MedSchool Thoughts

FAQ Updated

2011-11-07T00:00:00.000+01:00

The FAQ page has now been updated. To add a question, just send an email - but don't forget to add your email for quick response.

When the lecture is way too clinical...

2011-11-02T13:15:00.001+01:00

Main lesson learnt from today's genetics lecture in gene therapy, as found at Wikipedia:

- In the TV series Dark Angel gene therapy is mentioned as one of the practices performed on transgenics and their surrogate mothers at Manticore, and in the episode Prodigy, Dr. Tanaka uses a groundbreaking new form of gene therapy to turn Jude, a premature, vegetative baby of a crack/cocaine addict, into a boy genius.

- Gene therapy is a crucial plot element in the video game Metal Gear Solid, where it has been used to enhance the battle capabilities of enemy soldiers.

- Gene therapy plays a major role in the sci-fi series Stargate Atlantis, as a certain type of alien technology can only be used if one has a certain gene which can be given to the members of the team through gene therapy.

- Gene therapy also plays a major role in the plot of the James Bond movie Die Another Day.

- Gene therapy plays a recurring role in the present-time sci-fi television program ReGenesis, where it is used to cure various diseases, enhance athletic performance and produce vast profits for bio-tech corporations. (e.g. an undetectable performance-enhancing gene therapy was used by one of the characters on himself, but to avoid copyright infringement, this gene therapy was modified from the tested-to-be-harmless original, which produced a fatal cardiovascular defect).

- Gene therapy is the basis for the plot line of the film I Am Legend.
Gene therapy is an important plot key in the game Bioshock where the game contents refer to plasmids and [gene] splicers.

- The book Next by Michael Crichton unravels a story in which fictitious biotechnology companies experiment with gene therapy.

- In the television show Alias, a breakthrough in molecular gene therapy is discovered, whereby a patient's body is reshaped to identically resemble someone else. Protagonist Sydney Bristow's best friend was secretly killed and her "double" resumed her place.

Medical Mashup @ Klub Lavká

2011-10-19T08:17:00.000+02:00

Finally the photos from the Medical Mashup at Klub Lavká is up, in full quality, They will also be posted later today at Facebook so do not bother with saving them from here putting them up by yourself, doublets just makes life troublesome. Thanks for Medical Mashup team for organisation, Faculty students organisations from LF1, 2 and 3 for participating and for the people that showed up for a great night EDIT: There will be no photos posted on Facebook

A Great First Meeting

2011-10-17T21:29:00.000+02:00

My parents arrived to Prague this Thursday with 6 of their friends to see me, take a tour in the city, drink beer and eat great Czech food. Me and Kristýna planned to take them all to something more than just city sightseeing and could, with much and appreciated help from her mother, plan a trip to Hrád Karlstejn during the Saturday.
However, first I booked a table for 10 at Ambiente, an amazing Brazilian live restaurant, close to the Old Town Square. I strongly recommend anyone having parents or friends over that want to have a food experience to go there if a restaurant in the more exclusive range is to be preferred.

During Sunday we spent the whole noon walking the Czech nature at Prachovske Skaly with my parents, as the friends already left. It was a nice walk with amazing forests and rock formations not too long outside of Prague.
It felt great to work off the heavy food and beer from Ambiente and other smaller pubs.
However, when we went back to Prague we didn't have much time to rest before we were supposed to meet up with part of Kristýnas family for more food and beer.
This time we went for regular Czech cousin specialities - probably the best I've had so far here.

The weekend was great and it was very nice to see my parents, their friends and to see that they got very well along with Kristýnas family.

I believe that another week of hard work demands this kind of "rest"...

My Medical School Paradox

2011-10-12T20:01:00.000+02:00

The more I study, the more enlightened I become.
However, the further I advance in enlightenment,
the more I realise just how little I actually know -
and it is really frustrating...

The 'Death' by Kagan

2011-09-28T10:33:00.004+02:00

I’ve been looking a lot into philosophy lately.
‘Philosophy’ you might say – ‘what is up with that grown up shit?’.
Well, we all find interest in different things and after getting hooked up on the debate of religion I sort of took a short detour to the subject of philosophy – which, after all, is not very much unlike the former. Together, both subjects play a role in everybody’s life at some point.
For example, when was the last time you imagined death and your chest got all filled up by that dreadful feeling of unease and complete discomfort? Personally I remember that I used to do anything to avoid these kinds of thoughts, not too long ago.

Shelly Kagan during his lectures on the topic 'Death'.

As I think of it I had many periods, especially as a kid, when I found myself thinking about it while falling asleep and almost every time I ended up with a feeling difficult to translate into words. It was, and even to a certain degree today is, a quite uncomfortable issue to wrap my mind around. However, breaking it down help you see it from an interesting point of view.
The topic regarding ‘death’ is just a single fraction of the great philosophical questions raised but it’s a juicy one that I’ve recently been digging my teeth into.

So call it what you’d like but I’d bet you’d also get interested if you were to here out the lectures ‘Death’ by Shelly Kagan, Professor in Philosophy of Yale University. Not only is he a great character, sitting on the front desk with his legs crossed illustrating large questions with tiny schemes, but he is also an extremely great thinker. I don’t just say this because I share his ideas to at least 90% but rather because I think it does not matter whether you agree or not – you just can’t help but to get blasted away by what his and other philosopher minds are capable of stirring up.

Sunny Daze

2011-09-27T07:39:00.011+02:00

My summer was the most amazing summer in a long time, or rather, for all time so far. Since histology was my last exam and my flight back home to Sweden was the very next day I had a lot of pressure on my shoulders to make it and go home to recharge. At least this was my plan and I believe I’d be a little bit devastated if I would not succeed. However, as the previous post reveals I did make it and could fly with a feeling of relief the next morning. Kristýna accompanied me and more than just my dad met us up at the airport - he also brought the best weather possible.

We sure did hit the best weather in a long time.
The risky thing about taking vacation on the Swedish west coast is the weather. If it’s with you you’ll have an amazing time but if it’s not appealing at all then you might as well stay at home. Of course it was a bliss to see my family again and to spend some quality time with them and Kristýna but it’s funny how the weather decides so many things.
   For example, we wouldn’t be traveling with our family boat to the very extent that we did this summer. Swimming and sailing in rain is no fun either. The only thing I’d still do, even if the weather would hit us badly, would be to play around with the jetski. However, I won’t waste time writing pessimistic words about the perfect summer – I’ll let the photos I'll post later speak for themselves.

Kristýna left after three weeks and I stayed another in order to see some friends and just relax. I knew what was coming for me because we’d been planning a trip to Austria and my first visit in real mountains. I’m not much of a hiker nor walker or runner but I do like camping and being in the wild and I must say that Austria totally changed my mind. The nature was ever so beautiful and climbing mountains are really a fun quest to conquer.
   It was a battle not only with the mountain but also with my self – I wanted to reach those damn tops. But, I do have an issue with heights and this put extra rocks in my backpack. However, during the last climb I somewhat overlooked the feeling of dizziness and felt actually pretty damn confident. I think it takes practice, just as with anything else.
    MedSchool was not really close in my mind at this point and it’d take me another three weeks before I really started to plan in my head for the upcoming second year – and now I’m all of a sudden here, sitting in the park next to campus having lunch and reading biochemistry.

Time flies by...

Histology Final Exam

2011-08-02T09:45:00.000+02:00

The last days have held nothing but good weather, hence the long trip with the boat both north and south of the west coast. However, we didn't have to travel far - the very best spots are close to the harbour.

The jet ski have been a steady companion and together with the newly imported GoPro HD camera mountable on pretty much any solid surface I've snapped some rather amazing photos and videos - videos that are to be retouched and edited into a neat film later when the weather is getting worse.
As promised, I will give a recap on my preparation of the final exam from histology.
Straight after anatomy I booked histology in the end of June. However, as I finished anatomy the relief took over and the motivation of studying was completely absent. I took almost a week off, spending time with Kristýna and fixing in the apartment. The fact that Kristýna wouldn’t be done with school until the end of July, due to internships, made me rearrange my plan. One day before the deadline I cancelled the term in June. My plan was that, since I would stay in Prague until August anyway I might take the time to study properly.

Rushing things are never good, but after the event I think it was a bad choice.
As I previously posted, there was quite an unfortunate issue with the sign up system and I did not get a term. I could blame it on the system, but I’d rather be honest and say that it was my bad from the beginning to cancel the first term. However, more students were struck by the lack of slots in the July term and together we managed to open up more slots.
I now spent almost 4 weeks of studying the histology with increasing intensity towards the end. It was very difficult to sit inside studying when the sun was shining, knowing that I could have been done already. Kristýna was a huge support, kicking my ass to study and took me places to rest my head in between.

The histology questions are divided into three categories; cytology, systemic histology and embryology. I finished off the first part during the first half of the second week of repetition. It took me way more time than I had anticipated. My plan was to finish the systemic histology in the next week and leave one week for embryology. I was told that embryology was manageable in one week but since I didn’t really keep up during the lessons it would prove to be a lot tougher. The systemic histology took a bit longer as well, and in the end I had only 5 days for embryology.

Drawings are essential for embryology in order to understand the developmental steps which are rather complex. There are different books to study from and I recommend one that is well illustrated.
The day before the exam was like every other day before an exam, freaking out feeling like a complete idiot with no knowledge stuck in the head whatsoever. My exam was scheduled at Friday and my flight to Sweden the very same day. I knew it would be stressful so I contacted the histology department in order to change it to Thursday. It was a bit of a problem but after much doubt they agreed and let me in to the exam – as the first student. I got Prof. Kucera, a young professor who I had no contact with earlier, since he was not holding any seminars.

The exam is held in two parts, first the oral examination and then a practical microscopical examination from three slide preparations. The oral part contains one question from each chapter, as mentioned earlier; cytology and general histology, systemic histology and embryology. My three questions were:

- Blood Smear, preparation and interpretation.

- Islets of Langerhans

- Development of the Heart

Really nice questions, indeed. However, I had quite a hard time at the exam. I didn’t know the questions as well as I’d hoped.
It was a success after all, and I could finally finish the first year.
Now a lot of preparation must be made for the upcoming second year. But first, vacation.

Early dive into the cold

2011-08-01T08:43:00.009+02:00

I woke up from the neighbour boat playing a fanfare on his horn at 7 o clock, or more accurately ten to seven. I didn't mind since I being here for only a couple of days have brought me back to my early habits and schedule that I used to follow before going to Uni.
   Yesterday's intense jet ski ride with Kristina "at the helm" took the leg power out of me since her only mission seemed to be to try to throw me off - she almost succeeded - and in the evening I fell asleep at the deck with our dog lying at my arms.

