As we reach the half-way point of the first semester of year two, I'm starting to feel a little overwhelmed by the amount of effort required to do well in Medicine. I know that the upcoming years will be tougher than this year, with a full-time 9-5, 5 days a week attachment and intense Conference weeks filled with lectures, I can't help but feel a bit apprehensive that if I'm lagging behind now, I will be lagging behind in future years. In the space of eight rather short weeks (in my opinion, they flew by pretty fast), we have covered both renal and musculoskeletal systems. At the moment, my knowledge on musculoskeletal is close to nil, and I'm brushing up on my renal block now; and to help things, we just started neurology. I guess it's just a tiny worry, but it's a worry nonetheless, and I guess I've just got to keep at it. Good thing I'm finding all of this interesting (well, maybe not the renal), but still, it's a heck of a lot to keep track of - indeed, I didn't expect musculoskeletal being only three weeks in length; there's so many tendons, muscles, parts of the bone and functions of the whole system to learn! I'm glad we have mid-sem breaks not combined with Easter (that gives us, effectively, an extra day), and we don't have any mid-sem exams (definitely felt good last week walking around the university and seeing everyone heads-down).
I think that me and my mates playing Starcraft at every break is hardly helping the issue either. Or that we now have a Starcraft club. Oh what have I got into...
Showing posts with label semester. Show all posts
Showing posts with label semester. Show all posts
Monday, April 12, 2010
Friday, May 22, 2009
Work Balance, as our first semester in med draws to a close...
I tutor 3 (temporarily 4) students on the weekend, one-on-one, for a cumulative total of 7 (temporarily 9) hours per week. So far it's been working out perfectly, but as exams draw closer, I'm wondering whether I should cut down on my sessions, even if just for a week. Then I think, if I had more time-management skills, I shouldn't need to at all. Which gives me a challenge; to continue tutoring during the exam period.
Since it is Semester 1, Year 1, and my formative exam result was a pass (even if barely), I'm going to take up this challenge and see whether it would have any negative contributions to my exam performance and studying for it. I've already noticed that I finish Friday pretty drained, but I seem to rebound back on Saturday, in time for tutoring, in essence, from 10am - 6pm. Then I have a temporary student on Sunday afternoon, and I also have church, which means that both Saturday and Sunday's mornings and afternoons are occupied.
At the moment (Friday night), I'm very drained, and kind of fell asleep in the last lecture (Pathology of Diabetes), which means I'm feeling pessimistic about this challenge and whether I'll pull through. Even though I have a big aim (First in my course, I know, laughable) and bigger competitors (great thing about med: everyone's a nerd, so everytime you go anywhere in the med building, there's a big group studying), I have a feeling it won't be enough to pull me through this stuvac block. But who knows...
Not to mention, I haven't even met everyone in my course yet, and its nearly the end of Semester 1. Haha... the groups I haven't met yet are the ones I have not had much to deal with yet; Indian girls, and caucasian guys and girls. It's an improvement from high school though - I think I could name a few people who I had never spoken to, in all of the 6 years we had; mainly because I would not be in their classes and my group would be very, very far away from theirs (both geographically across the school, and in terms of common interests). So yes, indeed.
I also found it ironic that we're so nostalgic, at the median ages of 18. Many of our conversations drift to high school, although I know that's all we've really experienced. But yes, interesting. Currently I'm in a nostalgic mood myself - listening to 1 Litre of Tears' Main Theme song (which by the way, is a very moving Japanese drama series. Very, moving. I was bawling by 5th episode, 11 episodes in all.) which summons back all the memories of Year 12 - the series, in fact, has a very strong nostalgia element, and all this classical music really accompanies this mood well. So I'll leave on this note - our first ever semester in med is drawing to a close, and I will miss it :)
Since it is Semester 1, Year 1, and my formative exam result was a pass (even if barely), I'm going to take up this challenge and see whether it would have any negative contributions to my exam performance and studying for it. I've already noticed that I finish Friday pretty drained, but I seem to rebound back on Saturday, in time for tutoring, in essence, from 10am - 6pm. Then I have a temporary student on Sunday afternoon, and I also have church, which means that both Saturday and Sunday's mornings and afternoons are occupied.
