Last weekend of the term

I had a tutorial on Thursday on auditory hair cells, and an immunology lecture. I also wrote my last essay of the term so I've only got notes to write up this weekend. The essay was for an interative physiology tutorial on Monday and it was on the body's response to hypoxia at altitude and in chronic pulmonary disease. It was only half as much work as it sounds because both responses are pretty much the same! We've only had 2 integrative physiology tutorials this term and the lectures have also concentrated on neuroscience and pathology. As well as more work on it next term, we'll also have physiology work from last year to revise for our exams because integrative physiology builds on last year's work much more than the other subjects.

As well as a lecture on muscle receptors, we had another two pschology lectures on Friday. They were on clinical psychology and develpomental psychology. We were shown videos of babies being tested and experimented on, but next Friday we've got the real thing - a few babies will be coming in for our lecture so we can see some developmental stages first hand.

Today I've been busy looking round rooms because we have our room ballot for next year on Tuesday. I'm 8th on the room ballot so I probably won't have a problem with other people taking the room I choose. I've decided to go for a room in the college annexe where I am living now, rather than the main college building, so that I will have access to a kitchen and because it is a bit quieter and less distracting here. Tomorrow is the medsoc Christmas ball so I'm going to get an early night tonight!

Practicals, psychology lectures and Christmas!

For the first time this term we didn't have a 9 o'clock lecture today. At 10 I had an exercise physiology practical. One person in each group of four had to breathe into a big plastic bag called a Douglas bag while they stepped up and down onto a block at varying numbers of steps per minute. We measured the amount of air collected and analysed it in a machine that works out the amount of oxygen and carbon dioxide. Then we plugged numbers into lots of equations to work out things like the energy expenditure and work rate.

Yesterday we had a less practical immunology practical. It was just looking down microscopes and drawing and answering questions on what we could see. The slides were of lymph nodes stained for different cell types with immunohistochemistry. We also had three lectures - one on antibodies, one on tumour viruses, and one on psychology.

The psychology lecture was the first in our Psychology for Medicine course. This is examined separately from the three main topic areas, which each have an essay and short notes exam. The equivalent of the Psychology course in the first year is Medical Sociology, which also has a series of lectures and an exam at the end. Yesterday's lecture was introductory and overviewed the history and subdivisions of psycholgy, with more detailed examples of how pscychology is applied to reading, the effect of media violence, and face recognition.

I started my last essay of the term today. Our work-load has kept me busy but has been light enough so that I could go away last weekend and not have an essay to write while I was off walking and playing team games in Shropshire. I have one tutorial left this week and two next week and then it's home for the holidays. Today I had Christmas dinner in hall with crackers and Christmas decorations. The medsoc (medical students' society) Christmas ball is coming up this weekend as well as the college carol service.

Just a quick post

Yesterday we had another two virology lectures by our tutor. This time they were on polio and viral hepatitis. Since polio is likely to be virtually eradicated by this time next year, it is unlikely that we will ever have to treat cases but it is used as an example of a typical type of virus. We also did a little bit on SARS, as an example of an interesting new virus. In the evening we had a neuro tutorial on visual processing.

Today we only had one lecture. It was on auditory pathways and how different frequency sounds are detected. And now I have the second part of this weeks PBL tutorial - so I'd better go!

Eyes, ears and potassium

Monday's gross anatomy was on the eye and ear. We swapped around between dissecting eyeballs, using ophthalmascopes, using oroscopes, looking at the prosected heads, and looking at skulls. Then in the afternoon we had a clinical lecture on eye disorders. There were some gory pictures of knives and pens in people's eyes and some optical illusions as well as the theory on visual disorders.

