The End Of A New Beginning

Total Spring Semester Volunteering: 31 hours

Habitat for Humanity: 16 hours

Environmental Pharmacology Soil Sample Collection: 1 hour

Southern Eye Bank: 14 hours

     This is officially my last blog post for the Masters Program! We finished up our last Cell Control test this past Tuesday, and my last presentations were a couple of weeks ago. The year has really gone by quickly. Hard to believe we had our opening social nine months ago! 

     I'm currently studying for the MCAT that I take June 19th, and while studying I'm awestruck at how much material we actually covered this year. I was reading a chapter in biology about different receptors where it started talking about the insulin receptor, to my surprise I knew more about it than the chapter covered! This program has helped me in many ways, but mostly in my studying patterns. Before starting at Tulane, I never really needed to study much in undergrad. This year really taught me how to efficiently study, a skill I'm glad to have before starting medical school. It was also an amazing opportunity getting to explore so much in a year. I was able to take a course with the medical students, volunteer, socialize with new friends and try research. I'm looking forward to seeing what the next chapter of my life will entail! 

The Home Stretch

     In a month and a half we will be graduating. When my Dad told my grandmother, she replied, “Again? Already?” This last month has gone by quickly. After Mardi Gras came to a close, I spent a couple of weeks intensely studying for the Shelf Exam. Not knowing exactly what to expect, I tried to over prepare. My study time was interrupted because my groups presented in both cardiobiology and advances the week before the Shelf, but we managed to get through it. After doing some USMLE World practice questions, I was worried that we would have a lot of questions dealing with diagnosing that we, not taking all the medical school classes, hadn’t been exposed too. Luckily Dr. Clarkson picked the questions, and while challenging, there wasn’t much I would call unfair. Fortunately most of the material came back to me a lot quicker the second time. 

     Now that the Shelf is done we just have some electives left. We have a Cell Control test tomorrow, and then just one more and we will be done. Now that we are in the home stretch, I need to start studying for the MCAT. Luckily our schedule these last couple of months leaves plenty of time for studying for the MCAT and for volunteering, with a little time left over to prepare for my last Cardio presentation!

Winding Down

     Mardi Gras has finally come and gone, along with our spring break! Feels weird saying my spring break is already over and it isn’t even March yet. It has been very entertaining seeing all of my fellow peers reactions to Mardi Gras. Being raised here, I guess you forget how “crazy” we must look to outsiders. Somehow Mike still had a blast, despite the shooting right in front of his apartment the night of Muses.

      In a little over two months we will all have Masters degrees, it’s so hard to believe. I am currently studying for my last block exam in Med Pharm, and then will have two weeks of intense studying until the NBME exam. I’ve been lightly reviewing and it’s hard to believe just how many drugs we have covered. I still remember studying for our first block in inflammation, way back in July when the medical school was still empty! It will be a relief to get that out of the way so that I can start focusing on studying more for the MCAT that I’m taking this summer. Once we finish with the NBME in less than three weeks, we will just have our electives left over. It should be a lot less stressful as we wind down over the coming months.

Blocks, MCAT, and NBME..No Big Deal

     Wow, this semester is almost over! We have a couple of more blocks before the Shelf exam. Winter break was much needed, but I certainly miss the 5 week long breaks of college. This semester I’m learning a lot more about time management, balancing the regular block exams with MCAT studying and studying for the Shelf, in addition to giving more presentations than ever before! We just finished the Endocrine block where I learned all about the inner workings of diabetes and reproductive drugs. Now we are delving into the CNS, with a heavy load of principles lectures.

     Last Saturday I got to volunteer with Mike at Habitat, we we were building walls and doing framework for a house a company VMWare was sponsoring. They had actually painted their logo on the concrete foundation of the house, and sent a drone over to take photographs of the site all of us working! It was very interesting yet pretty distracting. I learned from some of the Habitat employees that VMWare had actually donated $250,000 and was sending 400 volunteers to work with them for a week building house in the Greater New Orleans area. It’s great to see companies getting involved in philanthropic causes especially in our city. I’m excited for my next build with Habitat for Humanity. Until then I’ll be studying CNS drugs!

Community Service Hours: 

1-24-15: 8 hours at Habitat For Humanity

Halfway Over

It's hard to believe it's been 5 months since we started. Time has flown by. I've learned so much and had the pleasure of making so many new friends. I'm looking forward to next semester and what it entails!





9/6/14: 8 hours at Habitat for Humanity
9/13/14: 8 hours at Habitat for Humanity
11/20/14: 8 hours at Habitat for Humanity
12/4/14: 8 hours at Habitat for Humanity

Total: 32 Hours

November

     It's hard to believe it has been another month in the Pharmacology program. We've only had one test since my last post and I'm glad to report that went well. Now that we've had two blocks covering the new Mol Cell class I feel confident on how to prepare for our last GI block exams coming up. With our curriculum lightening up we have been spending more time volunteering and socializing. A couple of weeks ago about 10 of us traveled to Fountainbleau State Park across the lake to go camping for a night. We set up our tents and luckily we had two boy scouts with us (Graham and Spencer) to work on the fire. Nick brought several friends who cooked up fish fillets they had caught that morning. It was a great experience, and a much needed change of scenery. I'm looking forward to finishing up this last block exam so I can enjoy the winter break and hopefully catch up on some MCAT studying! I hope next semester doesn't pass as quickly as this one is.

Here is a photo of a few of us circling the camp fire our boy scouts worked so hard to build!

All About Renal

       It's hard to believe its been another month in the Tulane Pharmacology Masters Program. Having the CV Block completed, we dived into the renal system. I have really enjoyed the renal system and that all of the lectures overlapped on a set of common concepts. It was very interesting and useful learning about all the different drugs to treat hypertension, BPH, ED and UTI's. These are issues that many Americans have. The other night I spent several hours talking to my uncle about what medications he was on for hypertension and was relieved when I knew all of them.
   
      In the last month we had a new class sprung on us, Molecular Cell Pharmacology. I heard how hard this class was from several students who graduated last year, so I was nervous at first. Upon having a few lectures, my nerves calmed and I found the material fascinating. We learned a lot about gene therapy and stem cells from Dr. Bunnell, who has a lab at Tulane. Dr. Beckman has recently introduced us to the techniques used in tissue culture, a practice that is essential for pretty much every lab in the country. She gave us an assignment to find a good Youtube video explaining the basics of cell culture. Unable to find a decent one, my group decided to make our own. I've spent the day working with Nick, who graduated last year and who now works in Dr. Katakam's lab, making our own video on cell splitting. Below is a picture of us in the lab working on our production!