Hi Everyone!

For us at the College, Spring Break has just begun, so I thought it would be appropriate to touch on some of the ways students spend their Spring Breaks!

Buck-I-Serv: Ohio State offers service trips through Buck-I-Serv each break. These trips focus on a range of things like children, education and poverty, to housing to disaster relief and more; and they take place in a range of places from Florida to Illinois to New York and even some that are out of the country. Additionally, you are able to apply to be a trip leader which is a fantastic leadership development opportunity. I personally have gone on a Habitat for Humanity trip to North Carolina and had an amazing time—I made new friends, was able to give back in a meaningful way and had a lot of fun in the process.

Buckeyes Without Borders: An interprofessional medical mission team that takes a Spring Break trip to Honduras every year. Their purpose is to foster global health awareness and teach OSU healthcare students the benefits of an interdisciplinary

healthcare team on a positive patient outcome through outreach and education in underserved communities abroad, where they identify and treat the medical needs of their populations. Students that go always report having a great time, making friends and developing clinical skills.

Rotations: Some students utilize their free week to complete IPPE rotations, do project work or even shadow! This can be a great time for future professional development.

Vacationing with classmates: Many students opt for a more traditional vacation on Spring Break—relaxing on a beach, hiking in Arizona, ski trips and more! This is a great time to take a break from classes, relax your mind and body and spend quality time with family and friends.

Work/Stay–cation: Finally, many students will choose to stay home for spring break and unwind with a stay-cation of sorts—maybe even pick up a few shifts at work over the break.

I hope this gives you a little insight into what Spring Break at the College looks like. In whatever way you choose to spend your break, make sure to enjoy yourself and relax!

Cassie

Hi all!

For this post, I thought it would be fun to give you an inside look into what life as a pharmacy student is like. Obviously, it varies for everyone, and it even varies weekly for me, but I wanted to give you at least some insight! Since next week is Spring Break for us, this is actually what my week looked like 2 weeks ago!

Some things to know: I work every other weekend at Nationwide Children’s Hospital (so one of the major differences for my classmates is that some work during the week and hardly at all on weekends), and I am a P2 (different years will have varying class schedules).

The biggest thing I hope you take away—work-life balance is not only attainable but is very important!

Sunday: I had a fairly lazy morning consisting of a short run, long breakfast, light studying and church until I went to work from 2-10:30 pm at Children’s!

Monday:

Workout 7-7:40

Class: The focus this module is on infectious diseases!

8:30-9:30: we had a lecture on Community Acquired Pneumonia from a specialist at the Wexner Medical Center

10-11:20: We had a lecture on the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of antibiotics

11:30-12:30: This is our professional hour! You can get lunch or engage in a student organization meeting—for me, I had a meeting.

12:30-1:30: Small Group Session where we applied what we had learned in our PK and PD sessions

1:30-2:30: We had a free hour to study/grab a snack/etc while the rest of our class did their own small group session

2:30-3:30: We had a lecture on Urinary Tract Infections

Home: My family got a new puppy on Sunday so I got to head home to Westerville to meet her and have dinner with my family! After, I went back to my Grandview apartment to do a little studying and watch the Bachelor with my roommates!

Tuesday: I have lab on Tuesdays, which means half a day of class!

Lab: 8:30-10:45 (usually it goes until 11:20 but I got out early)! We worked on a patient disease management encounter and SOAP note (Subjective, Objective, Assessment and Plan–it’s progress note detailing a patient encounter) for it as well as a review activity from one of our previous lab courses.

Home: I got home and went for a run outside (yay for sunshine and warm weather!) ate lunch and relaxed for a bit.

1-5:30pm: I worked updating my notes and started to study for our upcoming exam and workshops!

After studying I watched Netflix, ate dinner and then went to bible study to end the night!

Wednesday: This was definitely one of my busiest days! We have class and I take an elective!

5:40-6:40 am: Workout! A good workout is one of the best ways to start a long day!

6:45-8am: I got ready for class, ate breakfast and relaxed before heading to class!

