How can I get past hating physiology?

[markelmarcel]

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I decided to post this in the pre-PT forum vs the PT forum, just because everyone who is applying has to get through physiology and once in DPT school you may or may not have to tackle it again... I am, unfortunately, one of the ones that has to tackle it again.

My prereq physiology course was killer. My professor was boring, and although I went to his office for regular help, I still did terrible on his exams... So, here I am again, immersing myself into the world of physiology (for 2 hours... following 2 hours of anatomy!) and I can't stop thinking, "Good Lord, I hate this!"

So-- do you guys have any tips or tricks on understanding physiology more? Is there something that made it more interesting for you if you didn't find it interesting to begin with?

I'm just looking for some pointers on how to get through this course and OWN it. 😉

 

[TheOx777]

I have no idea whether this will help you or not. I just wanted to offer my two cents on the situation. I know that as DPT students, many students LOVE anatomy(specifically MSK anatomy), but Physiology tells us how and why those anatomical structures function they way that they do. Again, this may not strengthen your passion for Physiology, but I do sincerely believe that our patients and colleagues(i.e. physicians, nurses, PAs, other non-rehab specialists) should expect us to have a working knowledge of basic physiological concepts.

I would also say that understanding Physiology at a relatively decent level will also serve to provide a foundation when you have to make differential diagnosis and must refer a patient. If a patient comes in your office for an eval. before treatment with a post-operative knee arthoplasty, yet you check all of their vitals and comes across what you think could possibly be a red flag, hopefully some of that physiology is to thank for such an astute pick up. Having a terrible professor can definitely make you want to poke your eyes out, especially in a class like physiology. I feel that our knowledge of physiology is just as important as our knowledge of anatomy, biomechanics, neuroscience, etc because most of our future patient will probably have numerous co-morbidities that have very little to do with MSK pathologies.

Full Disclosure: I love physiology!😕

 

[markelmarcel]

I hear you on the application portion of it; It IS interesting, but I can't seem to get over all the names of parts of cells and whatnot that it makes sense to me. I never learned about cells in high school (my bio teacher was useless) and after general bio and physiology I'm still just not really sure about it... I've really only seen this stuff once before and looking at cell diagrams in books is totally overwhelming to me...

 

[FlynnRider]

I hear you on the application portion of it; It IS interesting, but I can't seem to get over all the names of parts of cells and whatnot that it makes sense to me. I never learned about cells in high school (my bio teacher was useless) and after general bio and physiology I'm still just not really sure about it... I've really only seen this stuff once before and looking at cell diagrams in books is totally overwhelming to me...

Just keep exposing yourself to it and reading it and you'll get it eventually. Cell anatomy/physiology really isn't that complicated in a basic course. Maybe make it into a process for yourself; this has to happen for this to happen, which has to happen for this to happen, and these things happen here, here, and here. Instead of just memorizing endoplasmic reticulum, golgi apparatus, vesicle, and plasma membrane as words, memorize that the ER makes proteins that move to the golgi apparatus to be packaged in vesicles for exocytosis across the plasma membrane. If things are cogs in a machine instead of just concepts floating around without meaning, they might be easier to learn.