Week 11-12

So the end of term is here, and it's all about placements. During my time in term 1 at university, I have had the privilege of doing two types of experience, being the GP and the hospital.

GP:

• Completing placement at the GP has allowed me to witness the doctor-patient relationship from a front row seat, and see how a GP communicates with the patient, but also how a patient communicates back.
• I've taken part in some clinical skills, such as dip-sticking urine, using a blood glucose machine and manually taking blood pressure.
• I've observed and heard the stories of different cases from an array of patients. I have been introduced to a patient with MS, arthritis, different heart conditions, dementia and other different conditions.
• After greeting a patient and learning of their conditions being presented, my GP will then explain to me the physiology and the social side aspect of their conditions for my understanding. For example, what a bursa is and how this is presented in patients with arthritis. 

That is some spray-on snow on the mirror in case you were wondering! We have decorated the flat for Christmas!

Hospital:

• When I return in January, I will be working on a hospital ward for a week, this is to be confirmed.
• I took part in all the induction and training exercises prior to my placement, where I learnt how to handle patients but also other clinical skills (like the dip-sticking and using glucose monitors).
• I also learnt basic life support training, which includes basic first aid - like CPR, CPR modifications for children, choking, drowning, wound dressing etc. Thanks to my training, this qualified me to become further first aid trained for my part time job back at home at weekends.

After completing my January placement, I will keep you updated on how that went, any challenges I may have faced and my overall experience.

As for the student life, cooking has been quite an interesting thing! My flatmate was able to put together a 'cupboard masterpiece' which basically was him sorting through his food and whacking it all into a saucepan to prepare a glaze for a massive gammon he had bought. Another fun fact, your nearby grocery will reduce foods close to their expiry date towards the end of the evening, so it's a perfect time to go shopping. I think he bought it for around £3 for a massive gammon. He put together plums, blackcurrent cordial, honey, salt, sugar, lemon juice, white spirit, a splash of water and other in-the-cupboard-opportunists to make actually the best glaze/jam ever! Everyone in the flat wanted a bit it was that good!

He has also put together some other fine dishes, such as the one below.

And then there's me... who can't even cook oven chips.

Week 9-10

There is nothing too interesting I need to put across concerning the last two weeks. All that I can say is that it is now December and I have completely decorated the flat in Christmas decorations, much to their dismay! Decorations hang from the ceiling from tack (because we aren't allowed to poke holes all over the flat), the windows are sprayed snowy white and I wake the flat up most mornings with Christmas music blaring through the speaker in the kitchen.

We have finished the beginning module of Year 1 of medicine! Through the term, we have explored aspects of biochemistry of respiration and nerve conduction, the sociology aspect of medicine, the art of medicine and the statistical side.

This came to a shock for me, so I'll go into further detail:

Sociology:
There is quite a lot of sociology to medicine, which I didn't realise because I have never studied this topic at GCSE or A-Level. In these tutorials, we have looked at what a doctor-patient relationship is, and the different types of consultations. In lectures, we have explored what makes a good consultation for a patient, and what doesn't. This was particularly interesting because we did look at role play and acting situations out during our tutorials!

Art:
This is really interesting! It's amazing some of the art pieces that have been created through medical inspiration. I would recommend you looking at some of the artwork that is available online that has been done by medical professionals and students, that are sometimes inspired by real cases or emotions they feel while working in the hospital. This helps with that common conspiracy question: is medicine a science or an art?

Statistics:
If you haven't done maths, you may struggle at this stage. I did Maths A-Level and I am finding this extremely difficult and confusing. This is studying prevalence and incidence and how these two differ. This is about studying the difference in pattern of particular health conditions depending on location, ethnicity and socio-economic status which is obviously very important for a doctor to know.

We have also been introduced to the structure of our first exams in January, which you can already imagine I'm worried about. This is testing our histology, anatomy and all of the other points I've highlighted above.

For my next blog post, I will be discussing the placements I have been part of.