Just Another Day

A la Jon Secada...

• Practical this morning on transferring patients, did pretty well, now have to watch the tape and self-assess my own performance (they actually tape us, nutty)
• Lab on orthotics (canes, walkers and such)
• Lecture on Metabolic Disorders (e.g. Rickets, Scurv, Osteomalacia, etc.)
  
• Lab on compression for conditions such as lymphedema
• Helped a classmate move
• Watched the Yankees win while reading over notes... ok, so I had the notes open in front of me with little looking at them... ok, so I just watched the game to relax... hey, with my support they won in extra innings :-D
• Now in the process of typing up Musculoskeletal Pathology notes to ace the quiz on thursday... one day at a time
  
• "Do not go gently into that good night"
• Good night
  

Disrespect

The profession of Physical Therapy is not as respected or understood as the profession of medical doctors. A recent ad taken out by the New York state society of orthopaedic surgeons states that "PT's aren't trained to make a medical diagnosis or recognize many potentially life-threatening conditions beyond their limited expertise." This is an attempt to keep Direct Access out of New York State. For those that don't know, Direct Access is the ability of a patient to go directly to a Physical Therapist for a condition such as a sprained ankle or whatever the patient deems appropriate for the therapist to treat. As PT's we are taught when to refer to the appropriate source outside of ourselves such as a hand therapist or medical doctor. FYI 41 out of 50 states in the US have Direct Access with no greater incidence of malpractice. I think it is fair to say the orhtopaedic surgeons are a bit concerned about losing money that PT's could possibly take away from them if the current bill for Direct Access gets passed.

I am only in my first year of three as a StudentPT and we have already received training in spotting "red flags" that can be signs of cancer and other diseases. I refuse to accept these professionals accusations, however there is very little I can do short of sending in some money to counter their ad. But perhaps one individual reading this will be better informed and gain a little bit of respect for my profession. As a "doctoring" profession, we Physical Therapists are capable of recognizing life-threatening conditions, our careers depend on it and we care enough about our patients to use everything we are taught and then some.

NY needs Direct Access, help make it happen in any way you can.

...Congrats to Massey on everything...

Stayin Busy

In the fall I had 5 jobs (part-time) on top of my 6 classes
In the spring I cut back to around 4 on 5 classes
Now its summer and I have 3 things I can call jobs on top of 4 classes.
On top of that I really try to stay involved in the APTA and numerous leadership roles including organizing all of my old high school football teammates and telling them about one of our brethren getting married this weekend... Congrats to him!

Being busy tends to cut in on things like studying. So far it has definetly adversely affected my grades. TV too...
I tend to learn a great deal from questions I get wrong... but it's probably stuff I could learn much better by reading the notes over and over again... as I should be doing currently. Things like re-typing the notes or putting all the info on flash cards. Whatever works right... Like spending more time on writing this blog :-D

I'm still working on finding the most efficient form of study and time management. Its the passion that keeps me going, that love, that drive... I have to stop with these late night posts...
It's been a long day of HIPAA and OSHA talk and videos, transferring pt's from bed to wheelchair, supine, sidelying, listening to the chapter I read last night on congenital abnormalities come to life through my professor lecturing, and at this point I forgot what we did in the last class of the day
Like I said, its been a long day...

Every day is a gift

Just quoting Tony Soprano because it is true. We don't always see that bigger picture. Sometimes we get stuck in the day to day; short-term vision.

Reading the textbook for neuromuscular pathology the chapter on congenital abnormalities starts out "when you consider the remarkable speed and complexity of the embryonic development of the human... it is surprising that the vast majority of children are normal at birth." The chapter goes into numerous abnormalities that can happen during pregnancy.
There are of course numerous abnormalities that occur throughout the life span which can happen gradually or within seconds.

Those of us who do not have to deal with these problems tend to take for granted the ability to stand up pain-free or the ability to move your hands around in an organized manner.

My only message for today is take advantage of what you have in front of you while you still have it. Because don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you got 'til it's gone?

Studying...

Got two quizzes tomorrow and a case study/SOAP note presentation due.

