Directory — Personal — Blog Details for "Unprotected Text"

Unprotected Text

Unprotected Text
A scallywags journey through medical school.

RSS Feed Homepage

Articles: 1, 2, 3, 4

Articles

Please Note:
2008-02-05 19:13:00
It is not anemia, it is ANAEMIAThey are not neurons, they are NEURONESIt is not edema, it is OEDEMAIt is not cecum it is CAECUMIt is not esophagus, it is OESOPHAGUSIt is not hemoglobin, it is HAEMOGLOBINIt is not norepinephrine, it is NORADRENALINEThey are not determinants, they are EPITOPESIt is not microanatomy, it is HISTOLOGYYOU NAUSEATING TEXTBOOK!!
More About: Note

MBBS (Wiki)
2008-02-03 17:49:00
Whether it’s a bachelors in Google or doctorate in Wiki pedia, the use of such online resources is abundant in medical education. For me, science and efficacy of data has been drilled in during my biomed years. Yes, I used the internet, in particular PubMed which I have spent many hours refining search options and looking for papers of relevance. Much of the time, the university hadn’t subscribed to the journal articles I wanted to view. Yet, with persistence and effort we all managed to become scientists who knew how to obtain and analyse information as it was published. It was thus possible to be cutting-edge, on the brink of fact.Then I started medical school. PBL sessions in particular seem to be a fairly endless onslaught of Wikipedic drivel. At the risk of criticising some fellow students, it at times, is comparable to watching a trained monkey. Wikipedia is by and large, an excellent online resource. There’s a lot of very useful, accurate information on their pages and i...

Not quite Werther's Orignial
2008-01-31 23:04:00
GP day again, bit of a weird one. We spent most of the morning discussing eating habits with the practice nurse. She was a lovely lady, and I actually quite enjoyed the anecdotal nature of the morning’s discussion. After a cup of tea we all got to take a dipstick test on samples of our own urine. I did wonder just how awkward it would be if there happened to be say, a positive test for a urinary tract infection in one of us. Fortunately it did not transpire and they all came back as normal. By a quirk of coincidence I have to do exactly the same thing tomorrow as I’ve only just got round to registering with the local GP practice.We calculated our BMIs and mine came out as 19.5, officially classing me as underweight according to the UK, or normal in the eyes of the world health organisation. Being the brave, hardened, slightly underweight/normal macho person that I am, I even put myself forward for a blood glucose test. 5.8mmol/L, that for some reason I was quite proud of. We all...

The Lax Approach
2008-01-30 15:20:00
I’ve had diarrhoea all afternoon, spread right across my bed sheets. Just to clear up any misconceptions, that be, I’ve been reading about diarrhoea. It’s been an exhaustive few hours and I didn’t stop for lunch, but can you blame me? I found out that there is however, a lot more to diarrhoea (besides proving an absolute bitch to spell correctly) than just the usual bullshit. Diarrhoea essentially comes in a variety of flavours, I won’t bore you with the details regarding those. Still, there was one cause that caught my attention - factitious diarrhoea.More commonly seen in women with eating disorders who binge on laxatives to lose weight. Not a nice thought, but you can understand the mindset. Rarely however, you will come across patients who dilute their stools with water or urine deliberately. Munchausen’s? Psychosis? A cry for help? The problem with the medical textbooks is that they omit the mentality.The pathology of this PBL exercise was coeliac disease. Avoid glu...

Tummy Ache
2008-01-28 18:46:00
“Muscles of the anterolateral abdominal wall”Qué?Still a stranger in this town, the anatomy textbooks have once again come into play. I’ve spent most of this afternoon a tourist trying to locate the few basic muscles and fascias that comprise the abdominal wall. The rectus abdominis seems the easiest to understand. These strap-like muscles run vertically down the abdomen and are separated by the linea alba – something I remembered reading about in surgeonsblog over the summer. Together, this simple arrangement is better known to you and I as the six-pack. Aaah…layman’s terms.Then comes the headache. Internal and external oblique muscles that run antiparallel and perpendicular to one another separated by various fascias and overlying the transverse abdominis, all ultimately overlie the peritoneum.Right…think I’ll stick with “the tummy”.So, moving swiftly on we take a look at hernias, direct and indirect, inguinal and umbilical. It seemed all the more logical, and...

