Ok so I haven't really posted in a long time, I've thought about it but for some reason I just never got the inspiration to write. It hit me though today that it would be great to get back to posting sometimes just to get out my thoughts and also share what goes on at CCNM.
So first just a quick update on school. I'm a little over halfway into first semester of my second year, and of course I've got lots of new classes. It's been an interesting semester so far, a lot harder in many ways, but definitely more interactive and clinical, it's starting to feel a lot more like medical school (not that last year wasn't, though there was a fair bit of review last year, getting everyone on the same page for basic sciences and stuff). So here's a quick overview of all my new classes:
Physical Clinical Diagnosis (aka PCD) - this is a purely practical class, at 8am on Monday morning... I know such a crummy time. But it is really interactive. This is basically time to learn and practice all of our physical exam skills, so everything from listening to lung and heart sounds, inspecting the eyes and ears, and more! It's not nearly enough time to practice everything so I've been helping run some extra practice sessions later in the week, and I actually just got my own massage table at home to practice on friends and family.
Botanical Medicine 2 - This class is a lot more clinically based than last year. We go through different body systems (e.g. Respiratory system, Gastrointestinal system) and talk about specific herbs and actions that work to help with different problems. We also have a practical session Monday mornings where we go through a case in small groups and have to decide on a treatment plan focusing on botanical medicine, but also looking at other treatment options. It's a little tough, but also a great way to try to bring together all the knowledge we've learned so far.
Homeopathy 2 - Advanced homeopathy with Dr. Bakir (she is super excited about homeopathy). We're learning more about specific remedy groups, case taking and how to use repertories (looking up symptoms). I'm still pretty lost with Homeopathy, but hopefully things will start coming together as we continue this course next semester.
Clinical Medicine - This is the mother of all courses; we're in it for about 8 hours a week! This is a tough course but really great, because we're basically going through all the most common conditions that doctors see and looking at all the major angles: a bit of related anatomy and physiology, pathophysiology, diagnostics, all of it. So far we've been through skin (stuff like acne, melanoma and fungal infections), eyes (stuff like glaucoma), ears (otitis media), throat (strep throat), cough (pneumonia and bronchitis) and we've just started heart (hypertension). There is a ton of information but this course really brings our knowledge together and is going to be really useful in the future.
Health Psychology 2 - This course focuses a little more on diagnostics of common psychological disorders like depression, anxiety and OCD, but we've also come back to things like mindfulness. The really cool part though is that we have practical sessions most weeks, and for the first time second years actually have standardized patients! It's pretty scary having to play the doctor and interview the patient, but it's a great experience to try to go through a biopsychosocial interview and learn all about patients, especially to draw out information that is useful but may be difficult to initially get from a patient.
Asian Medicine 2 - We're focusing again here more on pathology of the different organ systems (Heart, Lung, Kidney, Spleen, Liver, etc), building on our knowledge of the basics from last year. We've also learned about tongue and pulse diagnosis, though it's pretty tough because we haven't had much time to practice stuff. Again hopefully this will start coming together with more practice next year.
Acupuncture 2 - We've been working on more complicated points now, getting through more channels and working on the back, the legs and the glutes! It's still hard but I'm definitely starting to feel more comfortable doing acupuncture, and the continual practice is great. This class continues next semester and by the end we'll have gone through the entire acupuncture book (well over 300 points I think between the 3 semesters of point location)
Microbiology - This class is all about this little organisms that can cause diseases and illness, from parasites and viruses to bacteria and fungi. There are a lot of things that can cause problems, but hopefully learning all about them and how to differentiate will lead to better treatment for future patients.
Foundations of Naturopathic Medicine - This is actually our last philosophy based course. The whole course (except the first few lectures) is actually taught by students in small groups. We go through lots of thought-provoking topics (like the usefulness of clinical guidelines, the placebo effect, and more), and have student facilitated discussions about them. It can get a little dry sometimes, but a lot of interesting discussions happen and it's great to have this knowledge about all these related topics to practice.
Clinic 2 - This course is a really great one that involves shadowing fourth year interns in the clinic. Unlike last year, we actually get to sit in with an intern for the entire visit. We also have one shift like last year shadowing a supervisor for a whole shift. In addition, we have to do 20 hours and get 20 patient contacts preceptoring health professionals outside of the clinic. I've actually had all 6 of my fourth year shadowing shifts, and my supervisor shift; it was a pretty cool experience and I definitely learned a lot about the clinic. I've preceptored with two different NDs so far and have one more ND and a chiropractor that I'm preceptoring with next week, and then I'll be done the course. The best recommendation I have for this course is to have a little notebook where you write down all the things that you see people doing that you like or dislike, and notes on things you think you should be doing or not doing in the future. I got a lot of useful notes that I'm sure will help me out in practice in the future.
So that's all my new courses for this semester, it's been pretty crazy so far (I think I'm in school for about 30 hours of class a week, with breaks it works out to almost 40 hours a week (even more when I had my clinic shifts or preceptoring). Time to take a break!
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