The one about sadness but not really

So this last post is kind of late (sorry Dr. Clarkson!), but my time in the program has come to an end. I took our last exam and walked out, got one good ole picture, and was on my way. There are many things ahead for me. AMCAS opened today, my MCAT is coming up, and soon, I'll hopefully be able to send an email to my faculty here that I've been admitted.

The program has provided with good times, better learning, and some of the best memories and friends. In a way, that's what it's really all about, right? What is an education without memories? What is advancement without some fun? If you're reading this, the program has provided me with everything I wanted and more, as you'd expect with a program of 30 people. I'll be staying in New Orleans for a bit, but looking back I enjoyed every moment I got to have here. From eating late at night, to cramming for a test, to sharing communal meals, to sweating my face off, to teaching each other, and to making memories, Tulane has offered me more than an education (if that isn't already apparent). To my faculty, thanks for keeping me on my toes and putting up with my dumb questions. To my classmates, thanks for keeping it weird and I'll be keeping an eye out to all the amazing things you do to change the world. To New Orleans? Thanks for being the place full of history, love, food, and experience that made me want to come back in the first place.

As always, if you've got questions, you can reach me at andrewtvan@gmail.com. Still a little hard to believe little ole me ended up getting a Master's degree. Roll Wave!

April Service Hours: 6
Cumulative Spring Hours: 40
2018-2019: 73.5

This one is still kinda related to food, but not really.

Happy April 1st!

So if you're reading this like I was, don't worry. The NBME isn't that bad and you've totally got this. Outside of the questions being a different style, you're going to nail it. Just study hard, know your indications, and be done with it!

So unfortunately, I haven't done much volunteering this month. I got a chance (last minute, albeit) to volunteer for Hogs For The Cause and it was awesome! Hogs for the Cause works with both local and national children's hospitals to help out financially with children that have brain cancer. Even if you can't volunteer with this, obviously your money goes to an amazing cause and it's so fun! Big fan of BBQ and big fan of causes like this. More information can be found at the bottom. I ended up volunteering through another organization that I am not involved with but equally support: Girls on the Run. Get involved and find out more about both at the bottom.

Since you've last read, I've finished out medical pharmacology and principles in pharmacology! All that's left is Molecular Cell and my MCAT! Program is winding down and soon we'll all have our little talks about where we'll go and what we'll do (great things no doubt), but for now, you'll just have to wait.

March Service Hours: 4
Cumulative Spring Hours: 34
2018-2019: 67.5

https://hogsforthecause.org/

https://www.girlsontherun.org/

Here’s what’s happened so far if you don’t care to read too much. I’ve finished our last medical pharmacology exam (prior to the NBME) and I’ve rounded out and finished Principles of Pharmacology! We still have our other classes to go, but that’s one down. The NBME is quite the test, even with the time that I have. Most of my time has been devoted to the MCAT which is steadfastly creeping up [May 31^st]. If you’re reading this as a prospective student, I will go ahead and let you know there is adequate time to do both this program and study for your exam!

As far as volunteering goes, I’ve spent most of my time at Goldring. My time is always rewarding in one way or another, but Goldring means a lot to me. I’ve written about what Goldring is, but not so much what it means to me. Let’s talk about my neighbor growing up. When I was a kid, she got sick. She came over less and less to my mother’s house and needed some support every now and then from her sons. My mom was the same way. Eventually, she lost her foot (big jump in the story obviously, and if you’re inept enough, maybe you can guess what gave her the amputation and my values for nutrition and food). See, the thing about food is that it’s one of the greatest joys in life, but at the same time, one of the most dangerous/beneficial things we toy around with in medicine. A little beside the point. In high school, I pretty much taught myself to cook. In fact, I found it to be one of the most relaxing things I could do. In college, I got exposed to the culture pot that it can be. See, I think, one of the best ways to experience a culture is food and one of the most beautiful things about food is that it brings people together (we all can agree over some food and you know it). Fast forward to when I’m a junior in college, I cook lunch for my mom and our neighbor. They enjoy it. Somewhere along the time I’m there my neighbor and I strike up a conversation about health. My mother likes to brag her son is studying to be a doctor (you know how moms are, clearly a little over exaggeration), but even I know that you must eat sort of healthy. When I ask her the naïve question about why she just didn’t eat a little healthier her response is what I’ve heard a lot: Too expensive and I really don’t know how to cook healthy like the doctor wants me to. That’s what I love about Goldring in a long, convoluted post. Here, I get the opportunity to participate in something I love to do and something that I am passionate about and that crossover gives me the ability to really help someone that might be just like my neighbor. Now, of course, this is New Orleans. I don’t claim to be some health saint with an 8 pack but being aware what food can do for me and do to me is quite something isn’t it.

