Endocrine System 2024

“Hollywood Ailments: Fame & Fever”: A pathology podcast - Team 11

Media Type: Podcast

Summary

team_11_image1.jpgOur PULSE assignment is a podcast of 5 people focusing on endocrine diseases and relating them to celebrities with the same diseases. The podcast dives deeper into the mechanism, cause, symptoms, etc. of the disease to inform listeners more about the pathology behind the disease. We chose this format because podcasts are easy to listen to and can be turned on whenever throughout the day which can encourage students to learn proactively even when completing other tasks. Relating the podcast to real-life celebrities can help students understand the disease in a more realistic context. Podcasts are generally accessible to a lay audience and are more ‘light-hearted’ when compared to lectures. Hosts create a more inviting experience for the listener that feels like they are a part of the conversation. Good podcasts are also interactive and will allow for questions, reference to appropriate sources, etc.

team_11_image2.jpgKeywords: Endocrine System, Podcast, Celebrities, Diseases

Sweet Solutions: An Interactive Learning Module to Diagnosing Endocrine Disorders - Team 34

Media Type: Learning Module

Summary

team_34_image.jpgOur PULSE experimental assignment is a self-guided interactive learning module made on Google Slides. It involves a case study of a patient who comes in, and the student, acting as a doctor, must choose what to do at various stages - asking the patient questions as he comes in, doing a physical examination of the patient, doing diagnostic tests on the patient, diagnosing the patient, then choosing different treatments for the patient. The student is able to interact with as many or as little of the learning module as they would like, reflecting their responsibility as the physician. There are also incorrect answers throughout the process of diagnosing and treating the patient, which allows the student to go back to the stages of testing and gather more information before proceeding. The slides for questions, examining, and testing allow the student to integrate previous knowledge on type 1 diabetes to understand what disease that sign/symptom belongs to.

We chose this topic because diabetes is a disease that is becoming increasingly prevalent and is an important diagnosis to understand. Because there are two types of diabetes and type 2 is much more prevalent, we wanted to give the students the ability to differentiate between the two. We also wanted to provide students with the background to go through the process of diagnosis and what kinds of questions they should be asking and what to do with that information. It is also something someone can do without understanding medical terminology because it provides background information at each step. We hope it could be used for people who also do not have any background in medicine to teach them about the effects of diabetes.

Keywords: Diabetes, Endocrine Disorders, Interactive, Self-Guided, Innovative

Pivotal Pathology Podcast: A new way to learn complex pathological concepts - Team 36

Media Type: Podcast

Summary

team_36_image.jpgThe topics of our assignment involve components from the Infectious disease, endocrine, and CNS lectures. The format choice that we decided on was a medical drama simulation podcast, similar to medical shows like “Grey’s Anatomy” or “House M.D”. We believed this format would be engaging for listeners since teaching pathological concepts with humour makes the learning experience more entertaining and memorable. In this medical drama, the patient, a factory worker, crushes his hand in a hydraulic press at work and goes to the hospital. The doctors interview the patient and determine a differential diagnosis for the patient, reading deeper into just the musculoskeletal injury at hand. Throughout the podcast, the listener will be able to identify important characteristics of infectious diseases, lead poisoning, and endocrine diseases. They will also learn about the underlying mechanisms responsible for some of the symptoms the patient was experiencing. Ultimately, what they discover is that the patient has a benign pituitary tumour, known as a pituitary adenoma, in addition to environmental lead poisoning. The doctors did not catch onto the pituitary adenoma at first since the patient’s lead poisoning masked the symptoms. This teaches the audience to adopt a more holistic approach and to ensure that every possibility is accounted for.

Keywords: Pituitary Adenoma, Parasites, Lead Poisoning, Hormones

Hormonal Chronicles: Adventures in the Endocrine Realm, A novel - Team 47

Media Type: Short Stories

Summary

team_47_image.jpgWe chose to focus on the endocrine system for this assignment, primarily on showing the interaction between various hormones and the glands associated with their secretion. The reason we decided on doing so using a story-telling format was because of how overwhelming it can be to memorize content for this topic. Students employ various learning techniques to learn them, and it certainly becomes easier to remember the actions of different hormones and glands when you can associate them with a character or a part of a bigger story. The components of the endocrine system are heavily linked with each other and understanding that they all work together to achieve a common goal of equilibrium is the moral of each short story in this collection.

Disseminating scientific information is also an integral part of research. Being able to communicate novel and fundamental ideas to various target audiences is essential. Teaching the endocrine system in the form of short stories is a unique and creative way to drive home the main points regarding the function of the system to people who may not have a strong science background.

Keywords: Endocrine Pancreas, Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Growth Axis, Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal Axis, Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Thyroid Axis, Diabetes Mellitus, Hypersecretion & Hyposecretion