And breathe...
2008-01-27 16:18:00
Cardiorespiratory is over, with only exams to look forwards to now. It was on the whole, far better than the first term crock of shit that was FunMed. Hell, there were times I actually felt like I was in medical school. A slightly turbulent third week has ended with a fairly placid, Oasis-filled Sunday. Just like old times.Tomorrow sees the start of a new block of teaching, kicking off with my favourite subject delivered by one of the most famous editors in the world of medical textbooks. Shame there’ll probably be the usual complete lack of respect from the wank-stain that makes up some of my year. I’m no gunner; I don’t ask countless questions or suck up to lecturers, or try to use an overly sophisticated verbatim when I do speak up. I don’t go around asking everyone what they got in every exam they sit, nor do I bang on about how much revision I’ve done. I do however, shut the fuck up and listen.So comes the next three week module (preceding my dissection fortnight) –...
More About: Breathe

Human Canvas
2008-01-23 16:00:00
Something you don’t think about when starting medical school is just how much you need to play patient to aid each others learning. Of course, we do get on occasion to meet real patients. Sometimes we even get to listen to their breathing, or take their blood pressure. In the past eight days, I have had to play the topless patient four times. Once for a cardio exam, once at the GPs, once for a respiratory exam and once today for…body painting.Surreal. That’s how I’d describe standing around topless for over an hour in the anatomy room. Just behind me, rows of preserved specimens in jars on display, to my side, two tables with cadaver shaped sheets covering them and in front, ten (seriously, ten) eager young girls wielding paint brushes eyeing up my chest.It was heaven.So they set about, gently prodding my chiselled torso, feeling for the landmarks and painting the outlines. My harem was hard at work, and I just stood there glancing round the room. I’ll tell you what, it’...
More About: Human , Canvas

Yr1 SSMs
2008-01-21 21:53:00
SSM Allocations:1a – Dissection (Limbs)1b – Neuronal and pharmacological control of body functionDissection starts in about three weeks, and is the one I’m looking forwards to doing most. Pretty pleased I didn’t get assigned any random goal setting bullshit.Been a long day, will blog more tomorrow.

Blood Brothers
2008-01-19 16:25:00
For years they lived in the same house together, cohabiting, existing but never talking. Related by blood was all they seemed to have in common. Like ships in the night, they would wander past one another in ghostly passage. Of course, it wasn’t always like that, but growing up and growing apart and accepting the silence was just the way it went. He was quiet, an introspective person whom did not have many friends, housebound by free will, afraid of the world, neglected by himself.Years gone by, a recluse suffering in silence, so guarded, secretive and withdrawn. In passing months, he became overwhelmed by anxiety. Turning to the internet out of sheer desperation. To those sites that prey on the meek, a few e-mails, some false reassurance. He began self-medicating with powerful tranquilisers and potent antidepressants (MAOI’s). They helped at first, but he soon had to increase his dose as tolerance built up. What those fuckers never tell you is how dangerous these drugs can be. ...
More About: Brothers , Blood

Blue Bloaters
2008-01-17 19:23:00
General practice, only for the rule breakers apparently. You see, bespoke treatment can only be provided by the most defiant of doctors. Not like those hospital specialists, those conformists whom must fall in line and follow protocol. These are the words of our practice doctor whom I have great admiration for, though I do not necessarily agree with that statement. Smoking was the topic for the day, which turned out to be a real revelation.The morning debate was pretty dry, it seems we are all rather too straight-laced to spark any passionate moot point. At one moment, we were discussing the effect of a strict upbringing correlating to an increased rebellious phase during adolescence. I personally agreed with the GP, in that often those whom were subservient to an authoritarian parental figure would become more defiant and act out in teenage years. One chap disagreed quite strongly with this point claiming his upbringing was very strict, but he’d never smoked or drank. The thing i...
More About: Blue

