Bacteriology: any experience?

[veridisquo]

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I'm in need of another science course for the approaching spring semester, and the only course that appears to work with my schedule is a 4000 level course called Medical Bacteriology.

I've heard nothing about the course, and don't know anyone who has taken it. I'm assuming it is the study of microbes associated with bacterial diseases. Does anyone know if a course like this is generally considered difficult? I know what the expect with upper level bio courses, but my schedule is already a bit hectic so i'd really like to avoid the course if it's as difficult or time-consuming as say, physical chemistry or organic.

For the record, i've taken microbiology (which i'm assuming has its similarities) and performed extremely well in it, so i'm hoping all is well here too.

Has anyone taken a bacteriology course before?

 

[jbone]

I'm in need of another science course for the approaching spring semester, and the only course that appears to work with my schedule is a 4000 level course called Medical Bacteriology.

I've heard nothing about the course, and don't know anyone who has taken it. I'm assuming it is the study of microbes associated with bacterial diseases. Does anyone know if a course like this is generally considered difficult? I know what the expect with upper level bio courses, but my schedule is already a bit hectic so i'd really like to avoid the course if it's as difficult or time-consuming as say, physical chemistry or organic.

For the record, i've taken microbiology (which i'm assuming has its similarities) and performed extremely well in it, so i'm hoping all is well here too.

Has anyone taken a bacteriology course before?

Had to take it for my major, wasn't too bad. But I took A LOT of micro. Good luck. 👍

 

[Em1]

I took medical micro last year (having had intro micro before that) and the prof I had made it pretty hard, although hard in the sense that it was a lot of information rather than being difficult to understand.

We had to know things about the individual bacteria (Gram + or -? endospore-forming?, etc) as well as what they do when they make you sick, and some epidemiological information such as who's most likely to have them and where (geographically) they're prevalent.

So it's a lot of memorization, how much probably depends on the prof you have.

 

[badlydrawnvik]

i took a bacteriology course last semester, wasn't that bad. although it wasn't more general than specific.

 

[veridisquo]

I took medical micro last year (having had intro micro before that) and the prof I had made it pretty hard, although hard in the sense that it was a lot of information rather than being difficult to understand.

We had to know things about the individual bacteria (Gram + or -? endospore-forming?, etc) as well as what they do when they make you sick, and some epidemiological information such as who's most likely to have them and where (geographically) they're prevalent.

So it's a lot of memorization, how much probably depends on the prof you have.

This is what I was thinking. For the sections on bacterial diseases in my micro class, we had to know a lot of traits for a given kind of bacteria: gram pos/neg, the diseases it can causes, the symptoms of those diseases and common methods of treatment, etc. A lot of memorization and a lot of potential for confusion between the different kinds of bacteria.

Fortunately, the professor assigned has amazing reviews (one of the main reasons I chose this course; I couldn't get into the genetics course he was teaching so I figured I might as well pick another course he's teaching) so perhaps he will offset any inherent difficulty in the material. I'm actually anxious to see what this guy is like because every single review he has has been a testimony to his apparent greatness.

Thanks to everyone who has responded so far. 🙂 I'm still open to hearing others' experience too.

 

[tacrum43]

I took Medical Microbiology (since micro was my major). I thought it was very interesting and relevant class, and it made me feel like a real scientist because we had to wear coats, gloves and sometimes masks, plus we had to get immunizations first because of some of the pathogens we were working with. 🙂

It was a hard class though, very time consuming, especially the lab. It always went the whole three hours, plus most of the class was in there for several hours on Fridays as well. It probably does differ some from school to school though.

 

[Em1]

Fortunately, the professor assigned has amazing reviews (one of the main reasons I chose this course; I couldn't get into the genetics course he was teaching so I figured I might as well pick another course he's teaching) so perhaps he will offset any inherent difficulty in the material. I'm actually anxious to see what this guy is like because every single review he has has been a testimony to his apparent greatness.

Don't equate amazing with easy. My medical micro prof was amazing as well, in that he was an excellent teacher and had a weird sense of humor that kept the lectures entertaining. But it was still a very time-consuming course b/c we had to know so much.

 

[gujuDoc]

Our equivalent course is known as Determinative Bactgeriology. It wasn't too bad. Our professor gave all the notes we'd need throughout the semester in the first week of class, and then from there we had to memorize different bacterial species and the characteristics (physical and medically caused symptoms) related to each bacteria. Many times, the medical symptoms of the diseases were similar but there would be ONE key feature that would set them apart and that was the way to study for it. The lab was fun too. We streaked things like gonorrhoea in the lab and saw what it would look like.

Other things we did were take oral samples from each other's mouths and then they'd streak the sample from their mouth and I the sample from mine. Once the samples were streaked we isolated the different bacterial strains and did procedures to teach us different bacterial identification schemes until we were ready to do the unknown at the end.