At the moment (Friday night), I'm very drained, and kind of fell asleep in the last lecture (Pathology of Diabetes), which means I'm feeling pessimistic about this challenge and whether I'll pull through. Even though I have a big aim (First in my course, I know, laughable) and bigger competitors (great thing about med: everyone's a nerd, so everytime you go anywhere in the med building, there's a big group studying), I have a feeling it won't be enough to pull me through this stuvac block. But who knows...
Not to mention, I haven't even met everyone in my course yet, and its nearly the end of Semester 1. Haha... the groups I haven't met yet are the ones I have not had much to deal with yet; Indian girls, and caucasian guys and girls. It's an improvement from high school though - I think I could name a few people who I had never spoken to, in all of the 6 years we had; mainly because I would not be in their classes and my group would be very, very far away from theirs (both geographically across the school, and in terms of common interests). So yes, indeed.
I also found it ironic that we're so nostalgic, at the median ages of 18. Many of our conversations drift to high school, although I know that's all we've really experienced. But yes, interesting. Currently I'm in a nostalgic mood myself - listening to 1 Litre of Tears' Main Theme song (which by the way, is a very moving Japanese drama series. Very, moving. I was bawling by 5th episode, 11 episodes in all.) which summons back all the memories of Year 12 - the series, in fact, has a very strong nostalgia element, and all this classical music really accompanies this mood well. So I'll leave on this note - our first ever semester in med is drawing to a close, and I will miss it :)
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
2nd Last Week of ICM for the Semester...
Today our ICM, and next week's ICM, was a review session. In essence, we didn't watch the videos of actors portraying medical students doing interviews, but instead went straight to the wards for some friendly non-assessable assessment of our History taking skills and bedside manner. We managed to fit three histories into one session, and I just so happened to be the last, which caught me unaware - nonetheless I did my history without any real fuss, but wasn't really thinking quite as optimally as I would have liked. Today was also special because:
1) We introduced our tutor, Dr Zelas (a middle-aged male surgeon) to Twilight via a patient who was reading New Moon (one of the novels in the Twilight series), and;
2) We spent a good fifteen minutes after the session planning what to get for Dr Zelas as a thank-you present for this semester's ICM; apparently we will be switching ICM tutors next semester(but not our group, yay), and may be thinking of including said novel in the present package. Hah! It would be amusing if he finds he quite likes Edward and Bella; perhaps he's an old-faashioned romantic, in which case he should take quite a liking to this novel aimed at the teenage female demographic! I have male friends who enjoyed the series; and I certainly enjoyed it (stayed up to 4am reading Twilight, and yes I'm quite straight) so the scenario of Dr Zelas sitting on a sofa reading Twilight until...twilight, might perhaps be not very farfetched at all, haha...
Apparently, we also switch PBL tutors this semester too. So we'll be looking to get something for our PBL tutor as well; although my absolutely shocking PBL assessment mark of 14/20 doesn't quite encourage me (though on second thoughts I was a bit quiet...) I will look forward to writing the cards. I get the impression that Dr Zelas has no clue what our names are, and that we might be quite forgotten in a few years time, but I hope the gifts might help jog his memory when we become colleagues, hah.