Hits the fan
2008-01-15 16:18:00
If you throw enough shit at a wall, some of it is bound to stick.Guess how my day went…Let’s start with the usual PBL fume. It was horrendous, not because no-one had done the work, or I got something embarrassingly wrong. It was because the tutor seemed to be on the war path. I have never witnessed such a highly critical, deconstructive teacher in my nearly four years at university. The session, I agree wasn’t the most dynamic, and there was a need for some prompting, but the endless torrent of generally unhelpful comments directed towards the entire group only served to isolate the tutor. My back was literally soaked in sweat by the end of it (and the room was freezing) just because I felt so uncomfortable working with this individual. I’m sure they’re very good at their job and know their stuff, but instilling fear into the students is in my opinion, not the way to teach PBL. Being both apathetic and lazy I won’t be making any formal complaints, as some students have p...
More About: Hits

Touched for the very first time
2008-01-14 22:56:00
A double dose of medicine today, once again piercing that undergraduate hymen as we are introduced for the first time to ECGs and a chest exam. To add to the fervour of the event we are informed that the worlds first ECG was in fact the innovation of a physician at our school. If only he could see us now...So after a briefing explaining the equipment and technique to taking an ECG reading, we were let loose on each other. The first five or so readings were not so useful, as the ECG machine decided our classmate was in asystole despite his apparent ‘aliveness’. Upon much deliberation and reconnection of the limb leads we managed to wrangle a steady pulse. Unfortunately for us, no-one really understood just what the hell the different leads meant, especially the augmented ones and so finished the session staring blankly at the ECG trace, something to read up on later.Then came the afternoon session, a cardiovascular exam. Do not underestimate the complexities of such an examinatio...
More About: Time , First Time

More PBL
2008-01-11 18:38:00
A new term heeds a new PBL group. Is it any better? Sort of, it is a little more interactive. For one, there is a lot more input from the tutor and as a result we don’t end up with a seemingly endless list of obscure learning objectives at the end of the session. We are also coerced into deeper discussion of the scenario, and not finishing sessions an hour early.It’s okay, not amazing and I doubt it ever will be. I’m not sure I like my new tutor all that much. Some students, both in my group and others have made it very clear that they do not like her. I found the tutor to be a little…smug at times. It’s hard to describe really, but not exactly one for a cheery session. It could be worse, I heard one tutor opened with “let’s not bother learning names here”, whilst another simply shot a glance and dismissed a greeting from another student.Today’s session was more of a case of hit or miss. You do the reading, think you know the right answer but become partly paralyse...

Lock, Stock and a Bundle of His
2008-01-09 19:25:00
I seem to have developed a taste, for human flesh. After a morning in the anatomy lab manipulating cadaver specimens and filling out my work book, I casually placed the pen I was using into the pocket of my jeans. Unbeknown to me, it was the same pen I sat there chewing in the subsequent lectures until the smell of formalin kicked me into recognition. I was a little sickened by this, and have since designated it the anatomy pen making it a permanent resident of my lab coat pocket.The morning’s anatomy lab did not disappoint. I spent the majority of the session looking at the heart and major vessels of the chest, getting acquainted with those coronary arteries whilst courting the subject I admire. The lab supervisors are first-rate and explain things in a very logical and accessible way. I was surprised by how easily the content of Mondays lecture translated to the gross anatomy of the day, recalling the great vessels and nerves of the heart and lungs with relative ease.Something t...
More About: Stock , Lock , Bundle

New Year, New Unit
2008-01-08 17:42:00
The term kicked off with a 2-hour anatomy lecture extravaganza, which did not disappoint. All new material in vast and intricate detail, promises an interesting term. Perhaps slightly rushed was this sweeping introduction to the anatomy of the mediastinum and heart. I spent a substantial part of the lecture trying to recall the different planes of the body in order to visualise the 2-dimensional artwork in the lecture notes. On the most part, I think I understood what was being explained but got a little confused with the coronary arteries and papillary muscles of the ventricles. Not a problem however, as the gross anatomy lab is tomorrow morning.And so we moved on, to a short lab session taking different pulses in different positions both before and after exercise. In my truly incompetent style, whilst attempting to palpate my friend’s carotid artery I sort of throttled her neck, much to the lab technicians delight.The afternoon was spent in a clinical skills lab learning how to ...
More About: New Year , Year , Unit