In other news, Mardi Gras is here!! What a fun time.

February Service Hours: 15
Cumulative Spring Hours: 30
2018-2019: 63.5

Hi! Happy New Year! Here's quick update.

Here is what I am enrolled in this semester (which I haven't explained before sorry!):
1.) Advances in Pharmacology (This is where I present [and you will too])
2.) Cellular Control Mechanism (You remember PMAT?)
3.) Endocrine Pharmacology (Estrogen is kind of a big deal)
4.) Environmental Signaling (Estrogen is kind of a big deal in a lot of things you probably own [plus we're doing a fun little project to look at lead levels in soil])
5.) Medical Pharmacology (This is pretty much what you think)
6.) Neuropharmacology (This is also pretty much what you think)
7.) Principles of Pharmacology (This one is harder to explain)
8.) Seminar in Pharmacology (this is a lecture series where different people come in to lecture in a variety of topics in pharmacology)

Here's the school updates. We've taken our first exam in medical pharmacology and and principles of pharmacology. We covered a lot of estrogen, progesterone, signaling, and my favorite, diabetes. I wanted to be an endocrinologist at one time in my life. It was very fun (I really like diabetes), and VERY relevant. Things like this will undoubtedly be seen again and again so I can always appreciate it when get lectures on them. Clinical relevance is given, but I certainly learn a lot about pathways and drugs. Right now, we're coming up on our cell control and neurology block exams.

Here's what I've done with volunteering. I've pretty much done only Goldring this month! You can look back in my previous posts to find out what that is about. Recently, I've been more hands on. For example, last time we didn't have enough participants so I got to partner up and get in the kitchen. In addition, I've been able to give talks about nutritions, finance, and more of what-can-you-do kind of talks at the end of the night (previously this was usually done by the chef). I find immense value in this because I know at the end of my night I've gotten to not only help this community but be able to feel more apart of it.

Here are some life updates. I went to my first Saints game! A playoff at that. Something magical about that and as weird and corny as it sounds, it's hard to describe in words what a playoff game is like (I attended the playoff, not championship (you know if you know)). In addition, I've scheduled my MCAT for May (fun, fun). Of course, I've gotten to take part in some food. You might be asking why I do this so much. Food is, in my opinion, one of the BEST ways to experience culture and there sure is a lot of it here. We'll leave it at that.





(maybe my interest in diabetes is for prevention purposes)

Community Service Hours for this month: 15
Community Service Hours for the year-to-date: 48.5

Less about food than last time, but still kind of about food.

This month felt so short! Here's the quick run down. I took two exams (one of which is one of the harder ones), I ate a few sandwiches and volunteered here and there! I spent Thanksgiving in New Orleans in which I was invited to have lunch and dinner with wonderful classmates (shout out to y'all if you're stalking this blog), but to me, most importantly, we had a few days where I could wear a jacket (it got cooler).

So my exams were Cardiovascular and Renal block and Pulmonary block. Cardiovascular and renal block were a lot of fun for me (CV has always been my thing) and being from the deep south, it's always great to revisit hypertension and heart failure. Given my drive to be in primary care and extensive background working with underserved populations, this sort of physiology and pharmacology are the bread and butter. Pulmonology (I want you to know my computer want this pulmonology to autocorrect to demonology) was also a ton of fun! We learned about tuberculosis and pneumonia. I really wish we dipped into cystic fibrosis but it would have tacked on a lot. In the previous block, we also covered molecular pharmacology in which I got to dust off the gears from my lab days. This month was packed, but definitely not unmanageable.

This month I didn't volunteer as much as I'd want to. Most of my volunteering came from Edible Schoolyard's 20th Year Anniversary. If you don't know what Edible School Yard is, it's a integration into New Orleans' First Line Charter School of both education and hands on learning on cooking! I assisted with small amounts of set up, greeting, and whatever else was needed of me. While my time with Edible Schoolyard was short, it's easy to see the passion and community surrounding the school's staff and supporters. This is not my normal volunteering position so I don't want to speak too long about it, but definitely check out the description and website below. It'll do more justice than I will. I also spent sometime volunteering for GAPSA (Tulane Graduate and Professional Student Association) and helping out at a mixer. GAPSA throws tons of events, but they're on a large scale (anyone in graduate/professional school is welcome) so when you're a student you should both attend and help out. My role here was just being an event monitor, but I had free reign to dance on my shift too. Why no Goldring this month? I am scheduled to volunteer for next month!

