This morning I had my first clinic session of the P2 year. During the Summer months, as a P1 student, I was only really responsible for showing up and learning the basics from my fellow P3 students. I spent a lot of that time getting comfortable trying to locate certain materials in the clinic, getting used to how to process all the paperwork correctly, and of course peppering my P3 student with questions.

The Summer is long gone now and I am 3 weeks deep into my P2 year. I’m buried in notes and I am starting to realize this is not P1 year anymore. Things move fast and the hand holding has stopped. On top everything else I have part I of boards looming in the back of my mind. Somehow, between all my second year courses and my clinical experience, I need to figure out a schedule where I can effectively study for my board exam. It’s still a little early but time will definitely fly this year so I still need to be mindful.

Getting back to clinic though. Today we were exceptionally busy with patients. Dr. Mason, Dr. Kibrit, and Dr. Oster were all seeing patients this morning. As usual I was following around my P3 student (Sarah Strickland) assisting her with working up the patients. I took my patient’s vitals and then observed as Sarah worked up the patient by taking the history. When it came to doing some of the physical exam techniques Sarah turned to me and asked if I would like do the neuro exam. Up to this point in my clinic experiences a P3 hasn’t really allowed me to do much more than take vitals so I was really happy that she asked me. Our patient was a diabetic so it’s always important to know if a patient might be suffering from diabetic peripheral neuropathy. To check this I first did the Semmes-Weinstein test, followed by the vibratory sense test and then finally a lower extremity proprioception test. I then observed Sarah do a musculoskeletal and vascular physical exam.

After we completed the physical exam tasks and history we waited outside the room for Dr. Oster. While we were waiting it appeared that the clinic was bustling with patients. So much so that we were out of P3 students to see patients. Before I knew it I was being called over by one of the medical assistants to join my fellow P2 classmate Ian Barron to work up a patient. Was I little nervous? Yeah I would say so but after shadowing in the clinic during the Summer and then recently getting my hands dirty with Sarah my confidence with interacting with patients had definitely grown. Ian and I took our patient down to the lower level of the clinic to get some x-rays done first. We returned to the ground level and took the patient’s weight and height. Finally, we took the patient back to our designated examining room. There I took the patient’s vitals and completed the pertinent physical exam techniques while Ian asked the relevant history questions. Dr. Oster joined us shortly and took over from there. Even though my interaction with the patient was brief it was still exciting to see a patient, without a P3 present, this early in my P2 year.

If there is one comment I’d like to make about my clinical experiences it is this. Nothing beats real life experience. You can read about it and study until you are blue in the face but it’s really not until you physically do something that it really “clicks” and you start to get comfortable. Today I had one of those moments thanks to Sarah and the fact that the clinic was pretty busy today.

There has been a whirlwind of activity at the College and University in recent months and lots of positive changes are occurring.  A few of the recent highlights are worth mentioning… 

Graduation for the class of 2011 in June was a memorable experience and we wish our recent graduates the best of success as they continue with the next phase of their professional lives.  All graduates who were eligible for residency placement successfully secured training positions, and our focus has now shifted to preparing the Class of 2012 for the residency placement process. 

Our research activities continue to produce positive outcomes.  We are celebrating the recent success of several of our students and faculty at the national American Podiatric Medical Association (APMA) Annual Scientific Meeting.  Our students received every award in the student and resident category for their poster presentations and one of our faculty members also received an award in the poster presentation category.  The awardees are:

Jessica Minder, Scholl 2013, gold prize

Deena Horn, Scholl 2012, silver prize

Fraaz Sayeed, Scholl 2013, platinum prize

Bijan Najafi, Ph.D., silver prize

 Finally, we are looking forward to welcoming the Class of 2015 to campus this month.  This time of year is filled with activity and lots of orientation events.  Our students energize and reward us, and this time of year is always exciting as current students are promoted to the next year, and new students join the College. 

Warm Regards,

Dean Nancy L. Parsley, DPM, MHPE

Well its that time of the year again. Orientation week! 106 new faces make up the class of 2015 here at SCPM. RFUMS is looking fantastic with its upgrades pretty much everywhere. The Morningstar Interprofessional offers plenty of new study rooms with smart boards and a state of the art wet lab which allow students to get a clear view of demonstrations from any seat in the house. The library is also undergoing upgrades as well. Books are being moved into the 24 hour section to create more space. Finally the East pod, West pod, and Rhoades auditorium have all undergone upgrades with new carpeting, seating, and lighting! All seats have power plugs beneath them and cup holders for your personal beverages. No more of your laptops running out of power or spilling your drinks because you are fumbling around with your things!

As for myself, biomechanics ended very well for me. I performed strongly on the final exam and was able to make it out of the class with an A. Biomechanics is a course you must attend to do well in. It’s very hard to understand the movements of the foot if you don’t see Dr. Jarrett’s demonstrations. Overall I really enjoyed the class and I know I will be using biomechanics for the rest of my career starting with using the biomechanical exam in clinic.