I am aware that I drift off far from posting anything that is even remotely related to school, although, in one way it surely is. Getting to rest in between the heavy studies are a key to success, if one is to believe Kristyna. When I packed my anatomy and genetics books with me she look at me with an evil look. The books still ended up in my backpack but I haven't yet opened them.
   I am very happy that I passed the last exam right before leaving, having to leave with it undone or uncompleted would result in feeling obliged to go back to finish it and I would not have the vacation that I now can have. My mind still drifts off towards school, however, they are thoughts of satisfaction and eagerness, to see what the second year will have to offer and what challenges it presents that must be conquered.
   There is a possibility to demonstrate during the first year student's winter dissection and I will do my best to pass the test and hopefully out rule the competition. The interest for the demonstrating slots are changing every year but I believe that more students start to see it as the great way to repeat anatomy, which actually is the core in medicine. However, the test to sort out the non prepared (after all you have to teach it) is different from the test seen in the first year anatomy. The slides one has to label are not taken from painters in atlases or computer graphics, they are rather photographs from the actual dissected body and if the rumors are corresponding to reality it ought to be quite the challenge.
   Another goal of mine is to help with the guidance at the first year's enrollment. I very much appreciated the system where guides from the upper years showed us around the vast campus in town and gave us pretty much all the information we needed in order begin the year with the question marks straightened out to exclamation marks.
   Ever since the military service, where I voluntarily took the position as responsible for the safety and working environmental issues at platoon level, I have began to see that doing something else on the side and to actually get involved in questions that are important to others (may it be the guy next to you in the trench or the colleague next to you in the school bench) is a rather appealing way to satisfy ones need of feeling important with out being egoistic. As you might have understood I enjoy sharing of, not just thoughts, but experiences and information - a personal need of, for me, great importance.
   This brings me to a third route. There is a scandinavian, or purely Swedish (this I do not know for sure since I haven't had time to look into it until now), group of people from all the faculties that engage issues and questions about the return of graduated doctors to their home countries. Questions like these might be raised later even for me, although I have no idea what the future might bring, and I find issues regarding the Swedish system very interesting. It might seem early, but when they asked for persons to represent the first faculty, which surprisingly seems to be absent, I began thinking about joining in to see what it is actually all about.

I'm now sitting the the cabin of the family boat writing this (surprisingly fast) from my dad's iPad which I, not only hate to admit, but actually find really convenient. I'm not much for fruit and electronic hybrids - even if it seems they actually are resistant to worms...

It seems like the amazing weather will stay so today brings more jet ski, fishing and tomorrow we will travel north to other rocky locations in the West coast archipelago...
___________________________
Posted at the deep blue, via iPad

Jet Ski, Fishing and 20 sec Sunset

2011-07-31T22:11:00.000+02:00

Today passed by almost too quickly, however, we got a lot done.
We slept at the mothership and woke up early (if you consider 8:30 early that is). After the breakfast we went into harbour to reload groceries and more importantly to get the jet ski.
At first the weather did not look too promising but after a while the sun overtook the clouds and the temperature increased.
Kristyna got her virgin ride and it took her by storm - she really enjoyed the speed, just as I anticipated.
Dinner did not end up at our hooks by lunch time, we had to cheat and use some of the fish my father caught at the oil rig. However, being patient and trying again later proved to be the way to go - four of them ended up in the smoker, and finally in our bellies.
The sun just set in the far west horizon and now we will settle in the mothership, open up a bottle of red, light up some candles and just enjoy the sounds coming from the sea.

___________________________
Posted at the deep blue, via iPad.

Finally my mind is set free

2011-07-31T09:13:00.001+02:00

After three weeks being more or less locked up in my study room in Lipova the day of the final exam in histology finally arrived.
I'll give a full recap about in due time but at the moment I've relocated myself from dusty city to crystal-clear oceans.
Kristynka are with me and after one day in the west coast paradise we are sure enjoying it to the fullest.
My head is down at rest speed and set on jetski cruising, jumping off cliffs and eating the goods from the sea - the perfect recharge for the second year.
______________________________________________
Posted from the deep blue, via HTC Sense

English stripped Naked

2011-07-10T08:44:00.001+02:00

I very much indeed enjoy studying Latin and its marvellously paradoxical two sides; complexity and simplicity.
By the end of the previous sentence I've used at least four strong words in English with non-English origin. Can you guess which of the following belongs to what language?

Study
Marvellous
Paradox
Complexity
Simplicity

Study actually derives from Old French estudie, but for our sake lets deal with studium from Latin.
What about marvellous? Latin? Greek? Not at all, to my surprise, it actually is from Old French as well in the basic form merveille.
So, Paradox then, sure this could be Latin but by dissecting the word we can get the Ancient Greek prefix para-, and suffix -orthodoxos, indicating that this is of Greek origin. As commonly seen, many Greek words adopted a Latinized form and Paradoxos became Paradoxum meaning:

"a statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth" or "a self-contradictory and false proposition".

Complexity and Simplicity are English words with pure Latin origin; in its naked form rather complexus and simplex.

Latin at first sight is as complex as any new language (except Czech that is, which seem to origin from the green man "a planeta confusa") but as one embrace it and digs deeper it actually makes a lot of sense.
It's a language of great structure, at least if you have the honour to follow Prof. Svobodova's text book, and it can be broken down in an organized matter with, mostly, strict rules that can be applied to whatever sentence you'd like to create. This is the part of simplicity.

To give a brief indication of how a task and its translation might look like I'll give you an example from the book at page 172.
Translate:
- Superficial wounds in the pubic region.
- Bruises of the soft parts of the body.
- In the state after a severebilateral inflammation of the lungs.
- Sufficient doses for children.
And the solutions, in order:
- Vulnera superficialia in regione pubis.
- Contusiones partium mollium corporis.
- In statu post pneumoniam bilateralem gravem.
- Doses pro infantibus sufficientes.

I wish not to seem posh or act as some kind of Smart Aleck, nor will I in any way conceal my gratitude towards the Latin course - gratitude, when from my side expressed, has mostly been getting dull half-witted responses with little or no enthusiasm.
Anyone that have had Prof. Svobodova, might not share my view - and so be it. You might even think I am vastly exaggerating by saying that she was indeed the best teacher during the first year. Again - so be it.
My opinion might echo alone but I believe that the facts speak for themselves; the structure and discipline of her lectures were always high and, if ever so often threaten, well maintained. She spent time explaining and made us practice in between - to me that is true teaching.
The fact that she actually wrote the book, covering more than well the medical perspective of Latin, is something not to forget.
This greatly shows itself in the way the course is built up, step by step until the rope is tightly shutting the sac closed. Unfortunately, for our group but mainly for the professor herself due to some family matters, we missed out on the last two lessons dealing with numericals and verbs but with some set aside motivation that was a part not too demanding, however, using the word "easy" would be a lie.

Why the "DIET" in Diet Coke is a hoax

2011-07-09T16:27:00.000+02:00

I think it's great that someone actually explained this properly.
Not only will it give you the answer of the stated premise but also a great insight in the metabolic activity in the body in relation to pH

The Greatest Show on Earth

2011-07-07T19:00:00.006+02:00

Today I woke up (early) at 8 am and after a long search for something to eat for breakfast but I soon gave up, took a glass of water and went for grocery hunting. I usually go to Andel, a shopping mall across the river, and decided to do the regular base ware shopping.

It took me a while to get to the tram. The pleasant part was that I crossed paths with a good friend on her way to her Latin exam and the less pleasant part was that I discovered that I didn’t have coins for the tram ticket.
There Is obviously a revolution going on in the commuting traffic, something called “open card” is on its way and it is going to overtake the old “coin-for-ticket”-system. I also discovered that the price for the ticket option got increased, if just slightly. I believe that signing up for the open card is the next right thing to do.

After some walking I managed to change for some coins and got the ticket.
Shopping is fun, as always, but this time I kept the expenses down a bit. With my groceries packed in my rucksack I dashed for the tram but stopped as I saw the bookshop right next to the grocery store. I went inside for a quick look and to my surprise I found three out of a handful books that I’ve, for quite some time now, been searching for.

Two of them I have already “read”, or rather, listened to as audio books. Some people don’t count this as saying that one has actually read the book although to me it is all the same – the content doesn’t change so to speak. Well, I bought them because I admire the authors and would very much like to read it myself at least once.
I was surprised how low the prices were on non-fictional pocket books and I consider it well spent money.

One of them I have yet to read, and it sure looks promising. Richard Dawkins is an amazing author judging from his earlier books that I have read. The title caught my eye at the first glance:
The Greatest Show on Earth
I immediately understood that this was going to be another book dealing with Dawkins favourite thesis; that evolution is fact and not fiction.
During the short way home at the tram I managed to read a couple of pages and this sentence made me smile, especially after passing my Latin exam the other day.
With the risk of being taken out of context, I quote,:

“Yet you find your precious time continually preyed upon, and your class’s attention distracted, by a baying pack of ignoramuses (as a Latin scholar you would know better than to say ‘ignorami’) who, with strong political and especially financial support, scurry about tirelessly attempting to persuade your unfortunate pupils that the Romans never existed.”

This sentence alone shows how beautifully complex and sophisticated Dawkins writing is and his fine ability to compose the text so that it speaks directly to the reader – simply wonderful.

I will end this post by saying that it is post number 200 in this journal - have I really written that many..?

Belief and Behavior

2011-07-07T00:04:00.002+02:00

Sleep is great, especially by entering it while listening to Sam Harris as he reads his amazing third book. Moral questions at its best and belief from another perspective. If you are interested in the former I strongly recommend his books. I might put up a link tomorrow.

My Neighbour pt.II

2011-07-06T12:23:00.000+02:00

The cat that came to visit outside my bedroom window have returned, frequently. And since I started to throw out some out of date ham and salami she brought two of her friends.
Now I got three small friends meowing at me from the back yard.

RainyMood makes everything better

2011-07-05T18:00:00.005+02:00

Whenever my head needs to relax I find this stunningly useful. It is a website that loops a thunderstorm and it is a perfect background loop for classical or ambient music. Try it yourself by opening up RainyMood and play your favourite soundtrack on your preferred website or media player.
If the volume is quite unequal just go to your computers audio mixer, usually in the downright corner of PC, upright corner of MAC and get it to equilibrium.

This, for example, is a neat track to combine to RainyMood.

Sit down and let Richard Bona do his wonders...

The Blessings and Curses of SIS

2011-07-04T19:03:00.000+02:00

When I first signed in to the SIS - the student information system of the school - I was impressed. The system seemed like an amazing way to keep track of all the bureaucracy regarding the University. This is where students can virtually go to the Professor's offices to claim exam terms, reflect upon courses and keep records of their grades etc.
It all worked well until today where an error was presented. I had but one fear when I entered this university; that failure would be not due to the lack of knowledge but due to the system. I have heard stories from persons where the system brought them into trouble and I believe this is what is going on for the students struck by this issue.

I had just finished Latin with a not so satisfying exam but with an all the more satisfying final grade and I have now only the final exam in Histology left to conquer.
Today was also the official release of the next exam period in the end of this month. 25 slots were increased to 40 and I understood that this will not be enough in comparison to the amount of students that wanted these terms.
Even if being ready minutes to 14:00, the official release time, the 40 slots was gone in a matter of seconds. Signing up for the term is more of a challenge than actually taking the exam.
The SIS-server somehow got overloaded and a lot of students were not equally able to "compete" for the terms, me among them.
This results in a postponing of the exam to early September, which I however do not find as the most disturbing part, but the fact that I will only have two attempts in total is a more unpleasant and unfair issue.
My intention is of course to conquer the credit in one attempt but if worst comes to worst not having as many attempts as other students makes it quite unequal, in my opinion. You might argue that we should have planned it better but I respond that this is just a grain in the heap.

There are too many students taking histology after anatomy, which I do not argue against, after all I planned my exams the same way. The number of students with histology left and the hope to make it in the month of July is too greatly outnumbering the amount of available slots. Given freedom to decide when to have your exams is a great tool - but only if the options are numerous enough. One choice is not freedom of decision - nor is two or three in this matter.
When there is not enough terms to grant every student three attempts, as policy states, there is something that doesn't add up.

Next term is released on the first of August with a capacity of 35 slots. I hope that this number increase because if not, the competition will look the same. And by taking in to account that a good 10-15% of the 40 that recently signed up might fail their attempt decreases the chances to win the "fastest connection get the sign up"-game even further.

