Almost done with finals!

Its been a long week. Here's how its played out so far:

Tuesday - VBS (veterinary basic sciences) exam 1. This exam covered our first 4 cases, about 140 multiple choice questions. It pretty much covered everything: anatomy, physiology, pathology, microbiology, parasitology , behavior and toxicology. I feel like I did pretty well on it.

Wednesday - Vet issues exam. Relatively stress-free exam.

Thursday - Practical exam. This was 2 hours of parasitology, histology, toxicology, behavior and pathology followed by 2 hours of anatomy and radiology. Unlike midterms, I didn't leave the practical exam feeling like I was going to cry. Always a plus.

Friday - VBS exam 2. Pretty much the same as the first, except covering the last 4 cases of the block. I didn't get to study as much for this one, and left the exam feeling like I had to guess on way too many questions.

Monday - Two exams today. The first was the ACT, or "assessment of critical thinking" exam. Basically, they gave us a case that was similar to some of the cases we had throughout the block, and then we had to pick 2 differentials and write about the pathophysiology of either of the diseases we picked, and how they could be causing the clinical signs and bloodwork values we saw. I was pretty freaked out before this exam, since it's 20% of our grade for the semester, but I left after the exam feeling like I did just fine. A lot of that is thanks to my anatomy tutor, who was wonderful about passing on some great tips for taking it.

After the ACT exam, we had our clinical skills test, which is a series of timed stations that you have to move through. There were drug calculations, epidemiology calculations, and then we had to demonstrate how to do things on stuffed animals or models like blood draws, catheter placement and taping, and a couple other things. Even though it was the easiest test we had all week, it was really nice to get it out of the way.

Tomorrow, I have my Micro/Cellular biology test. If its anything like the midterm, it should be a bunch of multiple choice questions, and a bunch of short answer questions. In theory, it shouldn't be too hard - it tests us over all of the scientific literature we've had to read and summarize all semester. However, its a lot of proteins, hormones and bacteria to keep straight. I'll just have to caffeine up, and power through it.

Speaking of caffeine, after finals, I'm going to try to quit my pepsi habit. Its just too many empty calories, and the caffeine dependence is probably not so good either. So, while I have 2 1/2 weeks of break to wean myself off of getting caffeine withdrawl headaches, I figured I'd give it a go.

And for the heck of it, here's a picture of what I came home to after I finished my clinical skills exam today:





That's right, I have the cutest, weirdest dog in the world.