[Pa23] Clinical Medicine Course

[Hastings, Jennifer K]

Good Morning,

I hope that this email finds you all enjoying Block 2!  My name is Jennifer Hastings and I will be helping out with the Clinical Medicine course.  I was lucky enough to have served on the PA faculty full-time for five years until the military moved us away from the area last year.  During my time at Campbell I very much enjoyed coordinating Clinical Medicine.   I have always welcomed any opportunity to stay a part of the Campbell PA family and am thankful to work for you!

Please note that there were some updates to the objectives from the syllabus so please refer to the objectives posted to Blackboard.  As always, exam questions will be tied to your lecture objectives.  When studying for your Clinical Medicine exams, I always find it helpful to focus on the following:

1.            Who is most likely to have this disease?  Focusing on demographics and risk factors.  For example, exam question scenarios often start out with pertinent patient information, "A  75 year-old man with a 60-pack-year history of smoking cigarettes" .....
2.            What are the signs and symptoms of this disease?  What symptoms will they report?  What will I find on physical exam?
3.            How will I diagnose this disease?  Paying attention to terms such as best initial versus diagnostic.   A patient presenting with right upper quadrant pain suggestive of a gallbladder infection...  An ultrasound would be the best initial test, however an HIDA scan would be diagnostic.  The terminology in the question can make a difference.
4.            How will I manage this disease?  Focusing on supportive care, patient medications, patient education recommendations?

Often, it can be overwhelming as the several diseases we are learning start to run together and overlap.  I have always found it helpful to compare and contrast diseases with similar presentations.  One approach is making a table with side by side comparisons.  For example diseases causing shortness of breath (asthma, chronic bronchitis, emphysema, lung cancer, pneumonia, etc).  This is similar to developing a differential diagnosis when a patient presents with a symptom.

This information may be repetitive,  however thought I would take the opportunity to provide an approach that has helped me over the years.  Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns!   I hope that you are enjoying the pulmonary unit!


Thank You,
JH

Jennifer Hastings, MSHS, PA-C
Adjunct Professor
Campbell University Physician Assistant Program
jhastings at campbell.edu



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://list.campbell.edu/pipermail/pa23/attachments/20211101/f9c9244a/attachment.html>