I will continue my studies as planned and see what solution will be the best...

There's Always Someone Bigger

2011-07-03T20:36:00.000+02:00

I don't like ants but spiders are fine.
This ant is quite webbed up, until...

The Final Battle

2011-07-02T13:36:00.001+02:00

The day before my exam I was still in the roller coaster clinging tight to the seat waiting for the ride to culminate. Kristýna had come return home to Prague a couple of days earlier (oh, how I was happy about that) and we spent the night having a picnic by the river, going over some last topography and finished it off by watching the amazing film Perfume - The story of a Murderer. If you haven't seen it I recommend you to do so.
I woke up earlier than I had to and got ready to eat and suit up. Eating is the worst thing before exams and even thou Kristýna made me an amazing sandwich with everything you'd ever wish for I was not able to eat even half of it. I turned to my backup plan: smoothie. You can put almost anything in there and it's easy to take in, even when nervousness inhibits your appetite.
The walk to anatomy department was very hot, it was indeed a god day, so I had to take my jacket off. The atmosphere in the building was really at unease. Most of the students from both the national and international parallel were already there - and I thought I was early with 15 minutes on the safe side. I found three friendly faces outside and we immediately started to share our thoughts about what was about to follow. I honestly cannot recall the great many things we discussed; "what-if"'s, "I-think"'s and "I've-heard"'s. I am, as you might have understood from earlier posts, not a man that speculates - however, even I had a difficult to brace myself.

The announcement finally arrived and we were summoned in the small lecture hall. A division was made and we international students ended up together with what I guess were 1/3 of the national students. We placed ourselves accordingly to the organization made by the exam assistants and after a quick introduction the slides began. I will not give details about the test itself, since a summary can be written in an earlier post.
It was much more difficult than I anticipated. The slides were often of unknown origin, i.e. they are from an atlas or painter I, and I believe many other international students, did not recognize. With this said, the ability to be able to apply your specific knowledge from one atlas to schemes from another is very much valued. After all, the anatomy, in theory, is almost all the same - with variation of depth of details of course.
After handing in our tests we were sent off to the lobby with time to kill - and anxiety to suppress. We gathered again and started to deal with reason and non-reason. With no certainty of one’s grade, and I should here mention the 21/30 to pass limit, we all compared answers and possible mistakes.

I scored 22 and a sigh of relief, yet slight disappointment, left my lungs. I was through to the next round. Students who did not pass the introduction test had to leave and those left among me, a good 60%, left off into different directions depending on what examiner they got. Of us international student I believe no one got the same examiner. There were two of the examiners I really dreaded; Prof. Elizka and Prof. Druga. They are both amazing anatomists, the former in lymphatics and the later in central nervous system, which is a good reason why one should be humble once facing them.

I was led to the practical part of the exam first and to my surprise the professors were not examining here. It was both organized and held by docents and their assistants which, was sort of a relief at the moment. This part did not present much fear nor problem to pass for me. The knowledge from the studies during the summer dissection course, not too long ago, was still rather fresh and well embedded in my spine. Since I had to wait a good hour to get into the practical I understood that I would be one of the last to go to the oral part – a prediction that later proved to be correct.

Inside Prof. Elizka’s office posters of lymphatic systems were hanging from the walls both high and low and boxes with unidentifiable items were placed into towers in every corner. It was a very comic scene that hit me as a nice mind break in all the stress. Take notice, I would never call a Professor’s office messy so what I describe is a creative chaos much convenient to the person behind it, but certainly not for a confused and stressed out student.

Five national colleagues were already present preparing their presentations by scribbling down as much as their brainpower could afford in the pressing heat from outside streaming in through an open window in the corner. I looked around and nodded politely in a good luck meaning manner to those who met my gaze. The assistant that had showed me the way to the office showed me my seat and I was given a bunch of papers from a stock of what looked like a well written, formal document in Czech. “Not what one expect on an exam…” I thought and followed it up with “…but recycling papers are a great thing…!”.
I prepared my pencils and the assistant approached with a bucket. Inside were the questions and I randomly picked a number coding for this set of questions:
- Muscles and Fascias; of the back.
- Kidney; structure, syntopy and blood supply.
- The Eye; blood supply, ciliary and pupillary reflex.
- CNS; spinothalamic-, spinoreticular- and spinotectal tracts.
I was at first puzzled by the set of questions and did not know where to start. I began by drawing as much as I could about the kidney since it was, in my opinion, the easier question. After that I sort of jumped from one drawing to another since I didn’t know how much time I had left. I understood from the order of students that I would be the last one which meant that I had four students ahead of me equal to about 20 minutes minimum each. After I had drawn for what felt like 3 hours I was finally done and couldn’t possibly get more out of my head. My six pages were filled with drawing from different angles showing different structures and I began to plan in which order to present them. Since I didn’t write more than one sentence I also had to come up with what to actually say.

This is the actual schemes I drew, however one page is missing:

All of a sudden my time was up and the last student before me unfortunately for him did not pass but fortunately for me I now thought that this opens up a chance for me to perform better an impress. Because that is what it is about – to impress the examiner with your knowledge and ability to present it.

In a regular fashion Prof. Elizka wanted me to begin with the CNS question about the spinothalamic tract. I presented my scheme, which he was very pleased with, and I just brainstormed as much as I could. He then did an unexpected move and asked me about the reticular formation, a complete different structure within the brain but with connections to the spinoreticular tract. I was at first caught off guard but came back in the game and could move on to the second question. With the nice backup of my schemes (I once again argue in favour of schemes) could rely on always having the knowledge approved in illustration. I have really no idea how long my exam lasted, time is not of the essence as you are getting hit by question after question but I remember that it ended in a neat discussion about Sweden since Prof. Elizka recently visited a congress there.

In risk of being too self confident I can end by saying that I was very satisfied with my performance and I am glad that the grade reflects my ambition. After the even I can say that it is a very good experience to be put in the hot seat in front of someone of great importance and with a level of studies that exceeds your own by a thousandfold.
Gratitude is also to be able to have such an examiner that allows discussion about the subject and lets you correct yourself if proven wrong. Being well prepared is the key retrieved by repetition and practice in presentation of the subjects.

Next challenge is Histology which I fear will be far much worse. For now, good night and may reason strengthen your mind...

Science can be HOT!

2011-07-01T10:30:00.001+02:00

You all know how we used to burn ants with magnification glasses when we were kids. Don't scold me if you didn't, I know it was a bad thing to do.
In this amazing video Jem Stansfield melts a rock in the Solar Furnace Research Facility in Southern France with what's got to be one of the most powerful magnification glasses ever created.

The 1768ft Tower Climb

2011-06-29T16:17:00.000+02:00

This makes my heart beat a great deal faster, maybe due to my slight scare of heights. Imagine doing it for a living(!?) - insane.
I guess it takes a certain mentality to be able to do this.

Laryngeal Nerve dissection in a Giraffe

2011-06-25T13:24:00.000+02:00

Can a dissection of a Giraffe prove evolution?
Richard Dawkins belives so, and the arguments presented are hitting hard.
This video is filmed in a real dissection, view it after your dinner.

A Story worth Sharing

2011-06-24T08:09:00.003+02:00

Tae-ho was born in 2000, South Korea.
He has no arms but works with what he got - something we all ought to do.
Inspirational to the fullest.

All rights reserved to MBC

Preparation Propaganda

2011-06-22T06:18:00.003+02:00

I’ve already implied many times that my main way of studying anatomy is through drawing. For anatomy all you really need is a good atlas, a source for regional dissection topography and a source for PNS and CNS pathways. I can write a whole chapter on which literature to prefer and for the beginning of next semester I hope I can share my thoughts to the first year students.

The first thing I should have done differently in anatomy was to print the exam questions in the beginning of the course, not in the end. It is true that you answer a lot of the questions during the year but it is one thing to know the fact and to be able to present it. I started with the first questions and it took me a great deal of time to write it all down. I understood that this was not the way to go so I started to build simple skeletons of the questions with criteria I had to cover.

By putting up a simple model of each question and by repeating the anatomy in the atlas I was able to recall the knowledge – it is true that once you’ve touch a subject, even just briefly, the knowledge comes back to you. There are some questions that require more theory than others, for example the general structure of bones and muscle, so those you must read up on a lot. More straight forward anatomy questions I found being up to date in my head and I spent little or no time on those.

I was told that being able to draw something about everything was a good way to go and I spent a lot of time repeating my schemes and drawings just to get the details right. My girlfriend Kristyna, who’s in fifth year of her studies and an anatomy assistant, helped me out by listening to me – mostly via Skype since she were by this time about to end her vascular surgery Erasmus exchange in Helsinki, Finland. Reading up on the questions and presenting them for someone is a great, and perhaps the very best, way to practice for the oral part of the exam.

I also found out that having a drawing to relay on during the presentation is, at least for me, essential. If I forget something I can go back to the drawing, re-present the statement and even expand it by adding things as I go.
Some of my preparations were drawings only, and I just kept the written things in my head, some examples below:

The Structure of the Final Anatomy Exam

2011-06-21T09:41:00.126+02:00

I will write as if anatomy is a subject of the past without revealing too much - thus keeping the final battle review unwritten for yet some time.
There's a lot to cover leading up to the exam and one part is the preparation work and the anxiety that comes with it.

The system of the University is built up so that you need one ore more credit(s) from each subject in order to advance to the next semester. Credits are obtained in the end of each course, or earlier if one manage to pass a special test. They are earned by staying within the limited amount of absences, usually four, and by passing all the checkpoint tests during the course.
Of course all the tests tended to accumulate during the end and one have to plan it correctly. As the analogue signatures of credits are getting signed in the index book, or "the golden book of God" as one of my friends once put it, one can seriously starting prepare for what really matters: the final exams.

The Anatomy exam can be broken down in three steps starting off with a straight forward slide test composed of 30 images, schemes or drawings with one unidentified label respectively. You need 21 correct answers to pass to the next round.
All indexes of the students that passed are then collected and randomly distributed to the professors, thus, you never know which examiner you will face until after the slide test (not that it would matter).
The students that failed are being called and sent home while the rest are placed with their examining professor. Two further tasks must be conquered; the practical dissection and the oral examination. Some students begin with the practical part and some directly to the oral.

The dissection is rather straight forward. You enter the dissection rooms to your examiner who starts of at one of six stations: bones, cadaver (muscles), thorax, abdomen, brain and CT/X-Ray. You answer the questions and are graded accordingly.

