Welcome Back, to Jon Nichol Bloog

  New post after about three years or something.  I am not going to check, but it has been a while.  I am pretty sure there are very few people who actually even know/remember I have a blog.  My sister Jodi might still be blogging and so she may see the new post but other than that i doubt there is much traffic here.
  Well seeing as I have moved to a new state for school I suppose an update here once in a while couldn't hurt.  Studying occupies the majority of my time so this will happen when it happens.
Life recap:
  Born...fun times as a child living in Holladay..school...school...school...mission...school...school in Arizona.  Good glad we could get you all up to speed.  By all, I mean Jodi, and you already knew that much of my life.  Now we can start talking about all the new things in my life since July.  Well I am living in alone in a 1-bedroom apartment in Glendale, AZ.  I do not think you will appreciate how hot it is here when I say hot in all caps (HOT), so just know it is hot here and I am not a big fan.  The heat leaves me little choice but to study constantly and avoid the outdoor world which had been such a large part of my life previously.  Perhaps I will have to settle for Cabela's now and pretend I am outside as I walk around the store.
  School is everything I expected and more.  I have made 1 attempt to "get involved" in the Surgical Club as the 1st year liason, but was over-looked for some kid named Chase.   Who is this Chase?  I don't know him but that might be because I am one of 250.  I am surprised at how many people I know by name and how many faces are familiar already.  We are going to spend a lot of time together over the next two years so I guess I should get to know a few of them.  I wouldn't say I have really put aside my natural introversion and dis-like of people in crowds, but I am friendly on the outside.

  Just some clarification so I don't have to explain this multiple times.  I am at the Midwestern University, Arizona Campus, College of Osteopathic Medicine.  Osteopathic Medicine is the same as your everyday doctors there is just a focus on primary care and using a technique called Osteopathic Manipulative Medicine (OMM).  Many people think Chiropractor, but this would be a superficial explanation.  OMM is quite different yet shares some similarities to Chiropractic care.  After school my name will have a DO (Doctor of Osteopathy) after it.  I will be board certified and licensed to practice the same kind of medicine you are used to.  I will also have the tool of OMM to diagnose and treat my patients.  Many MD's have seen OMM work and wished they had the skill and an option like that to offer patient whom pharmaceuticals are insufficient.  OMM is rarely the "back cracking" you would think.  Most of the treatments I am familiar with are similar to Physical Therapy and finding the dysfunction and treating the muscle by positioning the body in a way to allow the muscle to "reset."  Also stretching and massaging certain muscles can help.
  Osteopathic medicine has traditionally been more open to alternative medicine but it is not alternative in its primary focus to heal patients, and most commonly uses the traditional treatments of Western Medicine.  With the current Health Care situation and the lack of Primary Care Providers DO's are expected to fill the void.  Nationally there are about 900,000 MD's and about 100,000 DO's.  The number of DO's is rising currently while the number of MD's is contracting.  In the near future you will be more and less aware of the DO's treating you.  More because there will be more out there and less because you may never even notice they were different from an MD as they treated you.
  A stigma exists about DO's that they are people who couldn't get into a normal Medical School.  Truth is many of my peers chose to only apply to DO schools for many reasons.  I did apply to both and was not accepted to any MD schools but I felt my personal philosophy of health and medicine would fit more along the lines of Osteopathy.  I could have delayed my education a year and got into a MD school it just wasn't worth it to me.  My opinion of my home state school has deteriorated over the years and typically in-state applicants are considered first.  Applying to only school outside of my state made it a little harder.  All my excuses aside I am happy and excited to get trained to heal.
  I appreciate how Osteopaths consider more to a disease process than just what is going on inside the body microscopically.  Treating patients must consider the social, spiritual, and many other factors in order to properly heal.  I have also noticed how diagnosis by palpation (touching/pressing/feeling) is a key focus for osteopathic medicine.  In the even I don't have a CT scanner or something I trust my palpation skills will aid me in treating.  In the end I will be able to work in a Hospital or go into Private Practice and see patients and write prescriptions if I need to or use OMM to treat them.  I have no problem with allopathic medicine (MD school).  I just don't like the majority of the time prescription drugs are the only option.  In the end you can just call me Doctor and you will never know the difference unless you hear about the countless stories of how MD's tried to treat with drugs and a DO was able to cure with OMM.

  All that being said people also just want to know what kind of doctor do I want to be?  Well i have had an amazing experience for the previous two years to be an Emergency Department Tech.  I am EMT certified and I just stayed in the ER and did EMT duties there.  I got to see up-close how ER doctors work and what their typical day was.  I loved every minute I spent there.  I had some of the best co-workers and they became like family to me.  So you might see where this is going, I probably want to be a ER doctor.  Well, part of working in the ER is you get to see all the doctors who come to see patients on consults and I saw nearly every specialty.  I could easily remove many options from my list from those experiences.  One group of physicians we saw regularly were the Trauma surgeons.  I have seen and am really interested in surgery, so if I was doing any surgery it would probably be Trauma.  I have it down to these two options and I am about 95% sure I will end up in one of these two positions.  Many things to consider before I make any final decision and luckily I don't have to make one for another few years.

  Any questions?  Good because I was exhaustive in my explanations.  As always everybody out there needs to pray for snow.  More to come soon.   I need to get up-to-date so I can tell you all about this weekend and all the fun we had.  You might consider following me on twitter and instagram. @drjnichol4077 for twitter and drjnichol on instagram.