Hello readers, I have not written in a few days because classes at the University of Nicosia have started and the schedule is quite intense.  From 9 am to 1 pm I have my Anatomy and Clinical Skills class at the University of Nicosia/St. George's of London Medical School.  Then from 2-4:30 pm I have my Management of Healthcare class.  Both of these classes are amazing!  For the first time ever, I got to see a cadaver in my anatomy class.  It was really interesting!  Today, we learned about the digestive system and before that we covered the respiratory system and cardiovascular system.  After an approximately 1 hour and 40 minute lecture, we have our clinical section.  On Monday, June 3, we learned how to conduct a respiratory exam.  We practiced on our classmates which was a little awkward but it was very practical as we were actually using the skills we had been taught.  Interestingly, the method of a respiratory exam we were taught began with an examination of the hands.  Yes, the hands!  We were told to look for signs of cyanosis (excessive blue color) at the finger tips and then to examine the muscles of the hand for atrophy, which occurs in lung cancer.  We also checked the hands for clubbing, a kind of inflammation of the fingers that is indicative of some lung diseases.  Next, we look under the patient's tongue for further signs of cyanosis.  We learned about percussing too, a method where you tap areas of the body to listen for sound patterns.  We used this to examine both lungs by tapping the chest and back regions.
The next day, we learned about the heart.  It was extremely interesting!  The part that was most exciting was when we went to the University of Nicosia simulation suite.  Here, there were robots that were programmed to mimic human patients.  They breath, talk, receive injections, have catheters put in them, have blood drawn, and have audible breathing, digestive, and heart sounds.  The robots are controlled by an operator who, using a computer program, can change the "physiological" conditions of the robot to reflect many different pathologies/abnormalities.  We got to hear heart murmurs and the different types of lung sounds.  The robots also have a pulse and we learned the best areas to take a pulse on a human.  Here are some pictures:

The person shown by the bedside of the robot is our professor for the anatomy class.  Here, she is explaining to us what we can observe with the simulation.

Here, me and some other students from my program are learning about the heart and lungs using the robot.

 In the lab, we also looked at a real human heart from a cadaver.  The valves of the heart were extremely well preserved and many of the other structures were very obvious.  The instructors gave us a demonstration of the blood flow through the heart using the real, preserved heart.
Today, we learned about the digestive system and how to do an abdominal exam.  We were also taught about some clinical abnormalities of the digestive system.  For instance, we learned about the pain patterns of appendicitis.  We also learned about the different types of hernias.  Then, we learned about heart burn and diverticulitis.  In the clinical skills part, we learned about a simple way to diagnose some liver diseases through the presence of Leukonychia striata (stripes on the finger nails).  I thought it was really interesting that something that could be easily overlooked was a medical clue!
The other class I am taking, the healthcare management class, is also very interesting.  It is a cross between a medical ethics, medical administration, and medical public policy class!  It is taught by the head of nursing program here at the University of Nicosia.  She is really awesome and wise, and today I learned that she is a Greek Orthodox Christian! There are lots of students studying different health professions in this class, not just future doctors.  The first day, we learned about some of the healthcare challenges in Europe.  For instance, one of the ones that struck me as most unjust is that in the European Union, many healthcare workers will migrate from the poorer countries to the richer countries to make a higher salary.  This is especially a problem for Romania.  In Cyprus, many people left because the job market is bad due to the financial crisis.  Yesterday and today, we learned about medical ethics and legalities.  Our teacher made a point to emphasize that our future patients are people, not objectives to be completed or statistics.  One of my favorite things that our professor said is that "In order to become a healthcare professional, you must love your patients."  I really liked that she said that because it is my opinion that many and probably most doctors do not personally care that much about their patients, something that I believe is very important in medicine.  We learned about our responsibilities under European and U.S. law a healthcare professionals as well.  It was good to learn about the different policies in these places.  We also learned about informing patients of news, both good and bad and our professor emphasized the importance of patient understanding and clear communication by the doctor as well as respect for the patient.
Something we learned about in today's lecture was an especially interesting problem to me though.  We learned about organ trafficking around the world.  As someone who is very passionate about combatting human trafficking, I realized after today's lecture that organ trafficking is a part of human trafficking that is often overlooked.  We learned about how the wealthy bribe the poor with money to get their organs.  We also learned about the international laws about this.  This was part of a broader ethics discussion we were having.  Still, the issue stuck out to me and I had a lengthy conversation with my professor after class about this issue.  She was very informative and said we would continue to talk about illegalities in medicine in future classes.
To summarize, I have learned a wealth of knowledge in my first 3 days of class.  I've only posted about 10% of what I have learned on this blog because there is so much!  I love my classes and I have loved my experience at the University of Nicosia so far!  Tomorrow, I am visiting Nicosia General Hospital for my healthcare management class, so look for pictures and posts about that! It should be very interesting.  Tomorrow, I am also learning how to do a rectal exam in my anatomy class.  That should be...interesting...and slightly gross.  I expect we will be practicing on a cadaver.  As gross as it is, I want to learn because I can help others better in the future as a doctor!  I will have to get over the grossness at some point if I truly want to care for my patients and solve/alleviate their suffering.
For now, goodbye from Cyprus!