The human body is a bleach factory
Strange medical fact #1:
Your body makes and uses hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) which, with the help of Iron (Fe+), converts the H2O2 to clorox (OCl+) in order to attack inflamation - yes, clorox, as in the bleach.
Strange medical fact #2:
Men can have a tumor that looks like a pregnancy - it will often have hair, teeth, nails and other identifyable human tissues. But don't worry it not really a pregnancy - it is called a teratoma. This tumor is from the guy's own cells that went crazy dividing into things that it wasn't supposed to divide into (normally skin cells can only become skin cells and stomach lining cells can only give rise to other stomach lining cells.) There is a class of cells that can become anything - the infamous stem cells. These stem cells go crazy in the man's body and become hair, teeth, nails, organs, etc. Gross, eh?
A day in the life of a PA student:
- It is now semester three.
- At least half of my classmates are taking Xanex and Lexapro for anxiety.
- My blood pressure has actually become "prehypertensive" aka - high.
- I am a hypochondriac (either I have the disease I am studying that week or someone I know has the disease de jour).
- I wake up saying crazy things like "acanthosis nigricans" (a darkening of the skin seen in diabetic patients).
- We drew blood on our fellow students with virtually no training. We saw it done once and we were handed needles and vials and told to "go for it."
- I am able to read/write whole sentences in acronyms or crazy medical words (with airport consulting in my prior life, everything has a three letter code and whole memos could be written using them.)
- I think these words and acronyms are only used to make people in the medical profession sound smart. Take for instance the condition hepatosplenomegaly. Sounds like you might only have 6 months to live right? Well, it is just an enlarged liver and spleen. See, not so hard, but is sure sounds more impressive as one word. This is why we have high student loans. It is all one big vocabulary education. But we can't talk to patients with this language - they wouldn't understand a thing. So we have translate it all back to plain English. So who are we actually impressing with these words? Other medical folks! What's the good in that? It sounds cool when you are in public and talking to each other and others overhear - but that is about all. ;-)
But don't feel too bad for me. During our whopping two week break, I went to Cancun and had a private underwater tour of the 2nd largest reef in the world (the Great Meso American Reef) with some Mexican fisherman, saw Chichen Itza - pronounced kind of like "chicken pizza" (one of the largest ancient Mayan ruin sites), I flipped a jet ski on the Ohio River that was worth about 10 times the value of my car, and I learned to ride a horse bareback and witnessed what a horse ferrier does - they are the guys that shoe a horse. Did I also mention that I am heading to Xtapa, Mexico for Thanksgiving? I
tailgate for UK games, volunteer at medical clinics booths at various events, study way too much, read up on new drugs in my "free time" for "fun", attend pharmaceutical rep dinners (usually at shwank restaurants that my student budget cannot afford), draw blood and take blood pressures at parties after having a few too many beers, and have forgotten how to speak plain English. I speak Southern or medical. Or medical with a southern accent. Take your pick.
Oh, and while out horseback riding with my classmate Marsee and her husband, Russell, I think I glimpsed my first meth lab here in the rural parts of KY:
Your body makes and uses hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) which, with the help of Iron (Fe+), converts the H2O2 to clorox (OCl+) in order to attack inflamation - yes, clorox, as in the bleach.
Strange medical fact #2:
Men can have a tumor that looks like a pregnancy - it will often have hair, teeth, nails and other identifyable human tissues. But don't worry it not really a pregnancy - it is called a teratoma. This tumor is from the guy's own cells that went crazy dividing into things that it wasn't supposed to divide into (normally skin cells can only become skin cells and stomach lining cells can only give rise to other stomach lining cells.) There is a class of cells that can become anything - the infamous stem cells. These stem cells go crazy in the man's body and become hair, teeth, nails, organs, etc. Gross, eh?
A day in the life of a PA student:
- It is now semester three.
- At least half of my classmates are taking Xanex and Lexapro for anxiety.
- My blood pressure has actually become "prehypertensive" aka - high.
- I am a hypochondriac (either I have the disease I am studying that week or someone I know has the disease de jour).
- I wake up saying crazy things like "acanthosis nigricans" (a darkening of the skin seen in diabetic patients).
- We drew blood on our fellow students with virtually no training. We saw it done once and we were handed needles and vials and told to "go for it."- I am able to read/write whole sentences in acronyms or crazy medical words (with airport consulting in my prior life, everything has a three letter code and whole memos could be written using them.)
- I think these words and acronyms are only used to make people in the medical profession sound smart. Take for instance the condition hepatosplenomegaly. Sounds like you might only have 6 months to live right? Well, it is just an enlarged liver and spleen. See, not so hard, but is sure sounds more impressive as one word. This is why we have high student loans. It is all one big vocabulary education. But we can't talk to patients with this language - they wouldn't understand a thing. So we have translate it all back to plain English. So who are we actually impressing with these words? Other medical folks! What's the good in that? It sounds cool when you are in public and talking to each other and others overhear - but that is about all. ;-)
But don't feel too bad for me. During our whopping two week break, I went to Cancun and had a private underwater tour of the 2nd largest reef in the world (the Great Meso American Reef) with some Mexican fisherman, saw Chichen Itza - pronounced kind of like "chicken pizza" (one of the largest ancient Mayan ruin sites), I flipped a jet ski on the Ohio River that was worth about 10 times the value of my car, and I learned to ride a horse bareback and witnessed what a horse ferrier does - they are the guys that shoe a horse. Did I also mention that I am heading to Xtapa, Mexico for Thanksgiving? I
tailgate for UK games, volunteer at medical clinics booths at various events, study way too much, read up on new drugs in my "free time" for "fun", attend pharmaceutical rep dinners (usually at shwank restaurants that my student budget cannot afford), draw blood and take blood pressures at parties after having a few too many beers, and have forgotten how to speak plain English. I speak Southern or medical. Or medical with a southern accent. Take your pick.Oh, and while out horseback riding with my classmate Marsee and her husband, Russell, I think I glimpsed my first meth lab here in the rural parts of KY:
posted by TENN at 11:14 PM
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