S2W1: No Diving into the Deep End!

Semester two: week one!

We've nursed our egos having received our exam results back the other week and slept away our tired eyes. Time to get back on our physio horse and ride that pony to town! Or, at least to our Monday 9am lecture. Only the occasional 8am lecture this semester!!

Kia ora! We're back to the books after having a three week break! The official university break was two weeks, but we had an extra week off due to finishing exams earlier in the examination period. The physio-related highlight over this period happened whilst medicing the Saturday game following our last exam. One of our players was struck in the nose by an elbow when challenging to head the ball. The result: one broken nose! I was lucky enough to be able to relocate the nose as soon as the player came off. I then sent the player to be taken to the Sport Injury Clinic for further assessment and the player was back to cheer the team on in the second half of the game! Had the player dislocated a major limb, I wouldn't have had the pleasure of relocating that. Dunedin Tech Football Cub won that match 11 - one. I think the boys had been taking mental notes from games being played in the FIFA world cup!

Halfway through the year already! Here are our papers for Semester Two!!
- PHTY250: Anatomy! The focus will be on all things periphery (muscles, nerves, etc.)
- PHTY252: Pharmacology for physios. Sex, drugs & rock 'n roll! ... Naa, just drugs!
- PHTY254: Rehab science continues to expand the physio student tool kit.
- PHTY255: Clinical practice features hydrotherapy this week but will include two more clinical placements later in the semester.

New additions to the physio student book bank for semester two!

PHTY254 is split into MSK and Neuro this semester: Looking ahead to future musculoskeletal (MSK) labs, I am most looking forward to learning McKenzie management techniques for low back pain and other manual therapy techniques as well as other soft tissue techniques for the lower limbs (we look at techniques for the upper limbs and higher vertebrae next year). McKenzie and Mulligan manual therapy techniques were developed by New Zealanders and are world renowned. This is partly why NZ trained physiotherapists are believed to be among the best in the world. This week MSK covered more in depth info on physical examinations (looking to differentiate between pain sources and developing hypotheses and testing hypotheses). In the second lab we practised the mobilisation technique 'passive accessory movement' on our peer's wrists, ankles and hips. We also covered movement diagrams. This is a subjective tool for documenting resistance/pain/spasm throughout a joints physiological (normal) and accessory movement. During a 254 neuro lecture we were given the task of accessing a building around the university with a walking aid and pretending that we had a stroke. This meant altering our gait. From doing this we have a better appreciation for the challenges they face on a daily basis. For example, we were much slower at crossing at the traffic lights, battled with the cold wind, held up people trying to pass us and got a few interesting looks from passers-by. Looking ahead to future neuro labs there are only self-directed learning tasks (4+ hours per week) & Umove clinic (4 hours per week for three weeks)... thankfully the SDL doesn't have to be completed when attending Umove clinics. I have two more weeks of Umove this semester to go.

Umove is a public service (free) for people with neurological conditions to be physically active. It focuses on the clients goals and allows us undergraduates some hands on experience facilitating safe and effective exercise. The session on Tuesday was thought to be overbooked for the number of physio students present. The clinical supervisor was sure they were going to arrive all at once, before she had a chance to give us a little heads up for what we actually had to do. We were thrown into the deep end (but not as deep as the supervisor had previously anticipated). On my first Umove clinic a patient told me that my eyes look tired (it's true, they do) but then he likened me to Gerard Butler I'd say he was looking at my name tag ... I had to ask a physio peer whether this was a compliment - she told me that it was. Having now googled this apparently famous actor, I will take it as a compliment (although I don't look anything like him - I took a selfie so you can compare for yourself).

A common joke between physiotherapists (and sometimes their clients) is not being able to count... "not being able to count is a prerequisite for physio", "you've got three more reps to go..... [three reps later] you've got one more to go". 

In other papers this week...

• PHTY255 - Hydrotherapy. Our hydrotherapy sessions were held at the Dunedin Physio Pool. The temperature of the pool is a constant 35 degrees Celsius - a pleasant escape from the Dunedin winter. I'll tell you about this and our clinical debrief next week.
• PHTY252 - Pharmacology this week was all about pharmacokinetics or 'what the body does to the drug'. There were a few new concepts such as the 'vehicle' (not a BMW or Porche, which you might expect Pharmacists to drive); basically this is another substance that facilitates the absorption of the drug.
• I almost forgot to mention anatomy, PHTY250! We have self directed learning tasks on top of the usual weekly load (one hour lecture, 2x two hour labs, a short mastery exam + self directed learning tasks). We began the second semester covering the anatomy of skin through to deep fascia & muscle, developmental bone anatomy (and a few other things). That is, 38 pages of lab content to fill in this week alone. Busy times ahead!! Next week we begin what I believe to be anatomy for physiotherapy, ... the lower limbs!

 When writing these blogs, I seldom report what is happening in my life away from studying physiotherapy. It often feels like study takes up a large portion of our daily lives - I'm sure on paper it actually does! In this paragraph I wish to address the wider context of living and how I came to reflect upon it this week. I assure you that other life events don't stop while you're studying, so you need to keep up with them too! Brazil lost in the soccer world cup by 7 - 1 to Germany this week! The commonwealth games are due to start in a few weeks! NZ is leading up to a general election later this year. It was my dad's birthday this week. It's good to celebrate the current life of loved ones. I'm off to a friends birthday dinner on Saturday! These people make your own life worth living. A friend from high school is about to give birth to her second child - I saw this one via Facebook. Good on her! We need to celebrate the creation of life; life is precious. Student's do however participate in relationships all of their own; friendships, romances, family. I am lucky to have a wonderful girlfriend. We cook meals for each other a few times a week, text message and occasionally hangout. We are, ourselves, super busy - but that's working out just fine. I try to keep in touch with many friends with the odd facebook conversation. I often have a coffee (more typically, brunch) with friends passing through Dunedin or who are otherwise studying hard and need a social break. Because I enjoy dabbling with photography, a friend and I are trying some experimental photography styles - matching our local scenes into a fictional scene (he lives in Wellington). Then there are those people closer to home. My flatmate is having some difficulties recovering money off her friends old boyfriend as her mother has cancer and that friend had to return to another country. Relationships gone wrong and daily struggles with money are all to present in students lives. Other flatmates are reconsidering their future goals re: semester one results and developing their sense of self / identity  too. I have been keeping an eye out for a job in addition to full time study and luckily I had a job interview last week - my fingers are crossed that I get that. Being a student is not simply about studying. It's good to live in the present moment, but reflection on the past and of the future are important too. I actually came to reflect upon this when hearing of a death of a friend from high school. He committed suicide. A client at Umove asked me if I took walking for granted. I admit that I probably do. But I certainly do not take life and the life of others for granted and neither should you. So my tip for surviving physio this week is to be involved in the process of living. Be there for friends and family. We cannot personally be there for everyone, but collectively as the human race we can. Lets not go diving into the deep end.

From one serious note to another! Here is a look at next weeks timetable. Classes generally stay the same. My second tip for surviving physio: half an hour putting your timetable in electronic form is worthwhile (saves printing costs). Normally there is a 254 MSK lab on Wednesday from 1pm to 3pm... Hopefully this isn't a timetable error (I'll have to check!) But you can see how busy we are as physio students.

If you're after an entertaining lecture about pain, then watch this (~50min).

It's been a busy first week back!