Emily Wolcott
Emily's January Diary
Tuesday, 1-6-04
8:10 AM- So I rushed into class right on time this morning and realize that we are going over EKGs today. Hooray! I love Cardiovascular Block! Actually, I am terrible at reading EKGs. I can tell when some thing doesn’t look right, but I can’t tell what the problem is. Luckily for me Dr. Cadagmani explains it really well, if not slowly. So as I am fighting falling asleep, I am learning something (or at least I should be).
10:10 AM- As I am walking into Gross Anatomy lab I tease one of my lab partners that she has to go bobbing for a heart. We dissected the heart today, and luckily they were already dissected out of the body for us. Unluckily, they are kept in a big bucket of embalming fluid and you have to stick your entire arm in there to get them out. I was relived when I saw Dr. Eastman getting the hearts out for us. Today was one of the coolest GA labs. We got to hold a human heart in our hands. It just took my group awhile to get situated as to what is the front and back of the heart. It was really cool to see all the different valves and chambers. The hardest part was trying to learn the artery and veins that supply the heart. They all look the same and were really hard to find. Oh well, that’s what Netter’s atlas is for. It is a lot easier to learn GA from a book than it is from a cadaver.
1:10- Clinical Skills lecture can be great or really boring. Today it was boring because there is sooooo much vocabulary that has to do with the cardiovascular system that I don’t know. We were also supposed to bring our stethoscopes to practice listening to each other’s hearts. No one brought them, so we all got to leave early.
2:00- Whenever there is a short break in between classes, we all tend to congregate in the library. I feel bad for the people who are trying to study, because it can get crazy loud in there. It was nice to have a little break, because Tuesdays are such long days. We go from 8:00-5:00 without a break, and then sometimes I have student council for another 2 hours in the evening.
3:00- Today is the first day of our new CBL group. After every quarter the class is redivided into A’s and B’s and the CBL groups are reassigned. I have to admit I was a little tentative going in to CBL because my last group was so cool. I’m always afraid to have a “gunner” in my group that is going to be super serious and not joke around at all. Plus I was an A last quarter which means I had CBL earlier in the day. As a B you usually have to stay later. My group ended up being really cool. It took us a little bit to figure out our ground rules and how we are going to run our sessions, but I really like everyone. I do like that the school scrambles the class every quarter because it gives you a great opportunity to meet everyone in your class. Everyone was really laid back, and I think CBL is going to be really great again this quarter. I always look forward to it because we are learning off of real patient cases, and we have to think clinically. It’s really neat to be able to make the correct diagnosis, even if it is on paper.
5:00- I went home for about 45 minutes to watch the news and grab a bite to eat. Lucky for me my day isn’t over, because I have student council at 6:00.
6:00-7:45- Student council meetings are kind of boring for me since I am new into it. I don’t have many duties yet, so I kind of just sit there and listen to everyone else. Dean Brose comes to all of our meetings, and he is such a great resource. Our class has been having problems with questions that have been put on exams, so I asked the Dean who I should speak to about it. He said bring examples to me. This is really great because hopefully our problems will get resolved, and plus who is better to go to than the head honcho. That is one more thing added to my to-do-list, but oh well. Also, we year 1s have decided to have a class meeting soon, so I have a lot to plan.
8:00-11:00- I am exhausted after my long day at school, so I decide to not study and just veg until bedtime. It’s really hard to get motivated to study when you have been at school for 12 hours. So all I did was iron clothes for my ECC (early clinical contact), and watch TV. It was nice. Not to worry though, tomorrow is another long day, and so the cycle begins again.
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