CLE 748

Credit: 4 hours.

Underlying modern diagnosis and treatment of complex surgical disease is a fascinating and complex pathophysiology. In the context of current practitioner training, it has become challenging to address these fundamental concepts in detail that is sufficient to initiate long-term interest in the scientific underpinnings of surgical science. This rotation allows student a ‘deep dive’ into the underlying physiology and medical history of modern diagnosis and treatment. Students will meet surgical patients, whose disease will initiate investigations of the historical and basic science underpinnings of modern surgical care. Potential areas of investigation may include classic medical physiology such as the treatment of hyperkalemia in a surgical patient with particular attention to the associated cellular processes and electrophysiology, the mechanisms of non-cytotoxic systemic cancer therapy such as immunotherapy and gene or protein directed therapy or the physiology of systemic inflammatory response and the (largely failed) attempts to intervene in that pathologic process on the cellular level.

No graduate credit. 4 professional hours. Approved for S/U grading only. Prerequisite: Students must be in Phase 2 or Phase 3 of the curriculum. This course is restricted to students enrolled in the MD program at Carle Illinois College of Medicine.