Orientation week has been kind of hectic. The Ambassadors have been busy planning events for the new P1 class. I hope everything goes as planned. Today, actually, we have a BBQ being catered by Big Ed’s Bar and grill of North Chicago. On Saturday we arranged buses to transport students to and from Dave and Buster’s in downtown Chicago. I’m really looking forward to both events.

Lastly, my proposal was accepted about a month ago for the Swanson Independent Scholar research program. I’ve been eager to get started on my research but planning for these orientation events has really taken up a lot of my time. Once I get past all of this I am really going to step up my game and get the ball rolling with my research. I worked so hard just to get accepted now its time to finish it out and produce a quality paper.

Another late night in the library. I’m really enjoying this biomechanics course because we are really dissecting and understanding the everyday movements that we take for granted. I don’t think I will ever walk again and not think about what exactly is occurring during my gait. I’m sure as we dive more into different biomechanical disorders I will most likely try and diagnose myself and my friends.

The CLEAR summer research group, which had to take the accelerated biomechanics course this Summer, will be finishing up tomorrow with their final exam. I really do NOT envy them since they haven’t really stopped school since the end of the neuroscience course of Spring quarter. Hopefully everyone finishes up strong and can enjoy the rest of Summer working on their individual research projects.

Speaking of research…I think I’ve finally worked out all the kinks to my proposal for the Swanson Independent Scholar program. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve rewritten it. I feel pretty strongly about my topic and I think it will end up being a good study. I’m interested in investigating the influence of muscle fatigue on center of mass sway and postural control strategy. It will be a pilot study using healthy subjects. Amazingly we can alter their somatosensory feedback utilizing different testing environments which will help me replicate the physiological symptoms that patients with diabetic peripheral neuropathy endure. That’s all I’m going to say about that though. Hopefully my proposal makes it past the IRB committee first…or else there won’t be a study!

It’s 12:00am and I am downstairs in the computer lab of the Boxer library. Summer break is over and I am back to work studying biomechanics. The class of 2014 recently started the class on Tuesday and we usually have two hours of lecture per day. Biomechanics is really conceptual so this will be a change of pace from the typical memorization and regurgitation I’ve done for some of my past courses. Lower extremity anatomy is also fair game and will be tested on quizzes and exams. This makes sense since we are now learning about the movement of the lower extremity anatomy we have already learned.

Along with taking a Summer biomechanics course the class of 2014 will be getting their first taste of clinic this Summer. Students are divided up into several groups and will be doing a variety of introductory workshops and clinic visits. This is just the beginning of the early clinical exposure first year podiatry students get at Scholl.

I had my first intro workshop and during that session we practiced KOH fixations, Glucometry tests, and Venipuncture.

Program A is prestigious residency program located relatively close to Scholl but is out of state. Earlier this Spring the P1 class received an excel worksheet of the names and emails of students in the P4 class and where they matched on match day. From this match list I contacted a student who matched at program A and asked him if it would be ok if I visited for a day. After several emails between myself and newly graduated P4 he put me in touch with some of the other residents in the program. Through them I was able to organize a visit to the program which I did last Tuesday.

I was told that they were going to start the day with a morning cases and academics meeting. The meeting started at 6am which means I was suppose to be there by 5:45am. Program A is about an hour away from Scholl therefore I needed to get up at 4am that morning to shower, eat something quickly, and get dressed professionally so that I could make it on time.

I get there at 5:40am on the dot. I meet up with the Chief resident (who is a Scholl alum) and we head into the office room. So its me, a visiting current P4 from Scholl, the chief resident, and another 3rd year resident (graduted from OCPM) and one of the assistant directors of program A. The resident (who graduated from OCPM) is presenting his case, which was interesting, then all of a sudden…”Peter, why did the surgery that the pt received 3 years earlier end up failing?” I couldn’t believe it. I was getting pimped on material I haven’t even learned yet. I was pretty positive I put down in my email that I was a P1 student. I answered “I don’t know”. The visiting P4 chimes in and gives the correct answer. The presentation of the case continues then…another question for me. My answer “I don’t know”. The P4 answers correctly. I’m feeling pretty terrible now. We get through the cases and the assistant director leaves. The chief resident leaves with the visiting P4 and its just me and the resident who was pimping me for a good 20 minutes. I told him I’m sorry for not knowing the material he had asked me questions on. I told him I was only a 1st year student. He then goes “oh man! I’m sorry! I thought you were  a 3rd year doing your externship month with us! haha. Sorry about all the questions dude”. I breath a sigh of relief.

