Respiratory Medicine in Dundee
Phase 2 Material
The Dundee Medical School Curriculum, like any medical school curriculum, has so much to cover, in so little time. We have only 4 weeks in which to teach all of respiratory medicine, during the first block of 2nd year. Although some will return to respiratory medicine in 4th year, it is only for 1 week, and we get 2 or three students per month. So, we have to take it that owe only have 20 days in which to teach every student everything that is important in respiratory medicine.
This clearly presents us with a significant challenge. I’ve tried to cover important topics in this section, to serve as pre-course material, support notes for lectures, and a “handy” place to find revision summaries.
Don’t forget about In A Surgeon’s Gown…
In a wee while I’ll also put up some formative assessments around here.
| Topic | Details |
|---|---|
| Respiratory Failure | The most commonly asked questions by phase 2 students centre around respiratory failure. So what is the difference between type 1 and type 2 respiratory failure. We try to explain things, and keep it simple. |
| Oxygen Therapy | The drug we give to more patients than any other, and until recently we rarely prescribed it, or thought carefully about how to deliver it. The BTS oxygen guidelines changed all that, and here we try to explain how to prescribe oxygen safely, and effectively. |
| Arterial Blood Gases | Oft misunderstood, seen by most as complex and confusing, arterial blood gases are an incredibly useful test. We try to demystify ABGs |
| Asthma | There are few "Pass/Fail" questions in the undergraduate curriculum, but it's so important to understand acute-severe asthma, and how to treat it. |
| COPD | COPD takes up so many of our in-patient bed days, and so much of our time in the hospital, it's crucial for all undergraduates to understand this increasingly common disease. |
| Pneumonia | Pneumonia is the second most common cause of death in the UK, and kills more people under 50 than every other infection put together. So you probably ought to know something about it. |