For those of you who don't know what a SOAP note is, its fairly unclear to me at this time too... actually it stands for Subjective, Objective, Assessment, and Plan in reference to the care of a patient for documentation sake... i.e. so that the next person that picks up the pt's* chart can carry on the plan of care... etc. etc.
(*patient, get used to abbreviations in this field)

And darn it, I just realized tomorrow is a Clin. Sem. lab, meaning I have to get all dressed up, boo to that.

Before I get back to studying I would like to congratulate my classmate that got engaged over the weekend and the other 2 that have already been engaged, and the one that is already married...
And a special shout-out to Junior's iced coffee - black with chocolate syrup... I am still feeling it 10 hours later, then again, I do normally try to avoid caffeine...
Good Night

The Post That Got Away

So I amn't that clever... I had a pretty good post all ready to go, then I got distracted and my internet crashed... lost all that work... not the first time something like this has happened

Just the universe telling me to be focused... perhaps even GO STUDY!!! as it smacks me in the face like my 2 1/2 year old nephew did when I babysat him yesterday...

Anyway, the lost post was about the classes I was taking, and had some reference to Godfather 3, and the massive amounts of coffee that I (a non-coffee drinker) will have to intake because of the crazy 9-5 schedule of classes...

And to all of you 9-5 or more working folk, I feel your pain, but lectures are way different than work... and I am paying for the honor to be sitting in this class whereas you have the immediate motivation of a paycheck at the end of the week or month.

Also on the topic of money... I was just screwed by two different banks on my consolidation of loans. Of course I only have myself to blame for not going completely out of my way to harass these people into giving me the service promised to me in the first place. Grrr. I hate loans.

So on a brighter note these are my "fourth academic semester" classes:

• Neuromuscular Pathology
• Musculoskeletal Pathology
• Physical & Chemical Modalities
• Clinical Seminar II

The first three semesters looked a little like this:
Summer I:

• Anatomy
• Physiology
• Movement Analysis I

Fall I:

• Anatomy II
• Neuroscience
• Movement Analysis II
• Psychological Issues
• Clinical Seminar I
• Research Methods

Spring I:

• Pharmacology
• Movement Analysis III
• Tests & Measures
• Teaching & Learning Strategies
• Foundations of Therapeutic Exercise

I choose not to reflect in depth on these subjects as my philosophy is to live in the present day. I will say that I did not do as well as I could have academically and that boils down mainly to a lack of motivation.

And on that note, I am off to buy some groceries, cook some said groceries, do some calisthenics, and study.

Sense of Urgency/Procrastination

My goal with this blog is to provide a perspective of a student physical therapist and to reflect on the curriculum that I am going through to become a Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT). I want this blog to be a resource for students thinking about physical therapy, other students to compare and contrast with their current programs, possible patients, and practicing PT's. If you fit any of these categories and are willing to devote a little bit of time to read my words, welcome...

For the record, I just started my second year of a three year DPT program at Long Island University-Brooklyn Campus... Everything else you need to know about me, feel free to ask... or find me on MySpace or Facebook...

I thrive off of feedback, so please take the time to leave your thoughts if you have them.
(I already know I tend to ramble and jump all over the place topic-wise, so those are things I need someone to keep me away from doing, thanks again...)

Hx: This blog is something that I thought to start up while sitting through a relatively interesting lecture on Evidence-Based Approaches to the Shoulder. I googled a few variations of "Physical Therapy Student Blog" and was only able to find one such blog in existence: http://blogs.chron.com/realrehab/

Of course this was back in February... and here we are in the middle of May, and I have finally decided to get committed to this. I think if there is actually the a decent amount of urgency for me to keep up with this then it will be a great thing. Most of my life I have needed that push. Even now as I am in a Doctoral program, spending tens of thousands of dollars to be allowed to practice PT, I still have to be faced with three papers and a few midterms before I get myself buried in books. I could break down the psychological reasons for all this but I want to keep this blog more about being a StudentPT than me.

I promise that future posts will

• Be more focused on one thing
• See procrastination as a recurrent theme as I search for a sense of urgency
• Be slightly more entertaining... hopefully
• Have more to do with being a StudentPT
• Have crazy, cool, colorful pictures such as this one:

I think I need to go study for something... go type up my PowerPoint notes... I may just fall asleep, who knows anymore?

Hope you come back real soon :-D

PS, has anyone seen my fuzzy JETS slippers?