We head to one of the affiliated hospitals of program A so that the resident could check up on a patient who just had a full transmetatarsal amputation. The pt had been suffering from Diabetic keto-acidosis and ended up getting ulcers on her foot. Therefore she needed the amputation to save the rest of her foot. Up to this point in my academic career I’ve only seen full transmetatarsal amputations on youtube. Seeing a post-op pt who had just had this operation done was a first for me. The resident checked the healing process and the assistant director, who had been with us in the morning, came in to speak with the patient. The resident then changed the dressings and re-wrapped the wound. After they were done with the patient we headed to the assistant director’s clinic.

We get to the clinic and I keep my mouth shut. The resident then explains to the assistant director that I was only a first year student. His eyes light up. “Why are you here?” I answered that I had a Summer break and that I wanted to get more clinical exposure since I had only shadowed a podiatrist working in a private practice. “Why did you choose podiatry?” “Where are you from?” “Why did you end up choosing Scholl if you are from New Jersey? What’s wrong with NYCPM?”. I’m on my toes now trying to rattle off as any coherent responses as possible.

I spent the next three hours in the clinic shadowing both the resident and the assistant director of the program. The clinic is located within an orthopaedic practice. I alternated between the resident and assistant director the entire time. We saw numerous patients suffering from a variety of medical issues. The questions continued “Are you married? Gotta girlfriend? Dating?”. He quotes a movie and now asks me the name of the character that stated it from that movie…things are starting to get entertaining now.

Every time a pt from the clinic got films done the assistant director pulled me over to show me the fracture and other radiological findings. It was great that I was being taught by the physician who is in charge of interviewing applicants for his residency program. Later in the morning there was some downtime for like 10-15 minutes and the director pulled me aside and asked me if I had any questions for him. We started chatting about a variety of topics and then I asked him about what he values in a person who is applying to his program. He stated:

• Be a “go getter” – stressed this most importantly
• Have a high GPA – shows us how much you know
• Good hands

In the clinic, one patient in particular that the resident and I encountered was very disgruntled. She had a fractured sesamoid bone in her foot. For those who don’t know, the sesamoids are located on the distal end of the first metatarsal. From what I was hearing, its a painful and very annoying issue. It takes a long time to heal and becomes quite nagging. Well obviously this pt had enough with this medical issue not resolving itself. The resident handled the situation beautifully and maintained his composure as the pt vented her frustrations.

After we finished seeing pts in the clinic I was told that I should join the chief resident and the visiting P4 student in surgery over at another hospital affiliated with program A. Myself and the resident I was shadowing at the clinic walked out together. He offered a several words of advice and wisdom as we headed out. Some of the things he stated were:

• GPA matters – shoot for 3.5 or higher
• Have good hands
• Be sociable! He stressed this point because he said its important that your resident directors like you as a person.

I then traveled to the nearby hospital to meet up with the chief resident and the visiting P4 student from Scholl. They were doing a surgical case with another assistant director of program A. They were doing a peroneal tendon repair. This was the first time I had ever observed a surgery first hand. It was a great experience and not something I thought I was going to be able to see.

Of course, as soon as I entered the OR and had observed for a little bit I then hear my name. “Hey Peter whats the nerve that travels to lateral side of the foot”. My answer “sural nerve”. “What’s the primary ossification time of the calcaneus?” “Secondary ossification time of the calcaneus?” “Where does the peroneus longus tendon insert?”. Question after question. Then the assistant director turns to me and asks the why I wanted to go to Scholl and where are you from questions. The questions kept on coming off and on during the 3.5 hour surgery. It was quite the experience.

One of the funnier comments of the day was when the chief resident turned to me and asked “is this your first surgery?” I answered “yes”. The chief resident then stated “awesome, then I am the best surgeon you have seen!” The assistant director then turns to me and said “well at least you are starting the bar rather low”. Everyone in the OR started laughing.

The surgery finishes up and I get changed back into my shirt and tie and put my white coat back on. Myself, the chief resident, the visiting P4, and the assistant director take the elevator down to the first floor. There is an awkward silence. I feel everyone just staring at me. All of a sudden the assistant director states “that white coat is awfully white! As soon as you get home you should roll around in the dirt so it looks more authentic.” The chief resident then states “Or you should just spray yourself down with betadine”. Everyone got a good laugh about that one.

I shook everyone’s hands and thanked them for letting me shadow. They told me to come back any time. I really felt I learned a great deal and I saw a great deal of podiatric pathologies that I had never seen before in my prior shadowing experiences. Although first year students are not further enough along in their education to truly appreciate the clinical cases I saw on Tuesday I still think visiting programs like I did is a worthwhile experience. If anything it has reinforced my motivation to get the best grades possible and to work as hard as possible in the clinic. I hope I can match into a program like program A one day too.

