1.3 Cellular Pathophisiology

     This unit has put into perspective for me a look inside a doctors mind to figure out a problem at a cellular level.  The classifications of different cell issues are so general yet cover every cell problem a doctor can find.  It makes it seem more manageable to be a doctor and figure out problems because if you can get a basis for a problem based on cellular pathophisiology you are one step closer to fixing the cell problem quickly and efficiently.  The different things that could happen to an injured cell helps me realize how they can get healthy once again.  The movie really interested me because I am potentially looking into the neurology field and it reminded me that ethics play a large role in medicine.  I can see how the drug would be controversial and why some patients reacted in a negative way after being woken up.  After 30 or more years of the world changing around them will they really want to wake up and jump back in or have they missed too much?  Is it worth the emotional toll this time away has taken on them?  It is interesting to think of how much goes into deciding on an experimental drug and how much information and proof some people might want to get an okay on the drug use even if you know it could save the patient.  This experimental drug use on patients is also a question of ethics because there is so much risk involved and it will impact the patient, the family, the hospital, potentially everyone involved or even closely related to the patient and their disease.  

I'm in choir and I'm in a really good mood and ready to go to taco bell for lunch.  I'm starving and I get in the car with my friends and we start the car and it's out of gas.  We can't go out for lunch and I have no food but I'm still starving.  As a cell I go through metaplasia and morph into an angry monster until my parents take me to get taco bell after school.  

Skin Cancer Unit

     In this unit, we were able to learn a lot about cancer of the skin but also test factors of our choice which added a really cool hands on element to the unit.  At the start of this unit we were able to use UVB probes, which for many of us were a very new and awe inspiring technology.  With these probes, we got to test anything we wanted to relating to UVB reception with different variables.  In our group, we chose to test different tee shirt colors for the level of UVB it allowed through the shirt.  This was a very interesting experiment and something I had never really thought about before this experiment.  Seeing our own, and every one else's experiments was really eye opening to how many factors actually go into how much UVB we are exposed to when in direct or indirect sunlight.  In addition to the experiment, we watched a movie (Living Proof) this unit that really gave us an inside look at what research for a new drug is like, in this case a drug to try and stop the growth of cancer cells.  It was really cool to see this in action but also cool to watch the movie after already having some knowledge about the topic which we learned in class prior to watching the movie.  We could then apply what we knew to what was happening in the movie with the doctors research and the patients conditions.   This unit overall was a great mix of hands on learning and informative learning to keep us aware of how skin cancer works.