Catherine’s Community Service

I had the opportunity to volunteer at the Crescent City Classic 10k Sports Exposition this month. My role was to assign bib numbers and check in runners for the beloved 10 k race. While the volunteering role was very straightforward, I was reminded of the rare, community centered, lifestyle that many people in New Orleans live. When making small talk, most people expressed that participating in this race was a tradition for their family, and it was not rare to hear that this was their 9th or 10th year running it. While not directly related to my pursuit of medicine, I think it is important to be aware of the population surrounding you and it felt really nice to be able to help the prosperity of such an event. I am going to continue to volunteer for similar roles like this in the future because I like to be aware of what is happening around me and have a newfound understanding of the amount of joy that depends upon the help of volunteers, and will no longer be taking it for granted. The...

 Don’t worry I am going to be volunteering so much in April!!! I have loved the curriculum this semester, especially the psychopharmacology module as I have a lot of interest and passion for that area. This program has been so rewarding because I understand content that I was previously exposed to on a much deeper level , and realized I had a lot of misunderstandings about concepts that I wasn’t even aware of! For instance, the complexity of schizophrenia now makes sense to me on a mechanistic level. Rather than the umbrella term of dysfunctional brain chemistry, I now know that it is (most likely) due to excessive dopaminergic activity in limbic areas AND finished dopaminergic activity in the cortex region. This imbalance is different for every patient and due to the inverse relationship between these imbalances, it is very difficult to treat accurately. I have loved the emphasis on individualized medicine, as it is the future of medicine and a topic I feel incredibly strongly abo...