Yesterday we had two virology lectures with our tutor, Dr James, and then a tutorial with him in the evening. The lectures were on influenza and the PBL tutorial was on immunity. I'm just researching it now! It's not a clinical one, like they usually are. It's on an experiment where various immune cells from mice after infection are cloned and injected into other mice with varying characteristics. As well as predicting the results of the experiment we have picked out some aspects to look into a bit more detail on, for example the secreted product INF and the experimental technique FACS. We also had a pharmacology seminar yesterday. It was about synaptic pharmacology, particularly in the central nervous system. Although there were a lot of drug names, some of them and many of the conditions they are used to treat were familiar, so it was interesting.

Today we had a lecture on sound and the ear, which went over a lot of the same information that was in an essay I have just written, and a lecture on regulation of potassium in the body. Did you know the potassium in your blood goes up to such high levels during exercise that the same levels at rest would stop your heart? (other chemicals counteract the dangerous effect) And it's potassium ions, not lactic acid like you're told at school, that makes your muscles hurt during strenuous exercise - people who can't make lactic acid still get the same pain.

Tutorials and scholarship

We've finished our pharmacology practicals now for the term so until special senses practicals start in a couple of weeks time, Thursdsays aren't as busy as they have been so far. We had a lecture on immune organization this morning and then an immunology practical where we tested samples for HIV antigens and the complimentary antibodies. Then this afternoon I had a tutorial on retinal ganglion cells and their properties.

Yesterday I was made a scholar for my exam results in the summer. That means that I will get a different gown (we wear gowns for formal meals, exams and a few other occasions) and will be invited to a Scholars dinner next term, as well as getting a money prize.

Tomorrow I've got another lecture on immune induction and one on visual pathways, which shouldn't be too complicated because I've already written an essay on it. Our essays for tutorials are often a week ahead of what we're doing in lectures, which means that we have more research to do but also helps us understand and learn the topics because we have had to work through them ourselves. Tutorial work aims to include more detail, especially of clinical and experimental evidence, which is necessary for writing good essays in exams.

Patient and Doctor

Hello. I've just got back from a PBL tutorial and have been out all day. After the first lecture of the morning we had an immunology practical. We had to count lymphocytes in helathy and abnormal blood samples and work out percentages of helper and killer cells by looking at whether antibodies labelled with beads bound to specific proteins on their surface. We then had several examples of results from other patients to answer questions on. After that we had another lecture on adapted immunity, followed by Patient and Doctor.

The Patient and Doctor course is a series of sessions where we meet up in college groups with a doctor who usually brings along one or two patients with conditions that are relevent to what we are learning about at that time. Today, however, the session was about consent and we didn't have a patient to question but the doctor was a specialist in medicolegal issues. He gave a presentation on consent and used an interactive computer programme to give examples of situations where consent is difficult. He also gave us chocolate coins to demonstrate the problems involved in selling treatments!

This evening's tutorial was about salmonella and classification of bacteria. Since it was a PBL I now have some specific areas to research before the next part of the tutorial on Friday.

Pain practical and Richard Dawkins

We had a practical on pain this morning. The demonstrators had a laser which can stimulate different pain nerve fibres selectively when they zap you with it, so one zap can make you feel slow burning pain whilst another gives a sharp pin-prick sensation. It was good fun and we learned that (in my group at least) boys are wimpier than girls! We also put capsaicin (chilli pepper cream) on our arms to see how the burning effect sensitises the skin to pin pricks. Unfortunately, it has no effect on some people and I couldn't feel any burning or sensitisation at all. In another experiment we put our hands onto a grill with alternate warm and cold bars, and the combined effect gave a feeling of intense heat. There was also a machine that vibrates and touching the back of the ankles with it makes you fall backwards, but touching the back of the neck makes you fall forwards (because of interactions between proprioceptive and other sensory neurons). I've even been recruited by the neurologist teaching us to be a volunteer for one of her experiments.

I've just got back from seeing Richard Dawkins speak at the Union. He read out some of his new book with his wife (who's apparently an actress) and then answered questions. It was a good evening off working and I now know a lot more about barnacles and platapi than I did a couple of hours ago!