Hey guys! I'm finally back! I just took my last final and I'm officially done with my first year of pharmacy school! I was planning on adding videos I shot while at school however, the quality wasn't up to my standards so I'll be sharing my thoughts with words and a few pictures.

For those who haven't been following my blog, I am a first year student pharmacist at UCSD Skagg's School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. I was debating on how to go about documenting what an average week (during my last quarter of my P1 year) looks like; it was difficult since each day and week varies. Not to mention that my life for the past month revolved around studying for exams, working on projects, presenting said projects and participating in extracurriculars. Anyways, for the remainder of this post, I will condense everything that occurred this past month to give you guys better insight to my academic life. 

I wake up extremely early compared to my P1 counterparts since I have to commute in horrible traffic to get to school and then get parking before it runs out! The parking situation at UCSD is absurd - they should really build more parking structures for students! I'd love to be able to sleep in on days when classes start at 10AM or later but I have to force myself to wake up, get all dolled up and roll in to school for a parking spot.

Spring Quarter P1 Year

MONDAY - 8AM-3PM

For any of you attending pharmacy school at UCSD, you'll be required to garb up for Dosage Forms, Spring Quarter of your first year! I enjoyed the lab portion much more than lecture since I'm more of a hands on person. Besides, you get to inject "medicine" into IV bags, make suppositories and capsules all without the worry of having it in perfect quality to dispense to patients. This class took place after lunch and I found it to be very applicable to pharmacy. 

My morning classes included BioChem and Pharmacy Informatics. If you took BioChem during your undergraduate education, you'll understand the basics of the class. I thought the first portion of the class was easier than the latter part since we had a T.A. baby-sit us the entire way up until the midterm. Make sure you attend all the review sessions - if I had to choose whether or not to go to class or the review sessions, I'd pick the review sessions! THEY WERE THAY HELPFUL! As for Informatics, if you're into coding and learning about SQL or R, you'll love this class! Although I know a bit about coding, this class is for those who have some background in those programs or those who have time to mess around with them. I was slammed with lots of work and projects so I made the choice to push studying for this class the week before midterms. Although I was able to understand SQL this way, it was a bit harder with R. 

TUESDAY - 8AM-5:30PM

At least we have a break this quarter! We had a class that ran through lunch during Winter Quarter! Anyways, my day started off with BioChem at 8AM which very few people attended. At most there were typically 15 people in class each time. Since I was already at school, I decided to attend class to absorb any ounce of knowledge I could from lectures. Up next was Gross Anatomy lecture followed by dissection lab. Gross Anatomy was my favorite class this entire year and I learned so much about the human body. I can recall my first day of cadaver lab clearly. As I walked into lab, in my scrubs, the smell of formaldehyde hit me followed by the chill of the room. There were around 15 bodies covered in some sort of white plastic scattered all around the room. No one was ready to reveal their bodies yet but then it was time. Once the plastic sheet was removed, it was time for the first cut. The professor asked my team who wanted to do it and I volunteered. I've always been fascinated about the human body and my undergraduate research gave me the opportunity to watch numerous human operations inches away. I could go on but I'll spare you guys the details.

After lunch, we had Drug Information and then I had my Spanish 2 elective. Drug Information teaches you a lot about online resources which I believe will be very useful in the future. Spanish was very different and cozy since there were only 7 of us. We practiced medical Spanish conversation and I definitely would have enjoyed the class more had I more time. 

Dosage Forms again but this time a 3 hour block of lecture. It gets tiring fast even with different lecturers each hour. We then had Pharmacy Practice after lunch! This class typically occurs multiple times during the week but we only had it once a week this quarter! We honed in on hot topics including - tobacco cessation and emergency contraception. At the start of the quarter, we had a Multi-Station OSCE (6 of them) followed by our normal OSCE right before the midterm. It was intense but it really tested my knowledge and I was surprised with my results! 

THURSDAY - 8AM-3PM

Our Anatomy professor is just adorable! Our entire morning 8-12PM was reserved for anatomy followed by Drug Information in the afternoon. I thought my Thursdays were fun since we were in lab for the majority of the day!

FRIDAY - 8AM-12PM

Biochemistry at 8AM followed by Drug Informatics. Very few people showed up to class on Fridays but I showed up since our BioChem professors took attendance. 

WEEKEND - REJUVENATE 

Presentation of our Dosage Forms project that spanned the entire quarter! That's the basic jist of my week during Spring Quarter of my first year in pharmacy school! If you guys have any questions or comments, please do not hesitate to ask! My email is located within the CONTACT tab of my blog :D

XO,

Adrienne