Class:

8:30-10am: Our instructor had prepared a lecture to watch ahead of time so class was spent reviewing the high points and doing several patient cases on community acquire pneumonia and hospital acquired pneumonia.

10-11:20am: We had a small group session on Acute Otitis Media (ear infections) and Urinary Tract Infections where we went over patient cases and specific questions we may encounter both in practice and in the exam.

11:30-12:30pm: Professional hour again! I had an e-board meeting for Pharmacy Council today during this time.

12:30-3:45pm: We had the afternoon off due to small group sessions so I met up with a few of my good friends from class, chatted and did a little studying.

3:45pm-5pm: This is the timeslot for my leadership elective (it’s wonderful and I would highly recommend it to anyone interested).

6-7:45pm: I normally would have headed home but one of the organizations I am a part of, Student Society of Health Systems Pharmacists, had an event with dinner and networking with residents and pharmacists to gain insights into credentialing and privileging as well as the residency process.

Home: I finally headed home for the night where I polished off a pint of ice cream, did a little studying and watched a TV show with my roommates before heading to bed!

Thursday:

7-8am: I got up and got ready for class, had breakfast and did a little last-minute studying before my quiz in workshop.

Class: Today is my workshop today—this is essentially small group session for 3 hours in the morning for me!

8:30-9: This part of workshop is dedicated to iRAT/tRAT (individual and team quizzes) over content covered in class.

9-11:20: We worked on patient cases in our assigned teams and went through the answers we chose as a class—this was over the same material our iRAT/tRAT was on (Pneumonia—community, hospital and ventilator acquired).

11:30-12:30: Professional hour again! I had a student organization meeting today where we got lunch and had a panel of pharmacy technicians come in and talk about what makes a good pharmacist from their point of view, as well as the new technician licensure laws.

Home:

1-2pm: I got in my daily workout!

2-7:30pm: I did some studying—primarily organizing my notes for our upcoming exam on Monday, made a Target run and had dinner.

7:30-10pm: Time to relax! I watched TV and had a glass of wine with my roommate before calling it a night.

Friday:

Class:

8:30-10: We had a review session for our exam on Monday with several of our professors and practice questions

10-11:30: I went to the RPAC (one of OSU’s fantastic fitness facilities) for a long and relaxing workout

11:30-12:30: Professional Hour! But I don’t actually have a meeting today, so I got to get lunch with friends!

12:30-2:30: This is our lab lecture timeslot. This week we had a quiz and did an activity to prepare for our lab practical next week.

Home:

3-5:15: I baked banana bread, and got ready to go out with friends for the night

5:30-to the end of the night: One of my student organizations, SSHP, had an inter-professional social at Pint House with free appetizers, and after we headed to the IPC social itself (IPC hosts social events throughout the year for all the inter-professional schools)!

Saturday: Today was a pretty relaxed day. I woke up later, worked out, had a big breakfast and watched Netflix most of the morning and early afternoon. Later in the afternoon I started to study for our exam on Monday with my roommates, and a couple of classmates came over to join us! Overall it was a productive but relaxing day.

I hope this gives you a better look into what life is like as a P2! If you have any questions feel free to reach out!

Cassie

Hi Everyone!

This week I wanted to talk module based curriculum! Why? Well, it’s slightly different than the traditional course work that most of us (if not all) experienced in undergrad, and it is how the PharmD program is taught at Ohio State!

When I say the traditional curriculum, I am referring to taking multiple classes and subjects at once, for the entirety of a semester. For example, you may take a medicinal chemistry class, a pharmaceutical calculations class, a pathophysiology class, a lab and have your introductory pharmacy practice experience (IPPE) all at the same time (courses varying by semester and year). And often, the subject matters in each class will vary widely from each other. This may mean multiple exams in multiples classes in a week, and a lot of balancing in regards to different course material and studying time. This is widely done, and was used by Ohio State for many years, as well as many other Colleges of Pharmacy.

However, in 2016 (for the class of 2020—that’s me!), the College began teaching a module based curriculum—something that I feel has been beneficial to my learning and pharmacy practice experience, despite having previously done my undergraduate studies on the traditional style.