One quick post…

During our last class meeting with Dean Parsely and Dr. Mason it was announced to us that the P2 schedule has been changed in an exciting way. The curriculum here at Scholl is always dynamic and very fluid. The administration takes into account the student feedback and does its best to make the best schedule possible. I have no doubt that our P2 schedule will be excellent. BUT…

One major change that I’m absolutely ecstatic about is that the podiatry students will now be taking the Pathology course with the M2 and pathology assistant students. Same classes, same lectures, same tests, etc. This will be the 4th class that the podiatry and medical students here at RFUMS take together in the 1st and 2nd years. The other three courses are Gross anatomy (1st year course), Essentials of Clinical Reasoning I (first year course), and Essentials of clinical reasoning II (second year course).

It’s Summertime at SCPM and I’ve been enjoying my time off from school. Its been nice to sleep in and not have to worry about being somewhere. I’ve been doing a lot of outdoor running and have been using the excellent gym facilities here on campus. I don’t feel quite like myself if I don’t keep up with my usual exercise habits. There were times, during the year, where I just did not have time to exercise. Sometimes I did have the time but I was just so mentally exhausted that I couldn’t physically drag myself to the gym. These are just a few of the lifestyle changes that incoming students should learn to deal with during their first year.

Today I finally turned in the paperwork for the Swanson Independent Scholar Fellowship program here at Scholl. The Swanson program differs from the regular Summer research fellowship program. It’s mainly for students who have past research experience and who have created their own original research proposal. There is less “hand holding” and more responsibility put on the Swanson scholar. Students awarded provisional Swanson scholar status must maintain a minimum gpa of 3.5 and must be successful in having their research published in an academic journal.  

There will be a lot to handle already between the second year academic curriculum and working in clinic. Adding the possibility of doing research for the Swanson Scholar program will certainly push me to the limit at times. This is what I signed up for, though, and I know I’m up for the task. My academic record, at this point in my education, speaks for itself. I’m a student who works really hard…plain and simple. If I have to cut intramurals and switch around my schedule to make it all work then I will do what I have to do.

The class of 2014 finished off the last week of class with a Neuroscience quiz on Monday (5/16), our final Essentials of Clinical Reasoning exam on Wed (5/18), and the neuroscience final on Friday (5/20). Although it was a hectic last week I think everyone was motivated to finish out strong. Students were also excited because we were all going to experience a nice three week Summer break after this. The only students who are not fortunate enough to have a break are the P1 students participating in the CLEAR Summer research fellowship program. These students will be participating in an accelerated biomechanics course during the first month of the Summer term and then will be doing their research during the 2nd and 3rd months of the Summer term. This is what they signed up for so I know they are up to the task. To learn more about the CLEAR Summer Research Fellowship program please go here: CLEAR Summer Research

As the Chair of the Scholl Ambassadors I have remained on campus to do campus tours. I look forward to meeting and speaking with the remaining students who are applying to podiatry school here at Scholl.

Recently, I submitted my application form for the Distinguished Scholar Scholarship which is a half-tuition scholarship for second year podiatry students. It’s a extremely competitive scholarship to win so I hope my overall academic profile is strong enough to compete with some of the other talented students in the class of 2014. Students need a minimum of a 3.4 gpa to qualify for the distinguished scholar scholarship. Other scholarships are available to all students as well. For more information on scholarships at Scholl please check out this link: Scholl Scholarships

Overall my first year experience here at SCPM has been amazing. I’ve really enjoyed attending podiatry school here and attribute a lot of my success to being really comfortable here at school. I do not miss the hustle and bustle of the city life which is what I had experienced during my graduate school days. For me personally, it made a difficult graduate program even more stressful.

I’m really looking forward to what the future holds for me here at SCPM. Right now I am on my Summer break but pretty soon we will be starting up our Summer Biomechanics course and getting our first experiences in clinic. Things are progressing quickly and pretty soon I will be juggling both clinic and courses throughout my second year. First year went by fast but I anticipate second year flying by.

Yesterday the P1 class had our final lecture exam in Lower Extremity Anatomy. The final exam was cumulative and had 150 questions on it. Prior to the final exam on we had two quizzes in LEA on Wed. In retrospect having those quizzes prior to the final was probably the best thing that could have happened because it forced me really study hard. After completing those quizzes (one was cumulative and the other was on the newest material presented) I felt pretty confident that I was really prepared for the Final exam the following day.

Evidently I was right because I ended up earning a 93% on the Final yesterday. I only needed a 78% to maintain my A in the course but that 93% really demonstrates how well I learned the material and retained all the minor details of the course.

Personally, I think incoming students will really enjoy the lower extremity course here at Scholl because of the way Dr. Bareither teaches it. He makes all the exams and quizzes cumulative as you progress through the course therefore you always have to review old material. It sounds scary but it really makes you learn it and understand it. I feel all our courses should be taught and tested in this manner.