My new favorite book

This is my new favorite book.  It's not a Respiratory Disease book that goes into a bit of Pathophysiology, it's a real Pathophysiology book!  All of my other so called "Patho books" are a joke when compared to this one.

Clinical Rotations

This is how much time I'll be spending at each rotation

Adult ICU:  12 weeks
Wards/ER:  7 weeks
OR:  3 weeks
PFT: 2 weeks
Level 3 NICU:  3 weeks
Simulated PICU/PCCU:  1 week
Level 3 PICU/PCCU:  1 week

I'll be doing the first week of my Wards/ER rotation next week.  I'll be working with a different Preceptor each day, which should make things interesting next week.

Orientation complete

I finished my hospital orientation.  I did the orientation in three 12 hour shifts.  My base hospital is freaking huge!  I've already gotten lost 4 or 5 times.  The tour of the hospital, on the first day, lasted 5 hours.  The person giving the tour actually go lost a couple times.  I'll be on Wards next week.  I also have a bunch of homework to do for the clinical site and for the college.

First day of Clinical tomorrow

I'll be starting my clinical rotation tomorrow.  I'm pretty excited about it.  Next week I'll be doing twelve hour shifts. I'm told that next week is an orientation week. I have to dress business casual, so I'm not sure if I'll actually have any patient contact. I'm bringing some scrubs and a lab coat with me, just in case I need them.

I've now finished the first two years of a three year Respiratory Therapy Program.  The third year is the clinical rotation part of my training. Everyone's telling me that everything will start to make sense during clinical. I hope they're right. I should graduate from the program in December of this year.

I picked up my NRP card yesterday.

Passed the composite exam

The average mark was about 3 percent above a pass.  Lots of people are going to be writing up study plans.  My final mark for the composite was 77%. 

What does a respiratory therapist, right out of college, need?

Someone recently sent me an email asking, "What does a respiratory therapist, right out of college, need?"  She's looking for gift ideas for a relative who's about to graduate from an RT program.  Something RTish that could be useful for a new RT fresh out of school...

Asking me for gift ideas is like asking a drowning man for swimming lessons.  I was hoping that others could leave some suggestions in the comments...

Composite exam marks by the end of the week?

Now we're being told that we will get our composite exam marks, by the end of the week.  I strongly suspect that too many people got slaughtered on part II of the exam. They're probably trying to figure out what questions not to count or how low to make the pass mark.

I guess I wasn't the only person wondering what made them think that I could actually answer those types of questions.  A lot of the questions were beyond me and I mentioned that to a couple of faculty today...

Waiting for marks

The final marks for fourth semester are starting to be released.  I'm still waiting for my Anesthesia and Composite exam marks. 

So far I've got two Bs and two As.  I'm hoping Anesthesia is an A+ and the composite exam is a pass.  If I fail the composite exam I have to write up study plan and be ashamed of myself, for a couple of days.

Composite exam - Part I and II

Part I of the Composite exam tested my ability to apply fundamental concepts and my ability to problem solve.  I think I did pretty good on that part.  That part was 2 hours long.  An hour later I wrote Part II.

Part II of the Composite exam was all case studies.  I'm not really sure how I did on that one.  I felt like I had a lot of opinions and not a lot of confident answers.  That part was 2.5 hours long.

I think my chances of passing the Composite are pretty good.  The exam tested me on very little of what I studied, or wanted to study, yesterday. 

I go to the big shiny new hospital next month and start my clinical rotation.

Two parts

The composite today has two parts.  One is from 9-11AM.  The second part is from 12-1PM.  I'm going to do some last minute studying, of first year material this morning, and then hope for the best.

I was actually thinking about what I should put in my study plan, last night.  That thing could potentially end up being really long and taking a lot of work to get done.

More thoughts about the composite exam

I finished my last real exam today, so now I'm studying for the composite exam.

I've been studying my ass off for the last 2 years.  As far as I'm concerned, I've spent 2 years studying for the composite.  I only have today left to review some things, before I write the composite.  If I get tested on things that I don't know, it really doesn't matter.  If it mattered, then my mark on the composite exam would show up on my transcript or at least have in an influence on a mark that does show up.

If I fail the exam I have to write up a study plan.  I essentially just have to make a commitment to study!  WTF?  I'm almost a straight A student, I didn't accomplish that by not studying.  There are a couple of people in my class who don't study that much and get great marks.  Unfortunately, I'm not one of them.

Also:  Yipee, I can spell check my posts again!  That feature has been missing for ages.

Here I go again

Once again I have underestimated how much I have to study for today's exam.  I left school at 11PM yesterday and now I'm up at 4AM to do some more studying for my 9AM exam...

Thoughts about the composite exam

I'm currently studying for my Pulmonary Diagnostics exam, which I write tomorrow. I will be writing the cumulative composite exam on Friday. The exam is supposed to cover what has been taught over the last 2 years of RT school.

