Student blogs

Yes I know, at KI this sounds like a rhetoric question. But to me and my nine other classmates – shoutout to you, you know who you are – this was very real. A course in basic medical science is included in the Health Informatics Programme because the students come from a medical or an IT background. Having a Bachelors in Information Systems, I can now tell you about my 5-week journey through the human body and its wonders!

The mitochondrium is the powerhouse of the cell

Did my 16 year old self back in high school think this sentence would ever be said again. No. Did I hear it in the first week of this course. Yes, and I can now get a 100% on this Buzzfeed Quizz. Jokes aside, this course started off with the revision of high school biology. There I was, drawing a nerve cell, and thinking “Ahh I heard about myelin before”. Interesting how much one really does remember.

As the course states, it provides us IT-Students with basic knowledge about cell and tissue biology, the nervous system, cardiovascular and urinary system, respiratory system etc. We got introduced to the body’s systems and common related diseases. There was a lot to cover. Thus it makes perfect sense that the course had a 9-to-5, five days a week schedule.

After four weeks and a hefty amount of theoretical lectures, we got the chance to participate in a lab where we got to dissect a pig‘s heart and inspect a whole body specimen.  This was for sure one of the highlights of the course. It is very rare that a non medical student gets to have that experience. I am glad I got to learn something completely foreign to my normal field of expertise.

A perfect bridging course

In conclusion, I would have loved to go more in depth into biochemistry or learn more details about treatment of diseases. Nonetheless, this was a perfect bridging course. Interesting literature was provided and our teachers were always happy to answer every question we had while always holding onto the fact that we had limited pre-existing knowledge. I am still amazed that we got the chance to work in a medical lab and inspect whole body specimens. I will be forever in awe of the body’s anatomy and functionalities. After having written the exam, I did not throw away my notes, I was not fed up with the topic. The course just left all of us wanting to learn more. So thank you KI, it was a wonderful learning experience!

Email: anne.rike.flint@stud.ki.se

LinkedIN: Anne Flint