PATH20003: Experimental Pathology

Lab/workshop performance and contribution (10%), EOS MCQ Exam (15%), Continuous assessment throughout sem incl. prac reports, lab notebooks and 5 small quizzes (75%) (more details below).

The last reviews are outdated as they recently changed the staff and structure of this subject (clearly for the worse), so don't base your decision on reviews older than 2020. That's what I did and let me tell you how disappointed I was.

TL;DR: I don't recommend this subject to my worst enemies. It was easy but not worth the headaches and frustration. Do yourself a favour and take something else if you can.

The content is divided in 5 blocks (ischemic disease, forensics, immune-mediated disease, haematological disease and genetic disease), each with a different case study where you're introduced to someone suffering from a particular condition (i.e. heart attack, death, glomerulonephritis, haemophilia and cystic fibrosis). Each block will have 2 lectures (typically 1 on theory and 1 on scientific writing), a workshop and a practical.

Lectures will give you some background knowledge and theory on the condition investigated in each respective block and it was mostly recaps from year 2 path so if you did PATH20001, the content for this one is very easy.

Workshops differed slightly from block to block but they were mainly to discuss results, ask questions and practice scientific writing.

Practicals will focus on one (1) experiment per class (and you bet we don't need 3 hours for that). Sophie will also have you look at anatomical samples and discuss organ morphology and such. Even though I did it all online, by this point there is no excuse for online practicals to be so disorganised and boring. You had a whole year to prepare.

Assessments:

- 5 small MCQ quizzes, 1 per block. Purely based on the theory lecture, 2% each. Easy 10%.

- Lab notebooks where you had to record what happened during the prac, 3% each. Marked very harshly.

- Scientific reports where you write a publication style report on the prac containing introduction, methods, results and discussion. First one did not count, purely to let us practice and get feedback. Report 2, 3 and 4 were 10% each and Report 5 is 20% (even though it's not necessarily longer or harder). Also marked very harshly.

Let's get into why this subject sucked so much, shall we? Let's start with the coordination, which is abysmal. Sophie would only publish lecture slides on Sunday at 10pm for a Monday lecture. She would "strongly encourage" us to start writing lab books and reports as soon as the prac was finished but wouldn't open the Cadmus link until 2 days before the deadline. 3 times we had to ask for feedback to be unlocked from Cadmus. Again, she forced us to PAY for a 100-page lab manual which I maybe used 3 times and every other self-respecting prac class would give for free or as a pdf. And again, the whole subject ended up being online for everyone and only the local students had to pay, the overseas students got a free pdf. Vicki Lawson was just there for emotional support for Sophie I reckon, cause she didn't do anything, just interrupted every once in a while to correct something Sophie said. She was also very unhelpful to students who emailed her with issues and kept changing the timetable schedule every week for stupid reasons. The last timetable she uploaded was around week 6 and it was version 4. She also gives the exact same lecture about scientific writing every other week, which doesn't actually teach you anything of essence or gives you any guidance on how to go about actually writing the assessments. The expectations on what they wanted from you were so vague. They told us write an introduction from current literature. I did that and got a 60% because that's not what they actually wanted. They wanted you to ONLY use background from the lecture and find sources to back this up. I figured this out eventually but in the first few weeks of the semester it was incredibly frustrating trying to figure out why you got the grade you got.

The prac demonstrators didn't help balance things either, and they are the ones grading 75% of your mark for the subject. How well you do will depend 100% on the demo you get. If you get Caroline, I salute you and will pray for you because she was the worst demo I've ever had in my life. Extremely harsh and poor feedback. She would take marks away with no explanation and whenever you would ask her a question she would reply with "hmm....well what do you think?"... UM I don't know, that's why im asking you, Caroline. And you might think oh its cause she wanted you to think about the answers rather than just give them to you, but no. You would say you thought and she would just shrug. No comment. So even then you're still not sure what the answer is. Completely useless. Not to mention she just told us to drive our pracs and workshops ourselves, so every time there would be a different student playing the role of demo that tried to guide discussions forward while she just sat there in silence. Great. Tbh, I can't say anything about the other demos. Would my experience have been better with a different demo? Probably. But I can't say that for sure. What I can say is the demo we got was horrible and completely unhelpful in every way.

For every block there are also ungraded interactive "tutorials" which you have to do on your own. Didn't mind these too much, in fact, they were probably the best part of the whole subject and the best way to actually learn the content and understand what they want you to learn.

The exam was fine, nothing too difficult, pretty much a recap of lecture theory and some questions related to the different experiments you've done throughout the sem.

If I haven't managed to change your mind from taking this subject the only thing I can say is: good luck. I honest to God would never take this if I could go back, even though I got an 89 in the end. Even when I saw my grade, I didn't feel like all the pain was worth it. I genuinely was just happy it was over and I wouldn't have to ever think about it again. If you really want to do a GOOD second year prac subject, I can't recommend BCMB20005 enough. Brilliantly coordinated, rewarding and with achievable student expectations.

PATH20003 has a lot of potential and from past reviews, it seems like it used to be what it's marketed as but has gone downhill with the current management and staff. I believe this is the first subject that Sophie coordinates so who knows maybe in 5 years it would be better coordinated but as it is I cannot recommend this. Genuinely the worst subject I've done in 3 years.