 

I haven't really studied much for the composite exam and these are some of the reasons why:

• I like sleeping.
• Trying to cram for an exam that covers 2 years of RT school is just plain stupid and I won’t spend more than a day doing it.
• I've probably remembered a few things, which I've learned over the last two years, and probably will be tested on some of that.
• The composite exam is supposed to encourage students to review and reinforce things that they have already learned. I don't need the encouragement to do that and will do that over the next eight months.
• How I do on the composite will not have anything to do with the marks that show up on my student transcript. If I plan on furthering my education, no one will care how I did on the composite. They will want to see my transcript. I have had no interest in studying less, for courses whose marks will show up on my transcript, so that I can do better on the composite.
• If I fail the composite, I will just have to write up a study plan that will address the things that I need to brush up on. I probably would have come up with a study plan, on my own anyway, so that I do better in clinical and can pass the registry exam next year. I probably wouldn't have written one up but I sure would have had one in my head.

NRP Certified

I'm now NRP certified.  I woke up in a cold sweat, last night, when I realized that I told the NRP instructor that I was bagging at a rate of 8-12 bpm when I was doing my resuscitation...

I wrote my Ventilators exam this morning.  I write my Pulmonary Diagnostics exam tomorrow.  I write the dreaded composite exam on Friday.

Preparing for next week

Next week is the last week of fourth semester.  I have to write an exam for my third Ventilators course, an exam for my Pulmonary Diagnostics course and the dreaded Composite exam.  On Monday, I also have to redo my NRP competency and my Ventilator competency.  If I blow any of those competencies, I'm screwed.

Last week I wrote my final exams for Pathophysiology and Anesthesia.  I think Anesthesia went very well and Pathophysiology was OK

It now looks like I'll be getting an A for my Simulation course.  I probably have an A+ for Anesthesia.  I'll be happy with a B in Pathophysiology.  I might be able to pull off an A+ for Pulmonary diagnostics but will probably get an A.

I also just bought a shiny new car.  My life sucks a little bit less because of it.

Scrubs too big

I ordered 5 pair of scrubs.  They're way too big and I will have to return them.  I need to wear a different colour, of scrubs, for my clinical rotations and was pretty confident that I had ordered the correct size.

Things haven't been going well

My clinical rotations start in less than three weeks and things haven't been going so well.  So far, I've failed two Ventilator competencies and my NRP (Neonatal Resuscitation Program) practical.  I failed my second Ventilators competency today, with a mark of 25%.   I had a scenario that included a a two day old term baby. I ventilated him as though he was a 30 week gestational age prem.  I also made a major mistake in setting up the pressure that I was using to give the baby his tidal volumes.  I thought I was ventilating with a PIP (Peak Inspiratory Pressure) of 25cmH20 when I was actually ventilating with a PIP of 20cmH2O. I was unwilling to increase the  PIP any higher, so I wasn't able to achieve the target tidal volume that was required.

I'm currently studying for final exams and the cumulative composite exam.  The cumulative composite exam covers 2 years of material. While I'm writing exams, I'll also have to prepare for and redo my NRP certification practical and my second Ventilator competency.  If I don't pass my NRP practical redo and get my NRP certification, I won't be allowed to do my NICU rotation.  If I don't pass my competency redo, I'll fail my Ventilators course.  If I don't those two redos, I won't be allowed to do my clinical rotations.  Now I know how it feels to be on the verge of failing and it really sucks.

I did however get perfect on my PFT (Pulmonary Function Test) competency.  Lots of people didn't do so well on that one.  Apparently the trick to doing that one well, was to watch the patient instead of the computer while getting the patient to do a flow volume loop.

I really hope things turn around, going forward.

Things going better now

I actually passed my last High Fidelity Simulation, which was the first one that counted for marks. Quite a few people had trouble with that one. I got a mark that was just over 80%. I was actually working with 'little miss perfect' on that one and it went really well. I had a chat with her and she seems to aware of what she needs to do to improve on in simulation. She's not shy about pointing out her failings, in sim, and made a point of warning me about them and offering advice on how I can help to make them less of an issue if they come up. I'm not shy about doing that either.

The low mark streak has been broken. I got a 94% on a recent test. I wrote half of my midterm exams last week and will write the rest next week. I hope they all work out well.

In a bit of a slump

4th semester is essentially half over and I'm in a bit of a slump.  These are some of the highlights:

1. Test marks consistently lower than I'm used to.  Getting the same low mark on three tests in a row and then breaking that streak, by getting a fourth mark that's 1% lower.
2. Joking with a smarter classmate about how she should fail a competency, so she knows what it feels like.  She failed the competency and so did I.  Up until that one, getting perfect, or almost perfect, was the norm.
3. Not being able to pass a High Fidelity Simulation.  It would have been nice too actually pass a simulation prior to them counting for marks.  The last simulation was a disaster.  The next one counts for marks.  If I fail the Simulation course, I'm screwed.
4. Being absolutely correct about an answer on a test and still getting it marked wrong.  It was taught wrong in class and everyone else accepted it. I guess, for a certain professor, the generally accepted fallacy is the truth.  WTF?  So much for Science and the quest for truth...  She wasn't really interested in the correct answer, which was pretty infuriating while I was talking to her about it.

Books I find most useful

I've wanted to update the list of RT books, that I like, in my sidebar. Instead of maintaining a list of all of my RT books, I'm now just going to maintain a list of the 9 that I find most useful. Getting the list down to nine was pretty hard.

I'm keeping the list in a carousel widget, which has now replaced my old list. The carousel widget only allows you to have 9 books in it.