New Years Absolution
2008-01-04 14:09:00
Another substantial interval with relatively few blog posts, apologies for the neglect and I know, a blog is for life not just for Christmas. Truth be told, there is either very little to blog about or I just lack the desire to write. This holiday has come with the usual baggage that accompanies every Christmas – family. In particular the annual boxing day meal with my dad (and one time a year I see him), where we try and make cheap small talk over equally cheap food which ensues the usual pathetic argument between him and my mother over something I do not care about anymore. Trivial in my mind, is flogging a dead horse. As per usual, I negate to tell anyone about the argument or that I’d even seen my dad. Divorce, it really fucks up your kids.So on to something slightly more upbeat – some invaluable lifestyle advice.Tip #1 – BirthdaysIt is ill-advised to ruse the night before about how you hadn’t yet bought your son a birthday card, only to write his birthday card and bir...
More About: Years , New Years

All I want for Christmas, is flu
2007-12-29 14:01:00
Well I got it, which was fairly unpleasant and most of Christmas day was spent asleep. Fortunately, it didn’t make much difference to my usual festivities and overall I’m really enjoying being home for a bit. I had a browse during the sales, but quickly got fed up – especially when a small child insisted on ramming past me with a pushchair filled with her dolls in the heaving store. My kids aren’t gonna have dolls, they’re gonna have some fucking manners.Another highlight of this past week has been watching ‘Coach Carter’ on DVD. It’s quite cheesy and although it isn’t supposed to be funny, there are some parts that had me in hysterics. My birthday is coming up and I’ll be returning to London for fun and frivolities in a double birthday (- the girlfriend and I) and New Years extravaganza!I’m certainly not missing medicine, not in the two weeks we had off. As much as I bitch and moan about my course so far, it is brilliant and I’m so glad I’m there. Looking ...

Chasing Cars
2007-12-23 12:48:00
The following is a completely true story I retold to the delight of hall mates earlier this term, I’ve meant to write it for a while but didn’t get round to it for whatever reason. I think it’s important to say, it has not been embellished, nor exaggerated in any way.It was about three years ago, when I was still in sixth form that my friends and I were out celebrating a birthday at the local bowling alley. The evening was relaxed, cheerful and fun with a few drinks and some good food. It was also a school night and so at around midnight we decided to leave, with the designated driver (whom I should add, hadn’t been drinking) giving us lifts to various homes. B was a loud, playful individual and as we got into his cheap three-door fiesta hatchback he produced a CD he’d burnt on his home computer.“Guys, you’ve gotta check this out” he said with much enthusiasm as he loaded it in and fiddled around with his car stereo. We burst into laughter as the Lion King soundtrack...
More About: Cars

Nominated
2007-12-21 15:37:00
Best New Medical Weblog (2007)I am utterly speechless, and looking at the list of other nominees I dare say I can’t help but feel flattered that I’ve been ranked amongst the best.Thank you so much to whoever nominated me, it has, quite literally made my day!
More About: Nominated

Autonomic Intermission
2007-12-18 17:59:00
For those of you who may be stumped, the correct answers for the previous post are B– X-ray and D– Pronation. Fortunately the other exam questions were up to scratch and proved more challenging. Still, couldn’t help but snigger uncontrollably in the exam when those questions came up, though 45 questions in 30 minutes left little time for jest. As for the SSMs, no idea what happened there, still waiting on our choices to be allocated I guess…And now for something completely different – the autonomic nervous system!Shit! That sounds like real medicine??So far so good. It’s only this week in preparation for our cardiorespiratory module after Christmas, but the content and lectures are generally far more interesting. Furthermore, the lecturer actually kicked out the late-comers who protested “But I’m only like, five minutes late”…yeah, try fifteen. Needless to say, it was nice to be able to hear the lecturer rather than some obnoxious prat sitting behind me chatting ...
More About: Missi

An actual exam question - part II
2007-12-16 21:59:00
What action is this? A. SupinationB. Internal rotationC. External rotationD. PronationE. Circumduction(Note the name of the file on mouse hover)
More About: Question , Part , Exam

An actual exam question
2007-12-16 17:42:00
What type of image is this? A. CTB. X-rayC. MRID. Contrast media X-rayE. Ultrasound(And yes, if you were wondering the website was left on the image)Answers on a postcard to the usual address…
More About: Question , Exam