MDHS

Yes, with screen capture etc.

Sophie Paquet-Fifield and Vicki Lawson

Nope.

1 Out of 5 (hated it)

They forced us to buy the physical lab manual for $15 even though the entire semester ended up being online and the overseas students got it for free as a pdf. If you'll be in person, you'll more than likely have to also buy it. Yes, I know its bullish*t.

1x lecture/week + 1x practical/workshop/week (alternating weeks)

Sem 2 2021

89

5 practical reports worth 75%, Participation in practicals and workshop 10% and End of semester multiple choice test 15%

TL;DR Very well coordinated subject with a lot of personal feedback that compliments PATH20001 - Exploring Human Disease.

This is a very content light subject that will give you a taste of how a lab works and allow you to gauge if you will enjoy lab work or not. I really enjoyed the pracs (we even went to a lab in the Royal Children's Hospital for one of the pracs) and is a really organised subject. I can't give it enough praise.

Yes, with screen capture

Jo Russell

All of the lectures are a preface to what you will do in the practicals that week. It covers the theory of the disease explored and it goes into a bit more detail than PATH20001 which will cover the same topics. The lectures run biweekly (except the first week) on the same week as your pracs however there are bonus lectures such as a Scientific report writing lecture and a review lecture. The MCQ will be in this lecture time slot at the end of the semester.

This is the easiest MCQ I have done in uni so far. You should be able to get the full 15% for your total subject grade if you pay attention to the lectures and workshop and understand the prac material. It will not ask about the method or materials but about how the results relate to the topic investigated. The only questions I can think of that people may find tricky are the microscopic diagrams which want you to identify pathological structures. But if you pay attention during the workshop where Jo goes over the pathological structures (which are night and day) and in the prac, it won't be a problem.

No past exams but a sample exam is provided

Pracs and workshops run biweekly and are in the same time slot. Thus you will have a prac week and then a workshop week. Rinse and repeat. You will be allocated a 1 hour time slot within your prac time for your workshop. This was the first year that the Lab record book was introduced (you get 2 books that rotate biweekly) which is similar to the lab reports you would've done in Chem 1/2 or in high school. You also will need to do a prac report which is due in your next prac class along with your lab book (every 2 weeks). Each prac report only covers 2-3 sections of a full report to give you practice of each section before report 5 which will be a full report. Jo, the same Jo that lectures, also runs the workshop.Your prac demonstrator will be with you and your group in the workshop. She will run through what you need to include in your lab record book and you prac report even giving you the specifics for each prac. She even gives you key words to include in each section and samples of good and poorly written sections of the lab book/report.

Your participation mark also depends on your contributions in these workshops so don't be shy. If you missed a result during the prac and for some reason didn't chase that up, Jo usually runs through the expected results from the prac. At the end of the workshop, you will get you lab book from the week before with feedback so you can adjust your current weeks prac content in your lab book based on the feedback. Prac report feedback are usually up by the end of your next prac. Don't forget to check the marking rubric which is on the LMS to ensure you cover everything that is required.

5 Out of 5

None

1 lecture biweekly (elaborated in comments), 1 x 3 hour laboratory or 1 hour workshop session

2016, Semester 2

H1

Performance (10% - continuously assessed), 5 x practical reports of 1,000 words each (15% each = 75% - submitted fortnightly), one hour multiple choice exam (15%).

Considering that this was the first time that the subject was offered, it was very well-organised and was a good complement to PATH20001. The topics covered are in a similar order to those of PATH20001, so again, it does make sense to do both if you are that way inclined.

In no particular order, the subject's content comprised haematology (namely, Haemophilia), forensic pathology, genetic disease, reversible and irreversible injury, and immune complex-mediated disease. Five topics and five reports - simple enough. The reports were supposed to be approximately 1,000 words each, but you will inevitably exceed the word limit. Despite University Policy indicating that penalties apply when the word limit is exceeded, demonstrators were quite lenient. That being said, waffling will prove costly. As always, check with your demonstrator, and I am sure that they will tell you how much you should look to write.

The lectures were helpful in indicating the content for the following weeks' practicals and workshops, and contained information pertinent to the exam.

Each week, there was either a practical or a workshop. They alternated on a weekly basis, and each practical corresponded to a workshop and vice versa. In the workshop, there was usually a series of questions to be answered that related to the practical.

The exam was exactly as it was billed to be; entirely multiple choice with questions relating back to the five topics covered, as well as some general pathology and practical technique.

Overall, it was a fantastic subject. The only reason I gave the subject 4.5 instead of 5 out of 5 is because I prefer Arts subjects, even though I am enrolled in Science. (So, take it as a 5/5.)

Yes, with screen capture.

Jo Russell

No past exam papers since it was the first time that the subject was offered, but there was a sample exam.

4.5/5

None, but Robbins & Cotran Pathologic Basis of Disease would be helpful. Pubmed is also useful.

1 x 1 hour lecture per week, 1 x laboratory (3 hours) or workshop (2 hours) session weekly.

2014, Semester 2.

H1