So it appears that each semester, we switch PBL and ICM tutors, have no idea in regards to switching PBL groups (although that may be quite possible), stay in our ICM groups, and stay at our chosen hospital (Blacktown, woo!) but also stay on the same day. It's unfortunate abotu switching PBL groups but I guess I look forward to working with other people and see what dynamics will appear in the new group :)
1) We introduced our tutor, Dr Zelas (a middle-aged male surgeon) to Twilight via a patient who was reading New Moon (one of the novels in the Twilight series), and;
2) We spent a good fifteen minutes after the session planning what to get for Dr Zelas as a thank-you present for this semester's ICM; apparently we will be switching ICM tutors next semester(but not our group, yay), and may be thinking of including said novel in the present package. Hah! It would be amusing if he finds he quite likes Edward and Bella; perhaps he's an old-faashioned romantic, in which case he should take quite a liking to this novel aimed at the teenage female demographic! I have male friends who enjoyed the series; and I certainly enjoyed it (stayed up to 4am reading Twilight, and yes I'm quite straight) so the scenario of Dr Zelas sitting on a sofa reading Twilight until...twilight, might perhaps be not very farfetched at all, haha...
Apparently, we also switch PBL tutors this semester too. So we'll be looking to get something for our PBL tutor as well; although my absolutely shocking PBL assessment mark of 14/20 doesn't quite encourage me (though on second thoughts I was a bit quiet...) I will look forward to writing the cards. I get the impression that Dr Zelas has no clue what our names are, and that we might be quite forgotten in a few years time, but I hope the gifts might help jog his memory when we become colleagues, hah.
So it appears that each semester, we switch PBL and ICM tutors, have no idea in regards to switching PBL groups (although that may be quite possible), stay in our ICM groups, and stay at our chosen hospital (Blacktown, woo!) but also stay on the same day. It's unfortunate abotu switching PBL groups but I guess I look forward to working with other people and see what dynamics will appear in the new group :)
Friday, May 1, 2009
A review of the first half of Semester 1, Year 1
This should actually be a much larger post, since the beginning is pretty memorable, but I'll condense it since I'm posting this at the end of Week 1 of the second half of semester 1 (wow what a mouthful).
So our first week begins with a whizbang (or perhaps not) introductory lecture by UWS Medical School's Dean, Neville Yeomans, to which our parents were invited. Made new friends, found some old ones, and the rest of that. We then had an introduction into the PBL style of teaching, which I had much forewarning about and so wasn't really that revolutionary; and then a series of lectures on what it means to be a doctor, ethics, morals, and all the rest of it.
The rest of the first half of Sem 1 was pretty much an introduction to all things medicine. Our lectures were mostly named 'Introduction to MRI', 'Introduction to Pharmacology', 'Introduction to Communication Systems in the body', etc. The UWS Course has two main components; Foundations of Medicine, which you could call the science side, and Personal and Professional Development (PPD), which you could call the humanities side.
Those components are covered by a week-long Problem Based Learning (PBL) case study (Monday being the introduction to the new case of the week, and Friday being the debriefing of that case), as well as lectures, practical sessions which were all in the computer lab for this first half, our ICMs (Introduction to Clinical Medicine - one 1.5hr session per week at a hospital as part of our clinical experience) and later on, dedicated PPD sessions.
So the PBL style of learning is essentially studying a fictional case of a patient who presents (or comes in with) a certain symptom, upon which we would hypothesise over reasons for the symptom (i.e. diagnose), note down anything we didn't know about the case that we should need to know (Learning Issues, or Objectives), and going away for the week to research by ourselves on the case. Lectures were generally related to the case of that week, which provided a little oddity in that we could predict what the problem with the patient was by deducing information from lecture names, hah! Then on Friday we would gather back and report on what we've learnt, and find out (a) what the actual diagnosis was (which is usually not a surprise by Friday), (b) what the official Learning Issues that UWS wants us to know are. PBL Groups are groups of around 10 people, with 1 tutor who is not a 'content expert' - i.e. we aren't meant to ask him/her about details of the information in the case (such as: "Is this really a myocardial infarction?") because he/she will reply with "I don't know, maybe you should put that up as a Learning Issue", heh..
Over the cases we had in that 1st term, we covered a host of things such as epilepsy, spinal injury, myasthenia gravis, anaemia, heat stroke, and sunburn, along with many others due to the broad hypothesising that we were meant to do as part of the PBL process. So it's been an interesting first half of the semester :)
We also had a Formative Test (read: a test used exclusively for your own standards to see how well you would do, andd it does not count towards final year marks) which we haven't received the results of back yet; I'm not too sure we were taking it seriously, but I certainly saw that there was much that I had not covered or had forgot due to lack of revision. Which brings me to...
