Thanksgiving break was great. It was way too short and by the time class started again, I had lost my motivation. It was hard to get back in the swing of things. This week went by way too fast. I'm really looking forward to Christmas break, but with all the tests we have coming up I feel like I need more time to study for them.

This week was full of lectures for Evidence Based Medicine and Oncology. We were told that one of the Oncology lecturers we had is one of the world experts in Radiation Oncology. He has developed new procedures for radiation treatment that should become the standard treatment. That is one of the really neat things about being at Duke. There are so many experts right here and they are willing to take time to lecture to us PA students.

We had our first CPX this week. The CPX is when we have a standardized patient (an actor) to do an evaluation and physical on. I was pretty nervous going into it, but I think I did a pretty good job. We had 15 minutes to get a history, do a focused physical exam and to discuss an assessment and plan. We were video recorded during the exam and were able to watch it afterward. We will have more of these spread throughout the rest of the year.

We did have one exam. It was the EKG exam. For some reason we were lead to believe that EKG's are so hard and that it is a really tough unit. To be honest, I didn't think it was that bad. I did well on the test.

So, next week we have another Evidence Based Medicine exam on Thursday and we have to present a research article on a specific topic. We will have a bunch more Oncology and some Cardiology lectures. The week after next is the last week before Christmas break. That week we have one test every morning and the rest of the day off to study for the next one. The exams are on Anatomy, Oncology, Musculoskeletal, and Cardiology. That Friday we have to present our final project for Evidence Based Medicine, which is an evaluation of several research articles.