In the last part of the final exam, the part that you in my honest opinion ought to fear the most, you will be forced into a face off with one of the professors. The oral part is composed of no less than 191 questions, or rather, categories. Out of the 191 you pick a randomized number coding for a set of four question. Here are the division, total number of questions for each category (in brackets) and some examples:

Skeleton and its connections, muscles, fascias, osteofascial compartments (30)
-Bones and joints of foot including X-ray images, plantar arches and their support
-General features of striated muscle, its auxiliary structures, motor end plate, motor unit, muscle spindle, Golgi tendon organ, denervation atrophy
-Muscles and fascias of thigh, femoral triangle (draw transverse section and boundaries)
Gastrointestinal tract (17)
-Pharynx – description, syntopy, blood supply, innervation, swallowing reflex
-Liver - structure, nutritional and portal vascular bed, intrahepatic bile ducts
Respiratory system (8)
-Trachea and bronchi, bronchial tree - description (draw scheme), structure, syntopy, tracheotomy
-Pleura – visceral and parietal, borders of pleura, pleural dome and recesses, pneumothorax
Urinary and reproductive system (15)
-Urinary bladder – structure and position, fixation and syntopy in male and female (draw scheme)
-Prostate - structure, topographic relations, prostatic urethra, ejaculatory ducts
Heart (7)
-Heart - description, chambers, heart wall arrangement (draw section through ventricles)
-Coronary arteries, coronarogrpahy, veins and nerves, lymphatics
Arteries (9)
-Common carotid artery, internal carotid artery
-Abdominal aorta, unpaired visceral branches and their clinically important anastomoses
Veins (8)
-Cranial veins, sinus durae matris, intracranial tributaries of internal jugular vein
-Superficial and deep veins of lower and upper extremities, varicose veins
Lymphatic system (8)
Central nervous system – CNS (29)
-Cerebellum – structure, subdivision and functional organization
-Association and commissural fibers of hemisphere, internal capsule (draw scheme of tracts in internal capsule)
-Lemniscal system (dorsal column tract), proprioceptive and tactile sensation
Peripheral nervous system – PNS (20)
-General structure of the spinal nerve, perineurium, vertebromedullar topography, segmental innervation, radicular areas, dermatomes
-Radial and axillary nerve, paralysis
-Abdominal and pelvic sympathetic system, pre-vertebral plexuses and ganglia
Sensory organs, skin, endocrine glands (13)
-Eyeball (draw sagittal section), cornea, sclera and vitreous body
-Choroidea, iris, ciliary body, eyeball chambers, circulation of aqueous humor, glaucoma
Regional Anatomy (27)
-Topography of abdominal wall, blood supply, innervation and surface projections of abdominal organs
-Inguinal region, inguinal canal, hernias (draw schema of inguinal canal)
-Topography of supramesocolic part of peritoneal cavity (draw transverse section through lesser sac)

The complete list of questions is available here.
As you can see the categories are rather wide and wont cover all the possible questions the Professors can come up with - more or less anything they have touched (and to be honest also not touched) during the year.
I am amazed over the fact that all of us, who passed, have managed to learn such magnitude of information in 9 months of time. Combined with the knowledge of Histology we should be able to zoom in on any part of the human body and be able to explain the structures building up that part, both macro- and microscopically.
I hope the rest of my colleagues will fight for a good grade this week, the fourth round of examinations, and that their outcome will be satisfying.

Luck comes with the prepared...

Great Measures in Busy Times

2011-06-20T21:35:00.004+02:00

As usual, I make a meme-spoof...

So here I am again, in a defensive stance against myself and the optimistic thought that keeping this journal alive would be a piece of cake. It most certainly is not.
You all most probably know why, especially if you've gone through the same thing and for those who yet have the experience ahead of them I will in the following posts tell you a bit of what to expect.

Since the previous time I posted here, about a sunny day filled with highlights if I recall it correctly, there have been both ups and downs.
March 22nd is the date stamp and, to be perfectly honest, all that follows is rather blurry.

I can happily say that I am alive and more than just alive. I lived through what might have been the most intense three months of my life "so far" - and with that said in quotation marks - I expect more of it.
If I look back the winter was just about to turn its back on us and spring came rushing in through the door. Anatomy and histology was just about to step up their games by introducing the head-on Anatomy Dissection course simultaneously with the Peripheral and Central Nervous System (henceforth PNS & CNS), all together stretching over one month.
I was prepared for a rough ride but when Histology finally swapped into developmental Embryology, a complete different subject, it just hit me in the face like a metal bucket filled with icy water - and by that I mean water first and bucket next.

As the finish line got closer for every day and with more and more material to conquer I entered a sort of pseudo-doubting roller coaster. The only way to cling on to sanity was to prioritize, hence, histology simple had to end up on the self for the time being.

With my mind freshly set on Anatomy there were days I felt I had it under control. I passed all my practical tests with good marks and was, with a good push in the back from Kristyna and my colleague Gal, almost ready to book a pre-term final exam.
CNS dragged me back into obscurity and that was the phases I gently swayed between; pre-term or not pre-term. Gal is amazing and I admire her for staying on track with her plan. Damn sure, she did it to the end - as one of the very first to fight and survive against the professors of Anatomy.
I failed in staying to the plan and scheduled my anatomy one week after the school ended, something that after the event seems to have been a good move anyway. Since I'm not much for "what-if's" I tend to save my energy not speculating whether it would have been better to do the pre-term.

The last day of school came to an end and the real preparation could begin.
My own final battle with Professor Elizka sure is a nice story, with an outcome that I am mightily proud of, and I am sure I will find the inspiration to give you the details in a separate post later on.

But for now I'm satisfied, and done, with wrapping up the prologue...

Sunshine and Pineapple

2011-03-22T22:59:00.004+01:00

Sunset over Anatomy Department...
Some days are just better than others. Today was such a day.
There are not really solid criteria for what makes a good day, I rather find the spontaneous and come-by-chance moments inspirational and "day-seizing".
Me and my friend Paymon usually talk about this in terms of "highlights of the day" which can take the form of pretty much any random situation.
A completely random thing that might turn into a highlight of the day is for example when you watch a beach saleswoman from Thailand teach the world how to slice up a pineapple on Youtube.

The weather today was like waking up from a shitty dream due to the sunlight shining through your dirty windows - okey, that was what really happened this morning and with that revealed; yes, I really need to clean my windows. I believe it's a good thing that mum is coming here on Friday.
After waking up, starting off the day with some histology and bio-genetics I went for the first lecture on the interesting topic "cell cycle and its regulation" but it was honestly and most unfortunately not very effective, knowledge-wise speaking. I dare to say and, although this is not the right place, to give the constructive criticism about the Uni power-point presentations that overall, just like in the Swedish Army, are very disappointing from many perspectives. If time allowed I would gladly make a template and convert them all just to get rid of eye burning colours and massive text boxes - maybe an interesting future project - but for now, neither of my concern nor place to complain, which means I'll leave this thought here.

The two and a half hour break before this day's last class in Czech language came as a relief because this meant that I could catch some hours in the blazing spring sunshine.
Right above the Institute of Histology and next (laterally?) to the Institute of Pathology there is a nice sloping park that got to be the cleanest park in Prague. There wasn't much wind at my spot and the sun was facing the hillside just right for maximum exposure - and that we enjoy, right?
I occupied a bench, took off my shoes and socks and for the first time this season my white, clean soles got to feel grass and gravel - just as my face got the first effective time in the sun.
The books were with me and I eliminated one hour by reading and the second and last one by taking a nice lying position and sleep off the recently ingested salami sandwich.

On my way home I took a right turn and bought a fresh pineapple at the Potraviny.
Not much is needed to create an over-the-average good day...

"We are going to die, thus - we are the lucky ones"

2011-03-21T18:20:00.000+01:00

Inspirational words from Richard Dawkins on the fact that we're the lucky ones to die, and more importantly - live...

Holding a Heart

2011-03-17T19:47:00.001+01:00

This week is all about the heart, a subject very close to my own heart. Even though today's lecture didn't give me much new knowledge I spent the time drawing, 1,5 hour result below.
I can happily say that I handed in my drawings to a Professor in the czech part of the anatomy department who obviously are interested. I hope he will like the originals and I'm curious to hear what he thinks and what he wants to do with them.

During Wednesday's anatomy practical we spent a lot of time in the dissection room studying the authentic heart. Holding it in your palm is a strange but exciting feeling.

As I said - it's all about the heart...

Out of the Ordinary

2011-03-14T19:15:00.000+01:00

A lot of things make me happy:
Waking up early to and get chills from the cold air and then taking a hot shower, having a good breakfast, drawing while listening to relaxing music, seeing the sun set in the horizon along the Swedish west coast, drinking a beer on the cliffs with good company - I can make the list long.
But last Saturday Kristýna completely gave me a new definition of the word "happiness".

I won't give away any details here but believe me when I say that it sure was a surprise to. She took me down to a calm place by the river in the middle of the city light drenched Prague. There I got to open my early birthday present.
She put a box in my hands and when I opened it I found myself speechless.
I usually don't get presents with such a personal touch to them - I believe me and Kristýna share the same frequency.

No, I wont get lost... To be honest, I know exactly where we are...

Beginning of 2nd Semester

2011-03-10T19:08:00.000+01:00

There is a wide gap from this date to the next. Almost as much as a month. I guess the urge to write come in periods.
I could write a long recap of the time I spent in Sweden after finishing my biophysics and first aid exams but I believe this photo above summarize it all up pretty damn good.

After spending some quality time with Kristýna (yes, love is in the air) in my frozen west coast home town we had to kiss goodbye and go separate ways again. At that point we hadn't been apart for too long - only a couple of weeks due to her Erasmus exchange semester beginning in Helsinki, Finland.

I went back to Prague for the second semester knowing that I had to step up my game a bit in order to keep up with the pace.
Currently I've got through two anatomy tests with good results and also increased my studies of the histology. I believe that I'm back in my previous study-gym-eat-sleep routine and that I'll be able to keep it for the rest of the semester.

There's of course a lot more to tell but I'll continue from here on...

Medical Dictionary for Word

2011-02-20T21:28:00.000+01:00

I got really tired of all the red underlining correction due to incomplete dictionaries in my Microsoft Word 2007 while writing the medical report for my seminar on Wednesday so I took a minute off to search for an add-on to make it correct it properly.

I didn't find one that's legit for MS Word directly but I found out that there's another way of doing it.
MS Word use files called *.dic which is simply a text file with words lined up alphabetically.
There's even an option to add you own dictionaries stored in the folder:

In Windows 7
\\PC-root(C:)\Users\'Yourname'\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Uproof\

By downloading this medical dictionary to your PC, unzipping it with WinRar or WinZip etc., and putting it into this specific folder, or equally located in Windows XP or Vista, you can open Word and go to the path looking something like this:
Word Start Button > Word Options > Language Options > Own Dictionaries

There you may import your own dictionary and by adding the file you just saved you're done with a fresh word list of medical terminology.

My new heart

2011-02-09T16:03:00.001+01:00

It's so nice to be home, breath some west coast air and see all my folks.
Dad picked me up from the airport and we drove back home chatting about pretty much everything.
At first when I planned these two weeks of "vacation" I wasn't sure if going home was a good idea, but I'm not regretting taking the flight back home because when you see the family you understand how much you've missed them.
I won't forget to study, been going over the circulatory system once already, and my plan is to finish off the upcoming three systems.

I've had some time to relax and I've been continuing watching Gray's Anatomy where I left off and I've also been drawing - just finished the conducting system of the heart. I've spent almost 1½ hours and I must say I'm satisfied with the result, the shading was hard but I'm getting better. The base is from Netter's, conductive system of the heart:

the Heart

2011-02-07T10:54:00.002+01:00

Winter Semester finally came to an end

2011-02-05T08:36:00.052+01:00

There's a thing or two that happened and now I got the time to put together a neat summary.

I left off by telling you I failed my first biophysics exam. A lot of different parameters influence the examination and this was my first encounter with this type of examination.
I could write many positive things about it, but more importantly also a lot of negative things - in a constructive way - although I wont bore anyone with such details unless they are interested.
The following week I dedicated to the gym, the booklet and to sleep.
I studied a lot and threw the notes that I've been studied from in the trash bin. Instead I changed perspective and started to break down the green booklet thoroughly. It helped a lot and that's just another proof that there's no point of taking short-cuts.

