Using this Resource

Bridging the Gap Between Normal Anatomy and Physiology and Clinical Education

This multimedia resource is intended to ‘bridge the gap’ between normal anatomy and physiology (A&P) and clinically-oriented resources.   Thus, this resource requires a basic understanding of normal A&P that is taught at the post-secondary level.  Where possible, this resource includes links to the Open education resource, Anatomy and Physiology by JG Betts et al, should the reader need a refresher on A&P before learning about pathology.

Similarly, this resource is intended to provide the science behind the disease a health care professional is managing.  When appropriate, this resource mentions clinical skills associated with the assessment, management and treatment of the disease and relating to why these clinical skills work.   To correlate the clinical skills mentioned in this resource, the authors have tried to include relevant links to the open educational resource  Clinical Procedures for Safer Patient Care by GR Doyle & JA McCutcheon.

When working with people who have diseases it is important to discuss the required and recommended communication strategies and supportive relationships: between patient and provider, provider & family, and patient and family.  This resource was created to provide the science behind the well-written stories in  Health Case Studies by G Rees, R Kruger, & J Morrison.

Working with patients while on their health journey is a team affair, and this resource highlights the interprofessional collaboration that occurs between health care providers. As in real life, this resource includes contributions from many health care disciplines and how they interact with other care providers. Thus, this resource is intended for multidisciplinary studies in the health care field. For more information on BCIT & UBC’s mandate on interprofessional education, please visit both  BCIT interprofessional collaboration education & UBC interprofessional education & collaborative practice.

Self-Directed Lesson Format

This resource can be read in any order desired.  With the exception of the Preface and Conclusion sections, each lesson contains:

• a pre-test at the start of each disease
• an introduction to the A&P involved
• discussion on the pathological process involved
• video lesson on  describing the differences between normal health and pathological tissues
  • where appropriate, the catalogue number of the DHPLC pathology specimen will be provided for the reader to view in greater magnification in the DHPLC virtual collection.
• a written or video lesson from Dr. Jennifer Kong & Helen Dyck teaching pathology from the tissue level to physiological changes to clinical manifestations
• interviews with health care providers with their clinical experience with patients with this pathology
• a post-test at the end of each pathology

As a Template for Course Development or Use within an Existing Course

This resource is intended for instructors to use at any level or specialization of teaching human health and disease. This resource can be used as a template to designing lessons from either perspective of clinical manifestations link to the underlying cellular cause.  This resource focusses on explaining the rationale behind each sign and symptom from the level of tissues.: thus it may be useful to any branch of health science to adapt for their own purpose, whether it be a professional program (e.g. medical radiography) or a theoretical base (e.g. 1st-year biology).

Finally, interprofessional collaboration is a reality in clinical life and there is a need to introduce it in the classroom before students enter their clinical education.  This resource strives to bring in voices from as many health care professions as possible to highlight the myriad of health care professionals a patient will encounter in their health journey.  Thus, this resource – in conjunction with the aforementioned Open Ed Resource Health Case Studies  – will be beneficial to interprofessional education.