USD Magazine Summer 2006

[ sy l l abus ] Course: Health Assessment Instructor: Sharon McGuire DESCRIPTION: Further development of nursing skills in holistic assessment of health throughout the lifespan, with emphasis on interviewing, physical examination and problem solving. OVERACHIEVER ALERT: Students are registered nurses who are returning to school to earn first their undergraduate, and ultimately, their master’s degrees. All of them work full-time — as nurses, caring for the sick and injured, in local hospitals — in addition to attending several classes a week. They seem surprisingly good-natured about it, considering. BOOKMARK THIS: Go to www.egeneralmedical.com/listohearmur.html and find out what heartbeats suffering from maladies ranging from a Diastolic Aortic Insufficiency to a Tricuspid Regurgitation sound like. (Frankly, when it comes to danceability, the Ejection Murmur has got the others beat by a country mile.) THEY PAY YOU TO DO WHAT ?: While most of the time the students practice health assessments on one another, for some procedures trained outsiders — known as “live instructors”— come in and act as “patients.” They are well-compensated for their efforts. DEPARTMENT OF OBVIOUSNESS: Upon being examined, one student, who describes herself as “a full-time mom, a full-time nurse and a full-time student,” is asked if she’s been experiencing any fatigue. “Yeah,” she sighs. “A lot.” VISUAL AIDS: Though there’s no waiting room, much of the Alcalá West Nursing Lab will remind visitors of a medical facility. There are beds (complete with somewhat alarming, prone, plastic“patients”), exam rooms ( sans ancient magazines) and his-and-her skeletons. Fun fact: One mannequin’s hospital bracelet identifies him as “Welby, Marcus.” AWESOME ADVICE: “Of course, you never want to palpate both sides at the same time, because we don’t want to occlude any blood going to the brain.”Well, duh.

be offered at (USD), and one of the first of its kind in the world.” Outgoing College of Arts and Sciences Dean Patrick Drinan was an early supporter of Hall’s pro- posal to add the class to the cur- riculum, saying, “This course’s emphasis on the true meaning of aloha — respect for elders — makes it perfect for USD.” It’s certainly proven popular among the 50 or so enrolled students, though as the semester pro- gressed they found it wasn’t nec- essarily the stroll in the sand they might have imagined. Hall expects them to work, to read, to discuss, to think and, naturally, to prove their knowledge on tests. Gnarly knowledge was imparted by surfing legend Woody Eckstrom, assisted here by professor Jerome Hall. On that particular day, partici- pants continued a discussion about masculinity and the prob- lems that arise when surfers go “aggro.” Students came up with a list of words describing that state of being: aggressive, aggravated, militantly angry, confrontational. Hall contrasted this sort of behav- ior with the concept of aloha . “Look,” he said. “There’s a differ- ence in being a person on a surf- ing board and a surfer. It’s about respect. ”The students murmured agreement. “One of the benefits of having a good liberal arts education is that you don’t just look at what data say. We’re training you to say, ’Yes, I see that. But is there more?’” After a brief foray into the merits of living one’s life to best exemplify the aloha spirit, the discussion returned to talk about masculinity, aggro behavior, respect and rebellion. “Listen,” he says, just before it was time to go. “If you have respect, you’ll be treated with respect. Oh! And don’t forget! Next week we’re at The Shack at Windansea!” No worries. They’ll be there.

TIM MANTOANI

“What do you think of short boards?” asks another. “All I can say is, to each his own.” Laughter. “Have you seen changes in the way surfers act over the years?” “Yes.” He looks a bit saddened. “I think we had it maybe a little better than you guys do.” A collec- tive sigh signals that at least a few of the students think so too. A week earlier, class was held in the more traditional environs of Maher Hall, where there was nary a seagull within earshot. Clad in a Hawaiian shirt exploding with hibiscus flowers and palm fronds, Hall greeted the class with a resounding, “ Aloha! ”The students returned the greeting with gusto. There was a buzz in the room, since a story about their studies had just appeared in the San Diego Union-Tribune , stressing the novelty of offering it at all, and noting that“it’s the first serious examination of the surf culture to

BARBARA FERGUSON

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SUMMER 2006