I rebooked the exam to the upcoming Thursday and this time I felt ready. My questions was good and I switched tactics. Instead of leaving out knowledge on the preparation paper I wrote a lot, and didn't leave anything out, even if is was just remotely connected to my topic.
I believe that when the examiner saw my papers he understood I knew at least something and therefore didn't push me hard.
It took me approximately a minute to explain the first topic; Light Propagation, properties and light spectrum. He heard me out and just asked a follow up question in optics, one of my favourite subjects among the biophysics material - which means that I didn't have much trouble answering that.
I kept talking, in contrast to last time where he did the talking, and the next topic, Particle Accelerators, went through the same procedure with a follow up question on magnetism.
The last topic was about Phase Border Phenomena and I had trouble remembering the different subjects under that topic which left my paper rather blank.
I tried to explain in a non scientific way and the good thing about this examiner is that he is not impossible in any way, especially since we had such a good discussion up until now.
He guided me through it and dragged some knowledge out of my head and the result ended up in a passing credit which made all the effort during these 2½ weeks worth it all.

Next up was celebrating at the Asian sushi restaurant that just opened up around the corner while simultaneously studying for the next exam in First Aid.
First Aid is another course that sort of just have been there as a side dish not really contributing to the meal, so to speak, which is a shame because I really like rice, or potatoes.
It was time to show of some military paramedic training - well, at least that's what I thought in the beginning of the course.
I thought I'd remembered it all, and also know it all - and I was proven wrong badly.
There are always updates and in this topic, as in everything else, repetition is the key.
I think I could have skipped out on the course by giving the examiners my documents from the Army but now when the exam is over (I passed even if I got the hardcore examiner) I'm rather happy I didn't.

It seems that I haven't been taking any short-cuts lately, and I start to wonder if I will ever be able to do that in the future.
When it comes to biophysics, unfortunately and to my utter surprise, cheating is to something worth considering and what scares me even more is the fact that it is to some also a "level up" in the social group interaction.

Regardless the time spent I can now happily conclude that I made it through the winter semester and that I'm excited to begin the summer semester. It's a true fact that studying anatomy will be a blessing to the brain after the massive texts about heavy atoms, quarks and gamma rays.

And, at last, I'll end this with a nice way to confuse your teacher:
(more nice exam answers at smosh.com)

Detailed Drawing Preview

2011-01-29T10:03:00.001+01:00

I have a couple of ideas and this is one of them. I cut it down as a preview showing some details but it's far from finished.
It's a great practice and I think I'm improving each time. So much fun.

How small is the world?

2011-01-28T07:42:00.004+01:00

Metaphorically speaking:
Let's say that during your vacation in France you enter a café and are about to order. As you stand in line waiting, the person in front of you turns around and appears to be your old class mate from elementary school.
Most probably, even if that person was only a friend of a friend, you'd start to talk. One of you will either think, or say, "oh, the world is so small!" and then you'd end up drinking coffee together.

That got me thinking, how small is the world really?
I was studying but got distracted by this thought and as I reflected I was looking out the window and saw a small bird sitting on one of the branches of the tree in the garden.
I said to myself: "the world must be so much bigger to that bird, than it is to me..."
Based on the thought that this might just be the case the size of the world must be proportionally smaller for a tall man, lets say 1,91 like myself, than for a child measuring only 1,30 above the ground.
Now, to think that in almost every "normal" case (I don't like the word normal), overlooking the fact that we shrink when we get older, it's true that with age comes height and vice versa.
Another parameter is that with age comes experience and I believe in most of the cases the source of imagination is greater in younger days.

The conclusion must be that the size of the world somehow must be inversely proportional to the size and age of the person.
Back to the initial reflection; the bigger and older we get, the probability of bumping into one of the unexpected meetings must then increase, yes?

I'm growing bigger and undoubtedly I'm also getting older, therefore my world is shrinking - and that means I need to buy more coffee.

Scanning Printer Result

2011-01-27T10:18:00.002+01:00

I finally boughtthe printer I've been looking for and four clicks on the website, four thousand CZK and four hours later it arrived.
I did the setup and eveything worked just fine. Finally I can scan my documents, print and copy.
I'll put up my sketches and and a neat test print. Some of them you've seen already so there will be a double post. Note that most of them are just quick drawings and I'm happy to reveal that I'm currently working on some drawings with a little more time invested in the drawing process.
Enjoy.

Biophysics: Day #4 - 6 + First attempt

2011-01-24T21:53:00.000+01:00

You how authors sometimes begin their books with the end and then what follows is the story of how the character(s) got there? I'm about to do just that.
If you're just here to find out how I did on the Biophysics all you have to do is finish this sentence (although it is not the end).

I've already taken my first attempt and I did indeed fail it, hence my humble adding of the sentence: "I was naive to think that one and a half week of studies was enough to cover the whole course".
But before I begin to explain how it was being examined let me first tell you about the way there, just as promised.

During Friday there wasn't much going on. I hardly left the apartment and tried to dig through the two last chapters in the booklet.
The pages in what we refer to as "the green booklet" really is horrible to read. Not that it lack the information, the other way around actually which cause it to be difficult reading.
My friend said it in a nice way: "...it's medical orientated physics, not physics orientated for medics..."

As I try to write down what I've been doing it hit me that the days all go blurry and starts to get mixed up in my head which is a sign of too much reading and to little living. The fact that I've sacrificed the workouts is not making me too happy but it's exam period and if that's what it takes then fine.
It's safe to say that I got all the other credits and the only obstacle left is the biophysics.
Saturday went by with at lot of formula memorizing and not too much reading which was sort of a good break from all the reading and sorting of terms.
During Sunday I mostly looked over it all and one minute it honestly felt like I knew enough but then waves of doubt went through my mind.
I scheduled for at least 8 hours of sleep and went to bed rather confident.

I wasn't nervous as I waited to get in for the examination. It started at 9 and I woke up, got ready and dressed up nicely one and a half hour before that. Note that the biophysic-department is in the building right next to my apartment so I didn't
have to stress.
During the exam it's really strange how everything in your head seems to just crawl up and hide.
It's easy to be wise after the event but another week would be good to have and a reschedule would have been the right thing to do.

Taking water over my head is just fine, failing an attempt is also fine - mistakes made are almost always good things, because one can correct them.
There's also rumours roaming around that it's fairly easy to cheat during this type of exam but I honestly rather get put down proven to have a lack of knowledge, do the second attempt better and finish it all of with a solid knowledge.
I discussed this matter the other day and the conclusion was as solid. The hard way is the best way, taking that road down will lead to more knowledge, experience and memories. Even if this philosophy covers life in its whole, not only biophysics, one is still able to apply it.

Now I have to schedule another week and I think that will be just enough in order to learn the booklet from inside out.
Although I'll look like this when I'm done it's going to be worth it.

Knowledge is easy to carry...

Biophysics: Day #3

2011-01-18T20:16:00.000+01:00

Today have been a really great day, even if I didn't study that much biophysics I've got a lot of other things done.
Since the Latin test is tomorrow I've mainly studied the Latin vocabulary and the declension table. The grammar patterns are pretty much stuck in my head from the first revision for the first test which saved me a lot of trouble this time.

Biophysics are progressing thou, today I spent some time to repeat yesterday's material covering Thermodynamics and Electrical Phenomena. There's still a lot left but I'm slicing it down into pieces and in that way I can easily see how I progress.
I'll post some nice videos for basic understanding in X-ray and MRI theory and once again, check out Kahn Academy for Thermodynamics and Electricity - he is simply amazing.

The weather today was so nice, almost early spring, and I could leave my jacket at home. I took a stroll up and down the streets next to the apartment in search for a printer. I've been needing one for a long time now and today I felt the urge to get it. That didn't happen, all I ended up with in the end were a new set of colour and sketch pencils, new folders and blank papers.
I know what kind of printer I want to buy, the problem is just to find it without going to the outskirts of Prague where I guess all the shopping malls are located.
That reminds me of the fact that I need to go to both Ikea and to a place that sell vacuum cleaners and washing machines, but I'll deal with that after the exams.

So, videos below, enjoy.

Putting it Mildly Quote

2011-01-18T10:29:00.000+01:00

"...If you will devote a little time to studying the staggering photographs taken by the Hubble telescope, you will be scrutinizing things that are far more awesome and mysterious and beautiful - and more chaotic and overwhelming and forbidding - than any creation or "end of days" story.

If you read Hawking on the "event horizon," that theoretical lip of the "black hole" over which one could in theory plunge and see the past and the future (except that one would, regrettably and by definition, not have enough "time"), I shall be surprised if you can still go on gaping at Moses and his unimpressive "burning bush."
If you examine the beauty and symmetry of the double helix, and then go on to have your own genome sequence fully analyzed, you will be at once impressed that such a near-perfect phenomenon is at the core of your being, and reassured (I hope) that you have so much in common with other tribes of the human species - "race" having gone, along with "creation" into the ashcan - and further fascinated to learn how much you are a part of the animal kingdom as well.

Now at last you can be properly humble in the face of your maker, which turns out not to be a "who," but a process of mutation with rather more random elements than our vanity might wish. This is more than enough mystery and marvel for any mammal to be getting along with: the most educated person in the world now has to admit - I shall not say confess - that he or she knows less and less but at least knows less and less about more and more..."

- Quote from Christopher Hitchen's Putting it Mildly: Part 3

Birthday Dinner at Lemon Leaf

2011-01-17T23:19:00.001+01:00

The red curry was really spicy, but Christian didn't give up...

Thank you all for a really great night, and most importantly: Congratulations to Suresh

Biophysics: Day #2

2011-01-17T08:48:00.003+01:00

The title isn't really correct since yesterday was more about Latin.
The final Latin test is held on Wednesday and if one pass it's automatically going to reward in a credit and with that, the subject is out of the way for this semester.
I got some biophysics done after all, a bit of reading in the morning before my friends came over and as well in the late afternoon before, and after, the gym.
We had a co-revision in my room and I went through the first two declensions and did some exercises from the book.
The rules and the grammar tables are easy to learn and the major problem is to learn the vocabulary. Easy you might think, it's just memorizing, and yes it is indeed although that takes time and as I've been stated numerous times before time is of great value these days.

Today I'll try a different approach on biophysics because I'm honestly keeping myself from freaking out - it's only 6 days left now and it feels like the things I read wont stick to my head at all which is really frustrating.

I'd just like to add, and this is a great deal off topic, that making sushi and listening to Christopher Hitchen's book "God is not Great" is a really nice and relaxing thing to do.
My sushi turned out to be amazing (even though it was vegetarian and 40% of the sushi was missing - aka the salmon) and Hitchens can also amaze me in many different ways and I think that I'll quote him later in my 5 minute break from biophysics. Another great thing that amaze me and inspire me lately is to make Skype-calls to Finland.

For those who think in a scientific way, like myself, and that isn't very familiar with Hitchens, Russell, Sagan and let's put Dawkin's in the name drop as well, should really "googl'em up".
If it turns out that you are, or after googling them become, familiar with them and it happens to be the very case that they do not amuse you in any way and are in fact not sharing your opinions at all then just drop it and leave it be - I'm not about to start any discussion, not just yet that is.

8:30 and it's time to get some revision done before the anatomy lecture.

Biophysics: Day #1

2011-01-16T09:35:00.002+01:00

I woke up at 8 and started my studies at 9 while eating breakfast. It get a bit messy sometimes with all the papers, the laptop and the salami slapping the keyboards, but it's worth it since eating and studying is a rather nice combination. Or studying while eating, either way you want to put it.