In terms of fun stuff? I attended TWO sandwich themed celebrations. One was celebrating New Orleans 300 years at Parkway Bakery and Tavern (you'll know what this if you visit/attend for sure) and one in LaFayette Square for National Sandwich Day. Parkway had a 300 foot po'boy or poorboy (this is something you'll also become very familiar with) and LaFayette Square had a 500 foot po'boy! I had my fill, obviously. It wasn't all about food though. Parkway's event benefit the Al Copeland Foundation, a nonprofit which supports new local cancer research, education and patient programs in partnership with LSU Health Science Center. Sandwiches and helping fight cancer is something you can definitely get behind.

Next month is short so don't expect too much. I hope you had a good holiday! As always, if you have any questions, personal or not, feel free to email me.

Find out more about the thing's I've mentioned here:

Edible Schoolyard
Al Copeland Foundation

We won Trivia Night (2nd in the eyes of the moderator, 1st in my heart)!! Our team name was Pharmers.

This is a 300 foot shrimp po'boy (which was delicious)!

This is a 500 foot sandwich (also delicious)!

Me in my natural form, two sandwiches in hand.

November Service Hours: 11
Cumulative Service Hours: 33.5

Not about food, but kind of is

I've done a lot of things this month. Here's the quick run down. Since you've last read (hopefully), I've taken two more exams, volunteered, and eaten a lot of food. I've utilized flashcards a lot more than I have as an undergraduate and I am officially in full fledged study mode, which I've weirdly missed. With some more unfortunate updates, I've had the misfortune of the heavy, spontaneous rain that sometimes happens here. This might not seem like a big number, but I strategically plan these things out every night and morning since I walk to school and I've done well. I suspect this number to be higher, but so far I'm winning the battle and updates on the war, me versus rain, will follow in the upcoming months.

So here is the long story.
Since you've last read, I've taken two block exams. Cell Biology and Physiology/ANS. While I missed a few questions here and there, I really enjoyed these exams. Let me tell you why. When I was an undergraduate student, I took cell biology and on my third exam I was presented with the following question: Draw and describe a polysome. If you're preparing for your MCAT or closing out on your last year of course work, hopefully you know what this is. What it boils down to is a group of ribosomes moving down a strand of mRNA. What does that look like? To me, it was a string with circles. (Neither my bachelors nor soon-to-be-masters is in Visual Art). I looked down at my drawing, realized how stupid it looked, and erased it. I obviously got the question wrong. When I spoke to my professor about it, he asked me why I erased my original answer (you could still see the drawing on the paper). I told him,  "I thought a string and some lines looked so stupid that I erased it". My professor looked me straight in the eye and told me that’s the worst reasoning he's heard in his 30+ years of teaching. Sometimes even the most complex concepts can be communicated in the most simple ways. 

So why do I tell you this story? Sometimes the most complicated things can be boiled down to simple ideas. To me, all things can be learned like this, but cell biology and physiology hold a special place in my heart after this experience. Both of the tests covered a lot of material, but they all boiled down to a simple basis one way or another. Understanding parts to better understand more complicated systems is the best way to approach something that seems overwhelming. That's all I did for these exams and I enjoyed most of my time doing it. I spent some time teaching, studying, and learning with others and I think that made it so much enjoyable. We're now in renal block and I look forward to writing about that too. Something about the little details...

I know I just finished a long story, but no worries, I have another one. This one imparts the value of my volunteer experience. If you know me, you know I have an unconditional love for food. Food is a window into the soul, culture, and person. If anything can bring us all together, it's food. There is no way around the statement that food is powerful. It's always important to remember that the thing we normally eat everyday is not always available and sometimes a little can go a long way. Each kind of food has a time and place, but healthy eating should always have a special place in your heart (there’s a joke buried in there somewhere). I came to Tulane to learn something new and continue my own path to becoming a physician leader. If you're interested in medicine, you have to inherently be interested in food. Not just any food, but healthy food. I could write much more than a blog post on this topic, but I firmly believe healthy lifestyles begin with education and a willingness to put in the work. Growing up, I saw my people in my community get type 2 diabetes, including my mother. What came next? Hypertension. One after one, I'd see people get worse until I finally asked my own mother why she and others around refused to adapt to a healthier lifestyle for the sake of their health? Her explanation? It's hard.