In module based learning, you focus on one class at a time, and the lab and IPPE compliment what you are learning in class. For example, as a P1, one of the major themes of the year was community based pharmacy. This meant that at the beginning of the year in class we learned about patient counseling, pharmacy law and more, in lab we learned how to take prescriptions over the phone, check prescriptions that would be filled in a community pharmacy, and that our IPPEs were focused on the community setting. P2 and P3 years are where you learn about the majority of your therapeutics. In module based, you walk through one disease state at a time. At the beginning of this year (I am a P2), we started with Cardiology, and learned the medicinal chemistry, therapeutics, pharmacology, and more regarding disease states involving the heart. Having such an all-encompassing view of the disease state made all of the content relevant and easier to tie together and understand.

Hopefully this gives you a little more insight into what exactly module based learning is and how beneficial it can be to your learning and understanding of content! I have personally found it to be incredibly helpful and find that it relieves a lot of stress as you are only studying for one or two classes at a time and can truly devote your understanding to it, rather than trying to juggle multiple different classes at once and getting less out of each.

Please feel free to reach out to me if you have further questions about the curriculum or anything related to the College of Pharmacy!

Cassie

Hi everyone!

This week I wanted to take the opportunity to go over resources that are available to you as an Ohio State student! Being a pharmacy student at Ohio State means that you get the small close-knit community of the College but also all of the resources of large institution! Here are my top five underrated resources offered by Ohio State!

5. Dtix: Dtix provides students with discounted (and sometimes free!) tickets and restaurant gift cards to places around Columbus. Some examples include gift cards to Cameron Mitchell Restaurants and Jenis, Blue Jackets and Columbus Crew tickets, BalletMet tickets, concert tickets, passes to Cedar Point and more! It’s a great way to get out, have fun and explore Columbus, while still being budget friendly.

4. Inter-professional Networking: Ohio State has just about every professional school you can imagine; from Pharmacy, to Medicine, Dentistry, Nursing, a graduate program in Social Work, and many more. These are your future colleagues, and learning with and from them during school, and the unique role each plays in patient care is a wonderful benefit. In addition to our curriculum which incorporates several inter-professional experiences and collaborative events each semester, Interprofessional Council (IPC) hosts events and socials for students to get to know one another and have fun outside of the classroom.

3. The Wexner Medical Center and Nationwide Children’s Hospital (and more): Ohio State is attached to a large, comprehensive research medical center and has close ties to one of the top 10 Children’s Hospitals in the country. As a student, you’ll have access to these medical centers, and the opportunity to hear from experts at them, and learn from them hands-on in the classroom and on rotations (that are quite literally right across the street). This is a resource that very few other schools have the privilege of, it provides you with exposure to a variety of areas of pharmacy and unique learning opportunities to help you succeed in the future.  Additionally, Columbus has the OhioHealth and Mount Carmel networks of hospitals, which also provide unique rotational experiences, content experts and a plethora of internships.

2. RPAC/Rec Sports:  The RPAC is a state of the art facility that includes a large weight area, several cardio areas, a track, basketball and racquetball courts, and provides a full schedule of free group fitness classes. There are several other gyms on campus (the ARC for example has rock climbing), as well as soccer fields and tennis courts, that are also great resources for students. In addition, Ohio State offers many intramural sports for students looking to get involved that way. One of my favorite ways to meet classmates and other professional students has been through intramurals—even if sports aren’t your thing, it is always fun to have classmates come to the games and cheer us on (my roommate has been known to bring Capri-Suns as post game snacks for our soccer team).

 1. Buckeye Football Tickets:  As a student you get discounted football tickets! While football may not be everyone’s favorite past time, at Ohio State it is so much more than just a sport. Buckeye football brings together people of all ages and provides a sense of community and pride unlike anything you will ever experience. Everyone should have the privilege of experiencing the comradery, excitement, and school spirit that is a football Saturday in Columbus; from Tailgates to the Skull session (the band performs and team walks through) to the game itself, and Ohio State affords students that opportunity.

All the best,

Cassie Rush