I began with the part that I'm already familiar with just to get my brain in the right mood:
Phase states, Gibbs Law, Analytical and Colloidal Dispersion Systems, Henry´s Law, Properties of Water, Diffusion, Fick´s laws, Viscosity and Viscous Flow, Stokes Law, Surface tension, Biophysics of Blood Circulation, Laplace Law and last but not least Poiseuille-Hagen Equation.
This is just one chapter out of eight so if I calculated the days correctly I should be able to cover it all properly at least once.

The different sources I use is a review and summary of the exam question which helps a lot. Sorting out information in the course booklet takes time and that is something I do not have enough of.
Youtube is another underrated source of knowledge and especially one guy there called Salman Khan (link: Khan Academy) is doing a fantastic work publishing over thousands of free lectures in different subjects.

I'm happy that the exchange of knowledge between the students here is great. Martin, who already have faced the ordeals of physics and have been teaching it before set up a small gathering and held a lecture on the fundamentals of physics.
It was a great improvisation and it really sorted out a lot of blurry stuff and prepared all of us for the more complicated subjects.

I can also say that since Facebook pretty much tracking everything we do, nothing bad about that, I believe most of you guys visiting my pages already know that I found my self completely lost in a box of 'certain' wonderful feelings during the last month. My head is so far up in the clouds sometimes that I forget time and space. I have a lot to look forward to and by getting reminded of that everyday is sort of a love/hate thing that just build up these amazing feelings.
I could go on like this for hours but it's now 9:31 and I'm one minute late.

Photos below from the study session at Martin's, and for those of you that still wait for the photos from the dinner at Lemon Leaf have to be patient, they will be posted but I believe you can imagine the work that must be done during exam periods.
Enjoy!

Quick note on Biophysics

2011-01-15T10:43:00.000+01:00

So, yesterday I finished off the remaining school work before the biophysics boot-camp week.
My exam is scheduled at the 24th and I realized that it will be a bit too soon. There's no good dates to reschedule too so I guess I'll have to give it my best shot.
The worst thing that can happen is that I don't manage to cover it all and fail, which means a rescheduled date for a retake. We have three attempts so it shouldn't be impossible.

So from now on I'll try to prove that it is possible to break down the biophysics course in one week. Note that I have orientated myself in the syllabus during the holiday and that I spent yesterday going over one chapter.
Any hints or sources on the material is appreciated.
And with that said, wish me the best of luck - I'll need it.

The game is on...

Dense Regular Skeletal Connective Muscle?!

2011-01-13T14:59:00.000+01:00

Histology is finally over, or at least so I hope - it all depends on how my slide test went.
I feel good about it, but as I recently discovered, feeling good about something is usually a bad thing.
We got two random slides each and was supposed to identify the tissue(s) within the sample as well as label them in a short description.
The first look at my first slide puzzled me. It saw for sure a lot of parallel fibres but also a lot of nuclei. My first thought was dense regular connective tissue from a tendon sample but it still had too many nuclei around the fibres from what I was used to see in this type of sample. So perhaps it's striated muscle? but there was no striation visible what so ever.
I wrote down a quick description and moved on to the next slide which was easier. The description didn't take too long and I could go back to the first slide again.
It really bugs me because I still don't know whether I choose the right answer or not.
Especially these two types can be really hard to distinguish since it looked like an awful mutation between these three pictures:

From left: Skeletal Muscle (1), Dense Regular Conn. Tiss. (2 & 3)

As you can see there's many similarities and it's going to be a long and curious wait for the answers next week.
Below I put up some nice mobile shots from our histology slide practice as well as a photo from today's anatomy lecture.

Today should be a day off, but I doubt that'll be possible since biophysics and Latin exams are just around the corner...

"You tried to make amends"

2011-01-12T21:14:00.000+01:00

New music video release by Tides of Man, and I like it a lot :D

Population: Zero - Life after Mankind?

2011-01-10T08:00:00.007+01:00

Yesterday evening I had a really nice conversation and after one hour I joined Jean and Niyat for some GIT (gastro-intestinal tract) studying.
I've been drawing a lot of schemes since one part of the test on Wednesday is going to be sort of a "surprise!-draw-this-random-scheme"-task, which of course is nothing but a really good practice. After all, that's how the final exam is going to be like.
I'll post my sketches in due time, and that reminds me that I need to go buy a scanning printer.

Life is like exploring a mind field over and over again. If one get through once it doesn't necessarily mean that you will know the way to go. There's nothing preventing the fact that at some point there will be a wicked mean s.o.a.b digging down new mines changing the path. It's part of the game and if one wants to play it one better stick to the rules.
I still fly around in my own little happy world most of the day but sometimes it's just so nice to project, or rather create, emotions of the other kind - to enjoy. Now, that might sound a little narcissistic and strange but my philosophy is that in order for one to have good peaks, one must have bad peaks and projecting problems into thought and emotions is just one way of me dealing with the bad peaks. Rather than suppressing them and build up a pile I like to slice it up in checkpoints.

Thinking and reflecting makes me feel good and since I've been getting into this post-apocalyptic mood lately, especially in the evening, I have to embed this trailer for the "Life after People" series. It's a really interesting predicting theory of how the earth will repair itself once its abusers are dead and gone.

Who will die and who will survive?

What will still be left and what will be forgotten?

What will evolve to take our place as dominating
(, abusing) species?

The Road

2011-01-09T16:26:00.003+01:00

Histology is not the easiest reading in the world, and to be honest I'd rather read ten anatomy pages instead of one in histology. It's not that it is less interesting, it's just difficult reading.
Music makes it better and since I'm currently listening to the official soundtrack of The Road I thought I might as well recommend this amazing, post-apocalyptic movie by John Hillcoat for you.

Listen to the soundtrack above and read about the movie here

Art Illusions: Skulls

2011-01-08T21:14:00.001+01:00

Today I've been studying all day, jumping between histology and anatomy back and forth. Now it's time to take some time off and meet up with some friends coming over for a pre-party.

While waiting I've been looking up some neat illusions and these are the best I stumbled across, enjoy.

Scanning Electron Micrographic Wallpapers!

2011-01-07T21:30:00.001+01:00

I found these neat scanning electron micro-graphs and decided to turn them into wallpapers...

A breif history of butterflies and hurricanes

2011-01-05T23:57:00.005+01:00

I was asked to publish more photos from my portfolio, this is a really old one from a series of photos shot in my parents garden - if there's someone out there good at species - then please let me know the name of this little guy.

I wanted to write a recap of New Year's Eve... not going to happen.
I wanted to write a recap of Christmas and the holiday... not going to happen.
I wanted to write a recap of my lecture for the students at my old High School... not even that, is going to happen.

All sadly due to the lack of time and energy.
You see, lately I've been occupied by winged creatures and hopefully, in a short matter of time, me myself will grow wings.
Now, unfortunately that's just wishful thinking and neither will I have more time on my hands nor will wings start to grow out of my back... It will, simply... just not happen.

This looks like a disturbingly depressing beginning and I can gladly tell you that's not the case - the other way around - actually a lot have happened, a lot of good things.
I can honestly reveal that a normal and sane person would probably be stressed over the situation regarding the studies; the pile is just growing but therefore not said the pace is decreasing, hence the reason to be stressed... and that's why it is great that I'm not sane at the moment.

While trying to stay insane, since that (briefly proved by my speculations above) obviously helps, I'm digging through that growing pile of work.
I just passed the final Czech test with a mark B which sort of boosted my insanity and what's left to conquer are the final anatomy and histology tests for this semester.
Anatomy is shouting "finale!" while throwing a slide test and a scheme drawing right in our faces - covering random parts of the Gastro-Intestinal System which some students rate as the toughest part so far in the anatomy studies.
Basically it consists of muscles, gross- and micro anatomy of the internal organs such as; the liver, gall bladder, pancreas, intestines (large/small) and other specific compartments not worth mentioning since my eyes and brain are starting to shut down this very second.
My plan is to go through the whole system, organ by organ and put it all together in the end applying that knowledge to as many different atlases as possible in one week.

Simultaneously histology did the feared jumped from level 1 to level 4, or rather; like playing Pac-Man with 4 times the normal amount of monsters.
Next test is the first real slide test on the samples of all the tissues we've been through so far, approximately 25 samples.
It's going to be the biggest challenge next week and preparing for it is going to result in a lot of coffee, and less time for very inspirational things such as hitting the Facebook update button 6 times per minute.
By now I can feel my own sarcasm slapping my tired face like bricks of concrete to a Shaolin Munk's head , and I apologize for that - I'm writing on pure will power now - but I guess no one dares to blame me since I've been studying since 17:oo straight.

In two weeks the last checkpoint will be reached; the final Latin test. I have high hopes for that test since Latin, or more correctly Medical Terminology, is very interesting and I'm very much admiring our great teacher.

I would like to write a novel right now but I think this will do for tonight. Now I'll enjoy the butterflies and hurricanes and with that said I'll close my eyes... take a deep breath... and... slowly... fall... asleep... dreaming about... butterfl...z..z...Z

Nice ending of 2010

2011-01-02T13:10:00.000+01:00

I got awesome DJ friends, illustrating and break dancing friends, cooking friends, good looking friends, bone digging friends, guitar and drum playing friends, snowboarding friends, drunk friends as well as sick friends - all of them making the New Year's Eve worth remembering

Arrival

2011-01-02T00:23:00.001+01:00

This is not a montage, it's the reflection of me in the air plane window

I stayed in the air and now I've finally arrived in Prague. It took me an hour to install some new things in the flat and it's time to search the empty fridge for something edible.

Next up, bed.

Departure

2011-01-01T09:45:00.000+01:00

Waiting for the taxi is tiring. Although I'm not tired from yesterday, which was a lot of fun.
It was wonderful to wake up today and feel good, maybe that has to do with me not drinking.
I'll compose something beautiful about yesterday, the holiday and whatever else that pops up in my mind later, perhaps during my flight because hey, it's time to go back to Prague and that means no more time for writing - but in contradiction more obligation to write. I love paradoxes, but you knew that already.

There's not much of a blizzard going on (I wished for summer at oo:ooam/pm) and the temperature should be around +/- zero which is good, because I do not wish to get stuck in Frankfurt. Apologizes to my German friends, but what the hell am I supposed to do there?
No, I think the departures and arrivals will keep the time table intact and I sure hope so because I have something rather important to do tomorrow.
Well haven't we all, everyday, when it comes to being stuck on airports or terminals of whatever transportation method one use.

Cross your fingers to keep me in the air...

Creativity

2010-12-22T15:32:00.004+01:00

Finished crafting these bracelet and necklaces.
It's so much more fun to make them yourself than buying multi-produced non unique things.

Bitchophysics

2010-12-21T23:42:00.002+01:00

I knew that it'd be difficult to study once I'd come back to Sweden but I never thought it'd be this hard.
Biophysics got a new nickname: Bitchophysics.
I usually find it interesting but the massive walls of text hammering my retina every single page I turn in that green booklet of pure madness is driving me insane.
There's a lot of different strategics how to conquer the boredom of reading the booklet and since there's a lot of formulas to memorize I thought I'd might as well start with that.

The fact that I find some of the theory very interesting makes it a bit easier - I know that some people keep saying that the exam will be easy, no one fails etc. - but that's really not what it's all about. I'd rather spend time learning the stuff properly because it is my strongest belief that it will in one way or another help me in the future, even thou it seems totally uncalled for to put the physics in the first year along with anatomy and histology.

In order to manage to get the studies done every day I'm keeping track of the time and make sure that I spend at least two effective hours.

