PA School Week 2

                 (How we entertain ourselves while studying: muscular model handshake)

Hello friends! Hope all of you are doing well. I'm happy (and so relieved) to let you know that I survived my first week of assessments! We had a quiz Monday - Thursday in Medical Ethics, Applied Anatomy, Medical Physiology and Pathophysiology I (MPP I), and Research Methods and Designs. Needless to say, by Thursday we were running on fumes, so to speak. It was a very challenging week mainly because of the enormous amount of material we covered in a short few days ,and then got quizzed in 4/5 of our classes in the same week. The first round of quizzes went very well and I hope and pray that the rest of them will go as smoothly for all of us. Here's a recap of some of my classes from this week:

Anatomy

This week we started going over the upper limb (first week we did everything related to the back muscles). This section was split up in two lectures because it was a lot of information to be fit into the time allotted for a single lecture. That means we go over everything in the shoulder, arm, forearm, and the hand, including the muscles, origin, insertion, innervation, blood supply, and function. We also went over the brachial plexus, which is the hardest yet most intriguing thing I've learned so far. It amazes me to see how intricately our bodies were made and makes me respect it more than I already did.

Anatomy Lab

Our lab and lecture for anatomy go hand in hand (pun intended). My lab group was scheduled to be in lab first thing Friday morning, which was surprisingly not as hard as I thought it would be. I actually woke up early and made myself breakfast and hydrated myself to make sure I make it through 3 hours of standing without any repercussions. We saw so many muscles and the cords and terminal branches of the brachial plexus that I am still in awe. While it was a lot at the time, I came home and reviewed my notes thoroughly and it all makes more sense now. The hardest thing about this lab was abducting our cadaver's arm so we could get to the axilla. I had no trouble taking a bone saw and removing the vertebrae to get to the spinal cord last week, but touching a hand that once used to hold his loved one's hands made it too personal and brought a lot of my emotions to the surface. As much as we try and succeed for the most part, it's hard to not think of what we're doing with the cadaver. Every time we have lab, I feel blessed to be even worthy enough to actually get to see the inside of our bodies. It is a privilege not granted to all and I am humbled by it every week.



Medical Physiology and Pathophysiology

We went over a lot of skeletal muscle and smooth muscle physiology this week. It was actually a better week than the last, because I remembered a lot of the skeletal muscle physiology I learned in undergrad. Thankfully that knowledge was sufficient enough and I just had to add some details to it all. We also started going over the different types of cell injuries and cell death, and that my friends, is a whole different ball game.

Next Monday, we have our first exam in MPP I and our second quiz for anatomy will be on Tuesday. So I will be spending my weekend studying. Hope you all have a happy weekend! Thanks for stopping by :)