When the weather outside is frightful, and FunMed so delightful...
2007-12-13 23:40:00
You’ve gotta love my halls – organising the Christmas party the night before the freshers FunMed exam. There’s something so charming about walking into a cheaply decorated hall to the sound of Slade, very…youth-hostel. Still I went for a bit, reluctantly danced and had a few drinks – was great to get away from the lockdown of our corridor this week. So in terms of work, well not a great deal accomplished for our first exam but perhaps more worryingly is the lack of regret.Revising is the ‘hot topic’ of conversation at the moment, understandably. If anything I’m more worried people will think I’m an arrogant prick for my reaction to this. Truth be told, I honestly can’t be dealing with the stress of it all so soon into the course, especially considering its small weighting. Some freshers have been in tears, e-mailing the tutors asking what happens if they fail and contributing to a tense atmosphere that ebbs through the place. I feel sympathetic towards them, but ...
More About: Weather

FunMed: the end of an earache
2007-12-11 23:51:00
Et voila, FunMed is over! Well, not quite. There is still the end of course exam that students are going crazy over. I’ve mulled it over a fair bit, and come to the conclusion that I’m not going to fail (you’d really have to work against the programme to do so) and with my current lack of motivation, don’t really care how well I do anyway. Subsequently any reading I should have done has not really happened.I did go over microanatomy on the weekend, which is surprisingly (and perhaps shamefully) one of my favourite things we’ve done so far in med school. Perhaps as it’s all new material, or a visual, aesthetic activity? I like the terminology for numerous reasons – there is a logical basis behind the nomenclature, and it is an articulate language in itself. Even when taken from the same tissue same, no two slides are going to look the same. There is a degree of abstract thought required, to put the tissue slices into a 3-dimensional context. It’s a little bit of a det...

A voice, humbled
2007-12-10 17:32:00
I just want to express my sincere gratitude to all those who commented and e-mailed me about my last post, I was really touched by the humanity and empathy from my readers.In the past I have refrained from blogging about relationships/family life and such, but felt I’d make an exception on occasion. I would like to make apparent that as far as I’m aware, I’m not on the rocks – far from it. In fact, last weekend I was invited to her grandparent’s diamond wedding anniversary, meeting her extended family for the first time. I felt very much accepted and more to the point, as I watched her grandparents cutting into their cake I wanted that to be me and her in about 65 years time.Perhaps I shocked a few people with the comment concerning attraction. I meant it purely in a corporeal, preferential sense. True beauty to me, is far more than skin deep (bleugh…and now I sound like a candidate for Miss World). In all sincerity, I will quickly get over the shock of it, and hopefully...
More About: Voice

Afflictions
2007-12-09 17:24:00
I can’t remember the last time I was in such high spirits, as Saturday morning. I’d had a long lay-in, wasn’t falling behind with work, enjoyed a hearty breakfast and made my way to the station. Hell, I think the sun may even have been shining. A half hour trip later and I’m at my girlfriend’s town waiting for her to show up. She rings me, asking what side of the platform I was on – same side as always. Apparently, she’s just around the corner. I wait a few moments and see a girl walking towards me. I ignore her, until she starts waiving at me. My heart sinks, I felt physically sick, palms start sweating and my hands are shaking.She’d dyed her hair. Her beautiful long blonde hair that I so adored is now gone.She picks up something is wrong, but can’t work out why. I explained later in her room that I was really upset about it. It got so bad I cried a little, something I haven’t done in, quite literally, years. She becomes very concerned, and thinks something else...

Zimmerflame
2007-12-06 18:43:00
GP day again today, though not a great deal to report on. It may have something to do with the lapse in concentration from the early start coupled with sleepless night or perhaps just the subject wasn’t enthralling. Elderly people, the huge chunk of medicine that is apparently overlooked by the profession. I must confess, it wasn’t top of my priorities and there was on the most part feigned interest.So came a 3 hour lecture from an ex-GP and ex-ex-surgeon who found his calling as a manager for Age Concern – not something I can relate to, but impressive none the less. Overall, it was a fairly PC talk on stigmatisation, needs and misconceptions of the elderly. Wishy-wash stuff really, some may call it common sense, but has to be done.For the latter part of the session we moved onto the taboo subject of ‘sexed up pensioners’. After the reluctance of my PBL group to openly discuss priapism in the scenario last week, I didn’t expect much engagement. I don’t find anything pa...
More About: Zimmer

More articles from this author:
1, 2, 3, 4