Big Update On the First Week of HST

I sat down to write this post and realized just how many interesting things have happened that I can't possibly write about them all. So I will describe a few highlights, the moments I felt were thought-provoking, memorable, or representative of the medical school experience. I'm going to go semi-chronologically starting from Tuesday.

Pathology: In addition to the standard fare of pathology, we have an invited lecturer every class, following which a few students can have lunch with the speaker. The first class was an academician who was very much involved with developing a marketable drug, and in Michael Moore style argued that the pharmaceutical companies are really what have made medicine progress. I made a mental note to read up more on the subject, but now realized I never got around to it.. The second lecture was about autopsy, with a presentation by Dr. Mark Flomenbaum, New York's first deputy medical examiner during the time of 9/11. The cases he described sounded just like cases that might be seen in CSI. My particular favorite was when one truck driver turned in a cargo of embryos suspended in jars. He found himself with 38 embryos that the owner claimed to be both fake and non-human faced with threats if he even so much as scraped a single cell for analysis. He took x-rays and sure enough, the embryos were real. And how to tell if they are human? Well, despite all our lofty thoughts about ourselves, apparently our most distinguishing feature is our footprint. Some more dramatic cases involved a girl who appeared to have died as a result of HIV which he uncovered to have suffered child abuse; and a case of a dead criminal who he found was shot by a police officer not out of defense but out of malice due to the shape of the shot wound...

Immunology: Our professor is incredibly entertaining and quite beloved by his students. I liked his story of Mithridates, one of the most formidable enemies of the Roman Empire, as one of the first to challenge the immune system to induce tolerance. He drank incrementally increasing amounts of all the toxins he could find to become invincible. Unfortunately for him, when he finally wanted to commit suicide, he was unable to do so by poison!

Anatomy: First, I was surprised and elated to find out that we will be learning anatomy from the developmental perspective! Despite my interest in the field, I find that others have very little sense of the kinds of questions that are asked and what studying development even means. Our first lecture covered the formation of the germ layers and explained how it relates to the arrangement of certain organs and how such understanding can explain some anomalies and congenital defects we might see. As for dissection-- it's the essence of medical school isn't it? I've always thought of the experience as one to look forward to, but that the names of anatomical parts are simply dull facts to be memorized. Since the course started though, I find myself extremely engaged in poring over the anatomy text, trying to identify all that I can. I realized that we need to know all these parts not because it's the name that matters, but that the "identification" means tracing each vessel from where it came from to see how they connect to one another; and finding out how the muscles go to understand how they produce movement. I'm very fond of our cadaver.. so far it looks like a natural death, as we haven't found obvious signs of medical distress as many other groups have. She's been pretty capable of showing us all the parts that we need so far!

Also, some anatomy tidbits from our professor. Look up a dermatome map... next time you can insult someone without their knowing it by calling him an S5! Your assignment for Friday night is to impress someone by asking to put salt and tequila on their jugular notch and drink if off of them without spilling it down their shirt...

Genetics: Little happening here so far; but we have a patient coming to visit us almost every class period!

I am pleasantly surprised that despite all the pro-science-and-technology hype of HST, we actually have clinical components integrated in our curriculum. Two of our courses require interaction with physicians and also case studies of disease processes.

And for fun, you might ask? We still got to see the rest of our classmates on the annual first year cruise on Friday night. The harbor is so beautiful! I miss the unique Dallas skyline, but I suppose I have traded it for the ocean breeze!