It's funny how I can already miss certain things in Prague after only four months, in a good way of course...

Managed to get home

2010-12-21T23:10:00.002+01:00

It's really not time to write about school but hey, that's what I do.
I was really lucky getting home to Sweden right before the chaos reached the airports all over Europe. I'm a bit concerned when it comes to my trip back thou, I hope it'll clear up before it's time to fly back.

Yesterday I visited my old High School to hold a small lecture for the last year students about how to go abroad, what to think of and what first semester of medicine is all about as well what to expect.
It was really appreciated and I hope that my information was helpful and that some of the students consider medicine as a field of interest. Knowledge and experience is meant to be shared.

I've been spending some of time to sort out my notes, studying biophysics and most importantly to relax and see my friends. We also got the results from the last Anatomy test and my result was double A's wrapped up as a neat x-mas gift.
I got a hold of a scanner and thought I'd scan some of the goodies from my sketchbook. Sorry for the clattery scribble and bad handwriting. Enjoy.

LF1/AIMS Winter Party [pt. I]

2010-12-18T09:48:00.003+01:00

LF1/AIMS Winter Party [pt. II]

2010-12-18T09:48:00.002+01:00

Philosophy during lunch time

2010-12-15T12:13:00.004+01:00

I haven't had time for anything else but studying for the two last tests. I know people from the 1st and 2nd Faculty are waiting for the pictures, from the last Winter Party event at Jetset, to be published. Just hold on guys, they will be uploaded by me and the other photographers at Saturday to different forums such as facebook, AIMS, LF1 and of course here on my log in HQ for you to save.
Anatomy went down quickly and I hope I did good, I don't want to have the test nagging my heels as I continue on next year.
Right now I need to navigate through the thick mist of haemotopoiesis and haematology. It's rather detailed and I really don't like to learn things shallowly.

My head is pretty much starting to shut down, it's just one more day left.
Sometimes you just have to take breaks from the books and as soon I get some time over I've been reading up on philosophic history.
"Strange" you might say, "interesting" is my answer.

Do not spoil what you have by
desiring what you have not;
remember that what you now have
was once among the things
you only hoped for...

- Epicurus [341 BCE – 270 BCE]

I can easily conceive, most Holy Father,
that as soon as some people learn that in this book which I have written
concerning the revolutions of the heavenly bodies,
I ascribe certain motions to the Earth,
they will cry out at once that
I and my theory should be rejected.

- Nicolaus Copernicus [1473 – 1543]

A well-deserved thank you

2010-12-11T10:29:00.003+01:00

Just wanted to give my dissection group's TA and responsible dissection leader Kristyna, demonstrators Sara, Zuzana, Shrey and Nabeel a well-deserved thank you, for a great job during dissections instructing and teaching.

Waiting is the worst part

2010-12-10T18:18:00.003+01:00

The hallway outside the dissection rooms were packed with anxious students. I wasn't as nervous as I usually am before these kinds of exams, more focused and just wanted to go in there and preform.

The waiting is the worst part and it's interesting to see how different people cope with stress. Some persons do crazy revision, some sits down on the floor just quietly drowning in nervousness, some guys are jumping around joking and some just try to block everything out with music.
There are some things that I really don't like to do and some things that I have to do before a big exam, this is my protocol:

- I never study on the day of the exam. I don't believe in last minute learning.
- I try not to discuss the exam material before the exam.
- I need at least 8 hours of good sleep to get all the information straight.
- I need a good breakfast.
- I try to drink or eat something rich in sugar right before the exam starts.
- Being nervous is fine, to a certain level. I always try to calm down and even if I'm not
I always put on a calm mask during oral exams.

The first names started to get called out and after 5 minutes the first two guys came out, with smiles on their lips. Facial expressions are the best way of telling if a person passed or not.
Over all the exam seemed to be easy and I confirmed that just minutes later. I was called in and had to sit down and watch my colleague being examined by the head of the Anatomy department Professor Grím. This is where my pulse went up. My exam started off on the anterior compartment of the upper limb and I got approximately ten questions.
It was amazingly easy and I feel a bit disappointed, not only because I screwed up one of the questions but because I wanted to be examined on all of my knowledge. I guess it's supposed to be an introduction because I doubt that the finals are going to be this comfortable. Of course I am glad for passing but the thing is that I was so prepared and I really wanted to get my knowledge confirmed. I still don't have the answer to the question: "do I know enough?"

'Valerie Lights'

2010-12-10T12:08:00.002+01:00

It's something about this song that really made me smile this morning :)

Dissection #4

2010-12-09T00:50:00.002+01:00

As we get closer to the test the dissections get more and more intense, I understand why.
The specimens are almost dissected so that all the structures are visible and orientating details is no longer a guess in the blue.
Reading the previous post you already know about my horrible night and good morning with the insomnia and skull test so this is the rest of the day.

After anatomy my first priority was to get home to eat, being tested and having introductions just drains one's energy and my breakfast wasn't the best of breakfasts. Eating and revising goes hand in hand most of the time so reading up on some topography and vessel pathways got me prepared for today.
I went to the dissection earlier in order to repeat the structures and not very surprisingly a lot of my colleagues did the same. The dissection tables were packed with students starting to freak out over the exam and you could tell from the sound level and the hectic atmosphere, I don't blame them thou, I have the exact same feeling starting to grow within.
Even if my common sense tells me to stay relaxed, focused and that it's not that great of a deal - I think we're making it bigger than what it really is - it's dangerous to underestimate such things as well.

Today was a really interesting and worthwhile day. I actually got to see some very important structures, due to an amazing dissection job from our teachers assistant Kristyna and Nabeel. They spent a lot of time to thoroughly dissect the inguinal canal - the one that is rather tricky both to find and to theoretically visualize.
I've been trying to fill my gap in detail knowledge as well as repeating old stuff such as origin/insertion of muscles which can be confusing sometimes.
Me, Niyat, Jean, Malek, Thomas, Arani and Nina gathered for revision after the day finished and with some supervision from Suresh (2 year student) we managed to repeat the most sufficient parts.
We ended about an hour ago close to midnight and now I really need to get some sleep, or I rather say TRY to get some sleep depending on my brain, because tomorrow morning I have a seminar in the subject we all forgot we have; Histology.

Let's call it a day already, shall we..?

Insomnia part 2

2010-12-08T11:06:00.002+01:00

When I was on my way home I really thought I'd get one night of proper sleep.
But gosh, I really can’t sleep any more.
Usually when I have this insomnia I tend to be very sick, starving or a complete nerve wreck about something – like the first night in the army.
This is something different. My head is so filled up with thoughts, course material, upcoming presentations and philosophic questions, and the only time I can really, thoroughly think it all through is when I go to bed.
It’s like putting a computer to waiting mode instead of shutting it down. The shell is quiet but the core is still making calculations - my body is sleeping, almost paralysed, but my head is in a high activity state.

I hardly hit any REM sleep at all and my curve should look like a straight line of 'xtc. I usually remember the majority of my dreams and I am often able to share them but lately I hardly dream at all, which is a big loss since I really like dreaming.
Now it is more like I’m processing and sorting all the incoming information during my “not-asleep-nor-awake”-state.

This quote is from one of the posts from one of the nights during the premed in Stockholm and I've been waiting for it to come back. Imagine this and then compare a Duck Tales Magazine with Sabotta Atlas of Anatomy and then you'll get the estimated difference.
Surprisingly it's showing up rather late which of course is a good sign.

Tonight was bad. My head was sort of imploding from hyperactivity and I mixed foraminae of the skull with visions of my future, dreams about spiders laying eggs in my throat (after paralyzing me with venom) with anatomical topography repetition, good memories from the past with nightmares of being chased by mouthfaced zombies (zombies with faces only containing a big mouth), pasta recipes containing not pasta but optic nerves and so on, the whole night through.
I think I got one hour of effective sleep and on top of that I twisted my neck so now it hurts.

By that processed and said, I'll end this post with some rather good news. Anatomy seminar just ended and I finally got the skull test out of the way so now I can concentrate 100% on the dissection exam on Friday.

Dissection #3

2010-12-07T21:02:00.003+01:00

Notes from the dissection black board. Covering the Brachial Plexus and the Axillary Spaces.
Today wasn't as good as the last two days.
Sure, I saw some new structures and learnt a couple of new things but my head just wasn't there with me. I wasn't tired really, nor hungry, I just didn't feel it.
And now I really regret not taking the skull test last Friday because tonight I have to pick up the bits I didn't study a week ago. I'm not getting confused but imagine pouring hot water into a glass of ice water and expect the ice to still be there. I guess you understand that the ice is a metaphor for my skull knowledge slowly crawling deep into the neurons as new fresh information enters.
The glass is bigger than I thought thou, there's still some space left.

Next week is countdown for the semester break and it's only 9 days left until I get to go home again for the first time since I got here. I'm really looking forward to it - but more importantly is to keep the focus to the end.

If you still haven't understood what we're doing in dissections the best thing I can do is to toss you a link to videos. I'm not allowed to publish anything from our class but this might give you a hint and maybe you'll see that it isn't as bad as you think.
On the other hand, I find it very disturbing that there's a lot of dissection videos available at youtube etc. even for younger audiences. If you find the second one disturbing then do not try out the clip labeled "autopsy" in the menu to the right.

Link to Muscle video (good for understanding/insertion/origin/function of muscles)
Link to Dissection video (in my opinion better for dissection of specimen)

Got to get back to the books now, over 'n out...

Dissection #3: Preparation

2010-12-07T13:48:00.000+01:00

Inguinal Canal Scheme

The inguinal canal is rather difficult to visualize and there's not too many good pictures out there.

I wonder if this one is a good one and if it's correct(?) - I hope I got the idea right but I'll see during today's dissection.

Dissection #2

2010-12-07T00:44:00.001+01:00

Pratik keeps my friends in group 4 busy at all times. Seems like very good theoretic revision.

Dissections today were a lot more hectic than last Friday. I don't know why it felt that way because it started off pretty quietly. Since half my group had retest in ligaments and joints they stayed in the big lecture hall and I actually got the whole limb for myself. I took my time and tried to apply some knowledge that I repeated during the weekend.
I knew we had to go through a small test during the day and since I was alone around the table with the best dissected specimens one of our demonstrating assistants came over and started to test me on the lower limb. I got questions on random muscles, topography such as the retromaleolar space, popliteal fossa and the nerves running along the spaces.

I did pretty good and the best thing is that I feel pretty confident with my knowledge so far.
Later on I got to know that I know far from enough, I got quizzed by different demonstrators and every time another detail came up that I didn't recognized - not to nice for the moment but it's a good way of filling the gaps.
The best thing about having the instructors around is that you can always drain them on information and I spent more time revising with them than dissecting which I guess is more important for passing the test on Friday.
I also have my skull test around the corner but I won't stress out about that just yet, there're still a lot to cover in the topography and pure anatomy of the structures on the cadavers.

Ever since we started to dissect I've been trying to keep a look out for the lymph vessels and the lymph nodes. It's a structure that we haven't touched yet which I don't understand since it's as important as every thing else. I finally got to see a lymph node today thou, but it wasn't as awesome as I'd imagine it to be - what a let down, right?!
Imagine a little boy hoping for an awesome TMNT-action figure for x-mas gift and finds out that the box contains... socks....

Still, the human body is pretty amazing and it sucks that I can't share the experience of seeing it with all of you.

Well, three more days to go before the big test and I hope that I'll be able to cover it all and feel somewhat confident to pull it off nicely.
I'll wake up early tomorrow for some breakfast and revision...