After shadowing in a multidisciplinary clinic called the PATH clinic back at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, this was further driven home. The PATH clinic is a clinic that serves those without insurance that are struggling with diabetes. It's multidisciplinary because while IM residents see most patients, those same patients are seen by nutritionists, dietitians, social works, and psychiatrists.  A lot of their responses in relation to food is that eating healthy was too much time, too much money, and too complicated. What we learn from this is that in this situation, medicine is not so straightforward. The large majority of people in the clinic varied in socioeconomic status, but for the the most part represented the lower end. There was so much going on in their lives. Travel issues, disease, family, bills. So much so that sometimes they'd forget one of the most basic things that a part of a routine doctors visit like medication or their notes. In this case, it's easy to see where the priority of food and the idea that healthy eating is both inconvenient and expensive becomes ever apparent. It's no one's fault, but we can make a change. It's funny how the same things that keeps us going and living can be the same thing that kills us. 

So where have I volunteered this month? I have volunteered for the Goldring Center for Culinary Medicine and an event for the Crescent City Farmer's Market. I've mentioned Goldring in my previous post, but seeing it really embodies everything I've written above. What you have is a wide variety of people coming together and learning how to cook a healthy meal in less than an hour (that hour isn't all cooking). You learn cooking skills and versatility. Most importantly, I think you learn that healthy eating comes in so many different shapes, sizes, and colors. Learning that and then learning how to do that is such a big step. At the end of each Goldring class, a chef sits all participants down and you learn about nutrition and you realize the affordability. You get to eat your own work and everyone comes together which is what I've stated as the most beautiful part of food. It's the skills and knowledge that the community takes away from the work that Goldring does that is the small step towards a bigger change. I also got the chance to volunteer for a fundraiser event for the Crescent City Farmer's Market. I spent my time setting up and making sure everything was nice and tidy for their BBQ event. I have always been an advocate for local farmers because wherever you buy from starts with the hard work of a farmer. Farm to table is truly a great experience and it allows the public to have access to the freshest, local produce (and it's usually pretty cheap). Isn't that something we can all get behind? 

As a final update, looks like I'm stepping back into the research world. This one you'll just have to wait for, it's a bit difficult to write about it right now.

So is New Orleans all about food? Of course not. There is so much culture. There is so much education. There is so much community. That is why I came here and that is what I will direct my focus too here in the coming months. Food, however, is definitely a big plus in more than one way. 

Until next time! Questions? Email me! Clearly I'm an open book.

Goldring Center for Culinary Medicine
Crescent City Farmers Market

October Service Hours: 22.5
Cumulative Service Hours: 22.5

Me in my natural habitat eating a chicken wing at the Crescent City BBQ

Goldring

Crescent City BBQ set up

Month 1

Time sure does fly. It's been a month since I've packed everything from The Magic City (Birmingham) and journeyed to The Big Easy (New Orleans). It's been a fun month. I've settled into the program and we've already passed our first block exam (I am studying for my second one as I write this) and I've had so much enjoyment getting back in the drivers seat. After not doing anything in the summer but work, it's refreshing to get back into learning (weird, I know). I've come to appreciate everything Tulane has to offer from our small, personable cohort, to other, broader things like facilities, the gym, and keeping up with what's going on in the research part of things at the campus. I have to admit, I do miss Birmingham, but I might have to claim two homes.

In my free time, I've spent time studying obviously, but the rest exploring the classics. I've ran various places in the New Orleans area, checked out the coffee shop scene, and of course, eaten. I think we all know New Orleans is known for food, but it's so hard to pick. This alone is something I could probably write a book on, let alone a blog post.

Soon, I'll start volunteering. I've chosen to volunteer at Goldring Center for Culinary Medicine. Long story short, I'll have the opportunity to help cook and spread good nutrition. Sometime next month you'll read extensively about this from my perspective. More information about the Goldring Center can be found below. In addition to volunteering, I'm currently contemplating diving back into research. Until next time!

https://culinarymedicine.org/about-us/

September Community Service Hours: 0
Total Community Service Hours: 0