just over a week so it will probably be another week before I write again. In retrospect, noticing that it is now a month since I have been here it is kind of unbelievable. What would I have done on any other June 1st? Would I have been working, been in summer school? Revelling in the newfound Canadian warmth? Meanwhile, it is quite hot and has been this way since I have arrived. I never check the weather; I am not sure how accurate it would be anyway, I just assume that it will be hot and perhaps rain. Bu t you can easily wait out the rain spells here.
Now to what’s going on with school. We have finished the arm, and now I can tell you all the muscles, where they originate and insert, the nerves, their course in the arm, which muscles they innervate, what part of the skin cutaneous nerves receive stimuli from, joints and their accompanying ligaments, movements, and arterial supply and venous drain. This along with an assortment of other anatomical features. After an initial struggle with the number of muscles to learn, I have found that most anatomists are not actually crazy, they at least try to name this logically. For instance, flexor carpi ulnaris, is a muscle that assists with flexion of the elbow, it attaches to the carpal bones, the wrist bones, and it runs close to the ulna and is innervated by the ulnar nerve. I feel like I am learning some latin and it is fun how they name things. At least I enjoy some of it!
In histology we have moved from hemopoeisis (the formation of blood cells), to cartilage, and today we will begin bone and bone formation. I have been relatively good at keeping up with the class this block, though I wish I spent more time on it this past weekend. I was pretty tired out from the week, and spent Friday catching up on lecture reviews, Saturday I spent concreting my arm knowledge and Sunday I was out of steam, slept a large chunk of the day to make up for during the week, and worked on getting reviewed on the leg for Monday (including some muscle memorization). So the weekend was a bit of a mix-up of things. I really hope I have kept up with what I have needed to, and that this week will not be too bad. The way things are starting out today is not good though – 3 ½ hours of sleep due to going to bed at 2:30am, and not being able to sleep past 6am.
In running matters, I have been running in the evenings every day pretty much. The best time of my day, as I am sure I have mentioned. I constantly want to be taking pictures, but I feel like there is no way that the picture could possibly convey how beautiful the landscape is on the island. I saw a giant lizard too the other day, the wildlife is pretty varied! I feel like Saba could maybe be like another Galapagos island because it is so isolated and the wildlife can specialize here, perhaps like the birds in the Galapagos. I have almost increased my route to the point where I can get to the beach. But – the thing is – there is only a beach here about 6 months a year. It depends on the tides, and every June it disappears until October. I think by the time I am able to reach that distance that there will be no beach left. I have heard there is hardly any at this point!
Anyways, my running is going fantastically, and it is a great way to see the island. I love it. I think training for a marathon here would be impossible though due to the terrain. It looks like my marathon goal is going to be delayed at least for a couple years. Well – you never know, but it looks like planning for training here would be difficult. If anyone has tips in terms of training on very hilly terrain let me know!
Interesting things for the day:
1. I love it when anatomy is easy, while reviewing the femur last night and fractures I learned about the Bumper fracture, which has to be the simplest fracture to remember. Aptly named, it is the name for a compound fracture that occurs when the bumper of a car hits a persons’ leg.
2. Histology is getting really complicated – I knew bone was difficult from the complicated presentation during studying for my MCAT. But the understanding of the cells in that context was quite simplistic, simply an understanding of osteoblasts and osteoclasts (different types of bone cells) was necessary to understand the constant breakdown and creation of bone. Now identifying the more complex parts of bone is more challenging. Also contrasting to other connective tissue will be difficult.
3. I feel like I go in and out of feeling comfortable with material. It’s such a roller coaster. I loved in undergraduate courses to feel confident about the material that I am being tested on. I feel like I cannot ever master anything! As soon as I do, I have spent too much time on something, or I am falling behind in some respect on another concept or class.
4. The vending machine here is terrible. It took my money on one occasion, and then yesterday, the dollar change machine ate my dollar. I would stop using it, except for the fact it is the ONLY food source on campus past 4pm. That is just ridiculous. They need a cafeteria expansion, or at least a better vending machine!
5. Block exams in a week and I am so scared. I really want to do well. Let me be clear, I want to be a knowledgeable doctor – and I want to know as much as I can! Learning more will help me be the best I can be at what I do.
Have a great week everyone!
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