I'm A&W (alive and well)

Hello world!  Wow...I can not believe I have not updated this blog in about 3 months almost!! First off, my apologies!!

Next, I completed my last class of didactic year yesterday!!!  All I have left to stand between me and clinical rotations is 5 finals next week and then I am free to relax and enjoy the holidays!!
I can not even begin to describe how much fun this semester was and how fast it went by.  I feel like I just updated this blog last week and here we are in December.

So a quick wrap up of the semester!
First off, I left you all on a cliff hanger about getting my rotations schedule which I received about 2 days after posting last.  I got my rotation schedule and got my elective in orthopedic surgery (yay!) and all of my other sites.  I will be staying in the same city my school is for all of my rotation which is extremely convenient.  I originally was slightly disappointed that I would not be traveling to other nearby states to try some other locations but then I stepped back and thought about the fact that I do not have to worry about housing or driving long distances to far away sites.  I also am excited to be doing 5 rotations at one big hospital nearby which will hopefully get me some connections for a future position there (fingers crossed). 

So this semester in clin med we covered neurology, hematology, oncology, nephrology, genitourinary, psychiatry, and nutrition.  A pretty fully schedule but I rather enjoyed most of these topics we covered.  I found out I am better at psych than I expected I would be and it was rather interesting to hear about the disorders some people suffer through that I can never imagine having.  Hematology was not my favorite but I loved the oncology unit.  We didn't get too into it but I think it would be an amazing experience to work in oncology someday if I chose to.  GU was a great module that I not only enjoyed but I also was good at which surprised me, so this is something else I hope to be able to see more of on rotations.  Our final for this course is the only cumulative one we have this semester - so I really gotta study up on some of the topics covered back in September/October!

In special populations, we did a module on pediatrics, women's health, and geriatrics.  I LOVED learning about women's health! It has always been a clinical interest of mine and being able to spend more than a month covering it 3x per week with my favorite professor (an OB/GYN MD and out program director) was great.   Learning about certain aspects of geriatrics was extremely interesting.  That is what I am studying now since that was our last module for this course and what our final exam will consist of.  I think a lot of geriatrics is stuff that should be "common sense" about how to treat them but it is good that it has been reiterated to us.  I found some lecture extremely fascinating - especially those on sexual dysfunction in the elderly and the lecture we had on death and dying.  It is important to remember how sexuality is common in the elderly and should be something that more people are educated about.  Also learning more about how dying patients feel during end of  life care is an extremely neglected topic that in reality could be a whole course on its own.

Medical surgery and procedures definitely turned out to be the most exciting class I had this semester.  I was disappointed we only had it once a week on Tuesdays and then had lab directly after lecture.  We learned how to do sutures (as shown in my previous post) and we even got to go to the nearby medical school and suture on their cadavers for practice of each type of suture we learned.  This was an extremely humbling experience that I can not explain very well to someone who has not done it before.  All I can say it that it was great to have the chance to suture on what is as close to living human skin as we can get but it was in a whole new dynamic knowing I was in the presence of self-less individuals who donated their bodies to helping me become the best clinician I can be.  There is no better gift that I can think of.  We also learned surgical gowning and gloving.  On a Saturday (yes, a weekend day) in October, my whole class got to go to a nearby surgical center and learn how to scrub into a surgery and how to gown and glove in the operating room.  We learned proper OR techniques and what to do when you are in there for your first time (DON'T touch anything blue/sterile; if someone says you broke sterility, don't fight with them, just go rescrub).  We also learned how to put in nasogastric (NG) tubes, foley catheters, IVs, and different injections (subcutaneous, intramuscular, intradermal).  We also did a splinting and casting lab with one of our ortho PA lectures. This was a lot of fun!  We got to keep the splints that we made for ourselves which was a lot of fun.  This class really continued to bring our class together and made us all very anxious to start rotations so soon!!!

And in other news, this is the first semester I can say that I am doing very well in pharmacology!! yay!!! FINALLY!

We ended our last day of classes with a bang - just like we would want to - a flash mob (yes, our second of the year) to "Everybody Dance Now" and "Gangnam Style".  Of course the students at our satellite campus and the professor over there was not expecting it, so it was a surprise and a perfect, fun way, to end the best year I have ever had or could expect :)

The night of my last finals next week, we are having a big cocktail party at a nearby restaurant so the whole class can celebrate.  I can not believe that I made it.  I can not believe that it is already over already! I never imagined didactic year would be this fast!! It was by far the best experience and the hardest one at the same time.  I feel so lucky to be able to say that I really do love the group of people I have had in my class this past year.  They are all wonderful people who really have the drive to become a competent practitioner and they were amazing this year.  We all continued to have the best attitude we could, even when we were in the midst of a crazy week.  I will miss them all in January when we are on rotations and only see each other once every 5 weeks - but I know that weekend every 5 weeks is going to be fantastic!
So I leave you with some pictures of our last semester as PA students :) Next time I write, I will be a second year on clinical rotations! (And will be better about updating this blog, promise!)

Is anyone starting PA school in Janurary or recently accepted to a program that starts in the Fall??  Congrats to you all - you are in for an amazing experience!!!

Our cookies we had made to pass out for National PA Week!

Some of us at a nearby hospital passing out info to spread the word about what a PA is and does!

Just practicing :-)

 

Ready to scrub in!

All of us ready to get into the OR

A perfect splint for a boxer's fracture :)