...how much effort I put into this first half of Sem 1, Year 1 of Medicine, versus the HSC. I must say that I've done exceedingly more than I ever did in the HSC, and I probably would have done much better, were I to have put that same amount into last year. I didn't though, and it's a regret but I've learnt from it, so I've decided to just do as well as I possibly can, in the knowledge that this is part of my career, and not working towards a certain number. So yep, that about wraps it up :)
Oh, and I spent my holidays semi-productively, revising most lectures, but also visiting old school friends and things. So I thought that was a very good start to a non-procrastination filled life ;)
So our first week begins with a whizbang (or perhaps not) introductory lecture by UWS Medical School's Dean, Neville Yeomans, to which our parents were invited. Made new friends, found some old ones, and the rest of that. We then had an introduction into the PBL style of teaching, which I had much forewarning about and so wasn't really that revolutionary; and then a series of lectures on what it means to be a doctor, ethics, morals, and all the rest of it.
The rest of the first half of Sem 1 was pretty much an introduction to all things medicine. Our lectures were mostly named 'Introduction to MRI', 'Introduction to Pharmacology', 'Introduction to Communication Systems in the body', etc. The UWS Course has two main components; Foundations of Medicine, which you could call the science side, and Personal and Professional Development (PPD), which you could call the humanities side.
Those components are covered by a week-long Problem Based Learning (PBL) case study (Monday being the introduction to the new case of the week, and Friday being the debriefing of that case), as well as lectures, practical sessions which were all in the computer lab for this first half, our ICMs (Introduction to Clinical Medicine - one 1.5hr session per week at a hospital as part of our clinical experience) and later on, dedicated PPD sessions.
So the PBL style of learning is essentially studying a fictional case of a patient who presents (or comes in with) a certain symptom, upon which we would hypothesise over reasons for the symptom (i.e. diagnose), note down anything we didn't know about the case that we should need to know (Learning Issues, or Objectives), and going away for the week to research by ourselves on the case. Lectures were generally related to the case of that week, which provided a little oddity in that we could predict what the problem with the patient was by deducing information from lecture names, hah! Then on Friday we would gather back and report on what we've learnt, and find out (a) what the actual diagnosis was (which is usually not a surprise by Friday), (b) what the official Learning Issues that UWS wants us to know are. PBL Groups are groups of around 10 people, with 1 tutor who is not a 'content expert' - i.e. we aren't meant to ask him/her about details of the information in the case (such as: "Is this really a myocardial infarction?") because he/she will reply with "I don't know, maybe you should put that up as a Learning Issue", heh..
Over the cases we had in that 1st term, we covered a host of things such as epilepsy, spinal injury, myasthenia gravis, anaemia, heat stroke, and sunburn, along with many others due to the broad hypothesising that we were meant to do as part of the PBL process. So it's been an interesting first half of the semester :)
We also had a Formative Test (read: a test used exclusively for your own standards to see how well you would do, andd it does not count towards final year marks) which we haven't received the results of back yet; I'm not too sure we were taking it seriously, but I certainly saw that there was much that I had not covered or had forgot due to lack of revision. Which brings me to...
...how much effort I put into this first half of Sem 1, Year 1 of Medicine, versus the HSC. I must say that I've done exceedingly more than I ever did in the HSC, and I probably would have done much better, were I to have put that same amount into last year. I didn't though, and it's a regret but I've learnt from it, so I've decided to just do as well as I possibly can, in the knowledge that this is part of my career, and not working towards a certain number. So yep, that about wraps it up :)
Oh, and I spent my holidays semi-productively, revising most lectures, but also visiting old school friends and things. So I thought that was a very good start to a non-procrastination filled life ;)
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