Ok, so it's been awhile since I posted. It's also been six weeks since I started PA school. WHAT?!!! Where did the six weeks go?! Why haven't I been posting more about my experiences?! What the Hell?!
Let me begin now. Six weeks late. (sheepish grin)
June 2, 2014. A day that changed my life forever - the first day of PA school. Honestly, the first day was pretty boring. It was an orientation day full of a bunch of rules and explanations of what the next two years of our lives would be like, along with paperwork to fill out. We had a chance to meet our professors as well as introduce ourselves - that was so nerve wracking. A simple "Hi, my name is Tricia" with some quick facts about myself left me literally shaking! but it was fun to meet everyone. Tuesday started the first day of anatomy. Our anatomy class is structured as a hybrid, meaning our professor pod casts the lectures for us to watch the day before we go into lab to dissect. There are some dissections that we skip due to time restraints, so on those days we have a traditional lecture then go into lab and look at models. So, for the first day of class, we basically had an introductory lecture and then went and looked at a few models in the lab. Nothing special, just something easy to get us going and oriented with things. Wednesday we dove right in and started with a back dissection. There are six "tanks" (cadavers) with two groups of 4 assigned to each tank. Each group has an hour to dissect and we take turns on who starts first every morning, so some mornings I get to sleep in! The first day of dissecting was a little weird. It was just a lot different than what I thought it would be like, and it is a lot harder to find structures than you think. I honestly thought I would like lab more, but I really don't like to dissect. I like to look at the structures after they are found and cleaned up, but our body has so much fatty tissue that it takes forever to find anything. It is too tedious and time consuming for me. :o)
The first week of class flew by and took a lot of adjusting and figuring out, regarding how to study and what to study. We were all freaking out by how much material we had to know and in how little time we needed to know it, which is pretty common. We basically have to know a different body area every day, or put another way, we are learning in eight weeks what most medical students learn in one year. Needless to say, there were multiple freakouts per week/day/hour/min. :o) Our exams are every two weeks, and for the first exam we covered the back, chest and arm - learning all the nerves, blood vessels muscles and bones for each area. I am happy to report that I passed without having to re-mediate. We have to get an 80 or above on our exams or we have to retake them. If we get below a 72 we get an academic warning, and after four warnings we are kicked out of the program. This year they implemented a new policy that warnings are left on a students record even if you retake and pass the exam, so this adds a little more pressure.
Our class is pretty inclusive and helpful towards each other. I can be sitting at a table studying and another classmate will sit next to me and we can start studying. Then another group will come in and join us. Everyone has pretty much divided into their own little groups, but everyone welcomes anybody that wants to join in on the study session.
The second exam covered the head, neck and lower extremity with a little bit of the spinal cord thrown in. The triangles of the neck were covered in the last week before the exam and everyone was freaking out by how much information we had to know. A group of us stayed after class for three hours trying to get it figured out. I didn't do as well on this exam, but I still passed!
The third exam, which we took today, covered all of the cranial nerves, oral cavity and thoracic cavity. I won't find out until Wednesday how I did, but I am hoping I passed. We have two weeks left and one more test to go! until a three week break and before we start back up in August. My brother is going to visit for the first week and the other two weeks I am going to relax and enjoy it while I can! I have been working every other weekend over the summer, but I am really hoping I can quit it August. It worked out that I work on the weekends we have a test, so I don't have much to study those weekends, but when the fall starts, I am pretty sure I won't be that lucky. Plus, I don't think I'll have the energy. I am really hoping some things change so I can quit in a month.
Well, that is a very short and jumbled version of what has been going on the past few weeks. It has been full of a ton of studying, but it has all been a great experience. I will try to go into more detail in a couple weeks after classes end. :o)
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