Debra Charity Volunteering

Earlier today I got the chance to volunteer at Reading for the Debra Charity! 

Debra helps raise money and awareness for Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB)- a genetic skin condition which causes the skin to blister and tear at the slightest touch. It affects around 5,000 people in the UK, and currently has no cure.  All the money raised goes towards the families and victims of EB, as well as aiding the research and equipment to help cure it.

The group of six of us volunteered from 11am-2pm, and were stationed around the shopping centre with buckets, leaflets and sweets, as well as having a "decorate your own cake" stall. It was great to have so many donations, and have a chat with some of the members of the public. One lady even spoke of seeing a child at Great Ormond Street Hospital with EB, and how it was truly horrible.

Thank you to Kate at Debra for letting me volunteer and my College Freshers Fayre for introducing me to the charity. I really enjoyed today and will hopefully volunteer again around Christmas!

Find out more about EB here

Donate to DEBRA here 

Get involved here

Step by Step Charity Busking at College

Yesterday (Thursday the 20th October 2016) my sister Katriona and I volunteered to busk at our college open day to raise awareness and money for the Step by Step charity to help homeless homeless youth in need of support.

The college raised over £250 for Step by Step and it was a great experience to be apart of. We arrived at 3pm and sang until 5pm, feeling nervous and cold from the rain- but it was totally worth it! Aside from the generous donations, it was especially nice when our principal listened to one of our songs (the one in the video) and complimented us at the end, saying "Thank you for doing this, I really appreciate it, those were some lovely sounds."

My sister and I had only prepared 5 songs; not knowing that we'd be performing for 2 hours. Thank you to our college for giving us the opportunity- we really enjoyed being able to use our musical hobby to help our college and such an important charity, so we will definitely be signing up to volunteer again soon (with more songs and warmer clothing next time!)

Click here to go to Step by Step's charity website, see their twitter post about the fundraising event, and please donate to their JustGiving page to help out.
Busking video: Sweater Weather - The Neighbourhood

Anatomy: Know Your Abdomen Online Course

Last week, on the 12th of October, I completed the University of Leeds "Anatomy: Know Your Abdomen" online course on www.futurelearn.com, (specifically this course) and thought I'd share it!

The course was split into two components:

1. Get in touch with your abs - locating the organs of the abdomen and using anatomical vocabulary 

2. Ready to digest something new? - exploring the gastrointestinal tract and it's common medical problems 

It was a 2 week course which required 2 hours a week. Although it's a very short course, I thought this was great as I could fit it around my busy schedule and found it as a break from normal A-Level consolidation. I found it particularly interesting to learn the specialist terminology of the abdomen (who knew something as simple as a six pack is called "rectus abdominus" muscle? How fancy). 

You surprisingly learn a significant amount of information in such a small amount of time, but it is broken down with videos from lecturers and surgeons, articles and short quizzes to help you. I even got to research and write short essays on the health impacts of six packs and beer-bellies, which you get to share with the other learners who comment, like and share their finding with you too in such a friendly online community. 

I managed to pass the end of course exam with a score of 73% and will soon probably purchase the participation certificate as a cute personal reminder! I'd definitely recommend it. There are so many free courses on futurelearn too, so even if science isn't your thing you can do courses on linguistics, business, archaeology..etc. 

I actually found out about futurelearn from my Chemistry teacher (shout-out to Temi) who recommended the Biochemistry course by the University of East Anglia, which I'll start on the 7th of November. I've also got an "Exploring Cancer Medicines" course in progress (also by Leeds), and hope to do one on dementia soon as well- which I look forward too!

My futurelearn profile: https://www.futurelearn.com/profiles/4542943

Introduction

Hi everyone!

My name is Ceilidh, and this will be my online diary of all thing medical related! I'm currently 16 years old, and eager to become a doctor. I am a dementia friend, St John's fist aid cadet and a student of Biology, Chemistry and Mathematics. 

I actually got the idea to make this blog from my college's Medical Society, as a nice way to document anything and everything that interests me (and hopefully others).

I'm by no means a blogger, or even a good writer, but I thought I'd give it a try, so try not to cringe at my posts haha. Maybe we'll have something in common?

Follow me on a journey to achieve! :)
-Ceilidh