Dissection #2: Getting geared up

2010-12-06T13:31:00.001+01:00

Exhaustion, Brains and CPU

2010-12-06T00:14:00.001+01:00

It hit me now as I'm going to bed, and I'm not joking, that I've been outside the apartment thrice this weekend: once for some grocery shopping at the Potraviny downstairs and two times to go to the gym.
The rest of the time I have been, guess what?
You probably guess right; studying. (I also started watching Grey's Anatomy but mainly: studying)
Not only am I amazed over how quickly the time just disappeared but also over how much work I've got done. Now I just hope that it all have sticked to my head - a head heavier than after the worst hungover imaginable.
I can't relax and trying to sleep is even more pointless. My head is exhausted, and it's still trying to revise as I close my eyes. It's like I'm mentally worn down but physically my body is fine - I guess I shouldn't have skipped the gym tonight.
I think there's a party going on up in my office with everyone invited: muscles, nerves, arteries and veins, everyone except sleep.

Computers have it easier, I guess they don't "feel" exhausted but hey, even they get worn down by time. It's stated that we'll never invent a computer as powerful as the human brain.
I can imagine why the computer always are slower; in a simple equation they can't just see the answer out of experience, take 1+1=2 for example. I at least are able to just see the number 2 without even processing the calculation(?). The computer however have to put the equation together, process it and then give the answer. But what if the computer stored all the answers and created "experience", if you know what I mean. But after all, I guess the human will program that binary equation for the computer to find all the answers in the first place.
But I still really can't neglect the thought that one day there might be computers wired together with neurons. Or even more far-out: humans wired up with a spare part of CPU (hopefully we wont go there, I'd rather see that we unlock the technique to reproduce organs instead...)

I'm not enlightened enough to understand it yet, but no matter how the brain works, it's an amazing structure in the body and I am grateful that it works...

Moral questions and science - can it be connected?

2010-12-04T16:53:00.000+01:00

I had to take a break from my muscle studies and use another part of my brain for a while.
Moral questions are always interesting and this perspective, presented by Sam Harris, were absolutely new to me - and probably to everyone else.
Religion and moral questions have always walked hand in hand and I guess that a link between science and moral have never been drawn like this before. I find this very related to my own way of thinking which makes it all even more exciting to watch. What about you?

Dissection #2: Pre-studies

2010-12-04T12:44:00.001+01:00

Today's task: repetition of the muscles in the upper and lower limb; their innervation, function, blood supply, origin and insertion.

Dissection #1

2010-12-03T23:51:00.004+01:00

(photo borrowed from kickassetout, note that this is not Uni. dissection room. no cred taken)

I went to the anatomy building a good half an hour before the dissection course started in order to get a locker and perhaps get a good slot at the table.
When I entered the entrance was filled by my colleague, every one of us ready to carve in on the specimens.
Dr. Snajdr gathered the group and tried to get the attention of the buzzing crowd of students, which he managed to do rather quickly considering all the excitement.
A short introduction followed with information about the different cutting techniques, important areas to be vary not to destroy, common rules and so on. It was nice to see all of my colleagues in lab coats, looking all proper and professional.

I was expecting our class to have two full specimens and some free limbs but unfortunately, by unknown reason, we only got one full scale body. We divided into two groups with 13 people in each group and started to continued carving of the fat tissue from our specimen (the second year demonstrators had already started to dissect during our introduction in order to save us time).

We got to dissect on our own under supervision of our teacher assistant Kristyna and the first hour simply flew by. A few minutes later I moved from dissecting the dorsal side to clean up the posterior aspect of the left arm and finally engaged the fascias of the muscles and some yet unidentified nerves and veins. I isolated the nerves and vessels and found out it was the ulnar nerve.
By now my scalpel was blunt but I din't change it due to the fact that time soon was over any way.

Even with 6-8 sharp scalpels working on one specimen from all sides and angles there were no cutting incidents - only a close one.
The grease from the subcutaneous layer covers pretty much everything including your gloves and tools. I slipped many times, luckily only with the forceps, but the demonstrator to my left was not far away to cut my cheek up.
She was making a cut from underneath, with the sharp edge of the scalpel pointing in my direction, while I was sitting down on a chair concentrating on my own cutting with my face just next to the tissue. I guess she tried to get through a rather dense structure and in my periphery I suddenly saw her either slip, or actually get through the tissue, plunging out with the overpowered motion towards my face. Luckily my reflexes projected my head back and sideways and the blade never reached me. I don't know how close it actually was but I can guarantee you that it felt pretty close.

I didn't learn a lot today but more importantly I got to see how the tissue behaves when cut and now I know what to study during the weekend.
Kristyna even set up a test on Monday, which I in fact really like since it motivates me to study even more.

It's going to be a long week with a lot of studying but the reward is pretty neat; a lot of knowledge, fun and in the end hopefully a credit...

Preparing for a busy week

2010-12-01T21:22:00.001+01:00

Next week is dedicated to dissections.
Every day from noon till evening we're going to have intense dissections and we've been promised tough studies to keep up with the course and little sleep.
I'm looking forward to it due to the fact that we'll start from the beginning, dissecting our way through the different layers of the body to finally isolate different structures in the task given to us. This means that we'll cover pretty much everything from skin, subcutaneous layers, muscles, nerves, arteries and veins - repetition of these chapters will be crucial over the weekend.
Simultaneously I've chosen to study and get tested on the skull which in fact are one of the most heavy parts of the winter course, at least so I've been told. Some of my colleagues are taking the skull test on Friday to get rid of it before the dissection course start but since I've spent time on Latin and Czech, perhaps a bit too much, I don't feel ready for a pretest.
I'm positive that I'd pass it if I'd take it but I rather study it properly and thoroughly simultaneously with the dissection in order to keep up my good marks.

Last week's hard labor got payed off rather good; getting back a really good result on the previous Anatomy test of the axial skeleton as well as passing the Czech test and the Latin test of this week. Tomorrow we'll get back the Histology test and as previously posted I do believe I'll pass it as well which makes me really happy.

I'd love to write a lot more, but time is not to be wasted these days, and soon I'll give a bunch of friends a Latin crash course walk-through for their test tomorrow...

Decisions, are we in control?

2010-12-01T20:46:00.000+01:00

I've previously linked to Dan Ariely speaking about the Human Moral Code and here he is again but on the topic "decisions", if we're really have control and how illusions may affecting our choices.

Carpark North

2010-11-27T22:16:00.002+01:00

The Danish band Carpark North just blew my mind out with their new video to the re-recorded track Just Human

Israeli Cuisine at Yonatan and Chen

2010-11-27T11:01:00.002+01:00

I know that Italian families are well known for their cuisine and traditional family dinner, not from my own experience, but you know from all those TV shows and cooking documentaries they show on world travelling TV-channels - visualize it for a couple of seconds, 1, 2, 3 and you're done. Now remove the milky sauces, the lasagna and add some spice, Hebrew and joy.
Israel is the new Italy - at least as far as I'm concerned.

Tonight's get-together and 'cook-n-share' dinner party hosted by my friends and colleagues from Israel infused me with happiness and joy I thought I'd left behind in a big box tightly sealed and placed in the attic back home in Sweden.
The smell of plates with well crisped chicken and potatoes, red bubbly wine á la Gal and to me exotic mixes of spices all together wrapped up and enhanced in a clutter of cheering voices and the jangle from plates and glasses being set on the table.
I'm not used to these kinds of events especially not where many different cultures and traditions are meeting in such a good way.
Such hospitality and joyfulness is rare here and I welcomed it as the pleasant break in a hectic schedule that I hoped it would be. I can honestly say that this was the first night ever since I got here when I could truly let my head relax just enjoying the meal, the conversations, the laughter and the smiles.

The dinner was as fetched from a another world, a taste experience richer than anything I've experienced since I got here - not even the Czech specialties at Pivovarsky Dum across the street would even be fair contestant in a comparison contest.
After a loud and jolly prayer the feast was on and spoons, forks and knives were tearing the dishes apart and in less than an hour, or should I rather say 300 taste experiences later, the plates were almost clean and the promised food coma started to kick in.
Although the dessert were still to come and what a dessert indeed. I'll let the photos speak for themselves from here on.

Thank you all for a fantastic evening,
I already long for next Friday and then I'll for sure bring some more wine and something tasteful to the table.

Today's Mission (-impossible?)

2010-11-26T13:46:00.000+01:00

Foramina and Canals of the Cranial Base from a superior view - perhaps the most difficult task for my memory so far (photo from tmj.pe)

The Human Moral Code

2010-11-25T23:37:00.002+01:00

This is a really interesting talk with Dan Ariely regarding the Human Moral Code. If you have 15 minutes you should definitely watch it and if you don't have 15 minutes to spare then watch it anyway, perhaps instead of hitting that addictive facebook update button over and over again - in other words; it's really worth watching.

Summer Flashback

2010-11-25T12:08:00.001+01:00

Good summer memories from back home (:

Test number 4 and 2

2010-11-25T12:04:00.001+01:00

Just came home from the histology seminar with half a smile, half a grin.
The histology test covering tissues (except nervous tissue) turned out to be a good one, I was rather lucky with the questions that suited me just fine and I hardly believe that I'm going to fail.
Dr. Becke usually gives the answers to the test questions once the test is handed in which I find a both a bit disturbing as well as a relief - guess I'm a bit 'split minded' today.
Of course it makes you know if you're way off and have to restudy the whole chapter but it can also give a certain relief because you can pretty much tell if you passed or not.
To me it only inflicted anxiety, especially since I found out that I wasn't far from a top result but that I made those stupid mistakes that stopped me from reaching it.
I believe that when you set high aims and the lack of knowledge lets you down it's fine - then it means you didn't study enough and you probably should lower your bar. On the other hand, finding out that small mistakes, not related to lack of knowledge but rather the disorientation of the knowledge, makes me so irritated.
Call it a small problem, vanity or whatever you'll find fitting, I know passing is what matters for now.

The anatomy test yesterday on the axial skeleton and its ligaments was our second slide test and I must admit that I was shit scared of what might pop up on the slides. There's no way you can know what pictures are going to be in the test, all you can do is to prepare as well as you can, studying the material from different atlases and whatever pictures you can find on the internet.
X-ray photos and CT-scans might show up as well and those are the trickiest ones. I think you can imagine that distinguishing processes and tubercles from one another in different opacities of shadow gray are rather difficult and the only way to get better at it is to study them thoroughly.

This test also turned out rather good and afterwards I felt satisfied with my answers. We got the result back from the last tests cross section and since I know I left out some details the result was to my surprise very good.

Studying is exhausting and I try to put sleep as a top priority - and you should know that sleep is a luxury article around here - and the fact that I've been able to plan my studies so that they won't conflict with it makes me happy (and thoroughly rested of course).
The study schedule is like a roller coaster stretching over one or two weeks. In the middle of the week the introduction gives me a hint of what to study. Then I settle down and start reading on my own, alternating subjects if I have more than one test. In the end of the weekend I tend to increase the study pace and I finish off with a good night sleep right before the test. After the test there's finally some resting before hitting the next wall forcing you to increase the pace once again.

Studying histology while Nina and Jeanine are going over the back muscles, books all over the place...

Next week is 'language week' with tests in both Latin and Czech and simultaneously I have to learn the basics of the skull as well as keep the histology studies up - although I can do this in my own pace it still means that I'm in for yet another rather hectic weekend...

It's a pity

2010-11-24T11:16:00.001+01:00

Note to self: Refuse to sympathize with dishonesty.