Anatomy: Systems and Diagnostics

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$300.00
$300.00
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In this 36 week course, students will develop an app to provide health advice based on actual biology, rather than on economics or politics. They will look at the biology and chemistry of the different bodily systems, and will create predictions about how to cause the various bodily systems to function optimally again. This course is based on the Biblical assumption that we have been "fearfully and wonderfully made." Students will learn how to design a user interface, as well as some basic organic chemistry and physiology. Please scroll down for more information.
"For You formed my inward parts; You wove me together in my mother's womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; wonderful are Your works, and my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth. Your eyes have seen my unformed substance..." -- Psalm 139:13-16a

Additional Resources Required:

  1. None.

So, what's the story?

Parenting and Dr. House were the inspirations for this course.

Some of you may have seen the TV show House. In this show, Dr. House is a cantankerous medical genius who solves a new medical mystery every week in unconventional ways against seemingly impossible odds. I can identify with Dr. House, since I am also cantankerous, but I digress.

Being a parent, and having to navigate the medical system has given me a new appreciation for medical understanding. I got some stuff in high school and a little more in college, and a little more from the Army, but nowhere close to what I needed to be a parent.

I will give you a multiple choice question by way of example. When your child spikes a 104 fever, it can be: a.) an infection; b.) a virus; c.) sour milk; or d.) teething.

If you guessed teething, you guessed right.

You did not, however, guess as we did when we whisked him off to the Urgent Care clinic in a city that we were visiting. This told us that we needed a better understanding of what we had always been trained was the case.

My wife has told me several times that she wants to take this course. I have told her that she will have to audit it, but that the knowledge gained from it will make us much more effective at navigating the medical system.

Since most of our students will, at one time or another in their lives, be responsible for another human being’s health, having developed an app that allows them to find health treatments based on science rather than on agenda will be useful.

Since the other students, to whom the above condition does not apply, all have bodies that occasionally get sick, it will be useful to them as well.

I have always wondered why the ancient patriarchs lived as long as they did. Maybe they just didn’t have modern medicine!
 

Adult accomplishments

  1. A medical diagnostic app, based on biology and chemistry, rather than on politics and economics
  2. A Cure Proposal for a given disease, submitted for publication in a professional journal

Transferable Skills

  1. Working knowledge of how the human body's systems interact with each other
  2. Ability to make nutritional choices for yourself and your family based on chemistry and biology, rather than on politics and popularity
  3. Ability to tell (at a basic level) what is wrong with your family members when they get sick or injured
  4. Ability to understand what the doctor is telling you, and to tell when the doctor is not giving you the whole story
  5. Ability to design an app with user interface to communicate complex, technical topics to laypeople
  6. Working knowledge of the publication process for scholarly medical professional journals

Which careers will this course give me a leg up on?

  1. General Medicine Doctor - Average Salary: $190,490 (https://www.careeronestop.org)
  2. Nurse - Average Salary: $100,910 (https://www.careeronestop.org)
  3. Pharmaceuticals - Average Salary: $79,980 (https://www.careeronestop.org)
  4. Biomedical Engineering - Average Salary: $85,620 (https://www.careeronestop.org)
  5. Medical Researcher - Average Salary: $80,530 (https://www.careeronestop.org)

General syllabus (Subject to change as needed)

  • Course Start: 27 August 2018
  • Week 1:
    • Building the formats/templates
  • Week 2:
    • Determine user requirements for diagnostic app
  • Week 3:
    • Initial list of disease types
  • Week 4:
    • Initial list of disease treatments
  • Week 5:
    • Revised user and requirements list
    • Initial build of the "answer" form (report to be generated)
  • Week 6:
    • Initial list of type of data required to fill in report and answer user requirements
  • Week 7:
    • Cardio-vascular system
  • Week 8:
    • Circulatory system
  • Week 9:
    • Skeletal system
  • Week 10:
    • Muscular system
  • Week 11:
    • Endocrine system
  • Week 12:
    • Integumentary system (skin)
  • Week 13: Thanksgiving Week
    • Neurological system
  • Week 14:
    • Digestive System
  • Week 15:
    • Reproductive system
  • Week 16:
    • Revised disease list
  • Christmas Break: 17 December 2018 - 6 January 2019
  • Week 17:
    • Revised treatment list
  • Week 18:
    • Revised report form
  • Week 19:
    • Initial list of hormones
  • Week 20:
    • Initial list of enzymes
  • Week 21:
    • Initial list of minerals
  • Week 22:
    • Initial list of vitamins
  • Week 23:
    • Revised system diagrams based on understanding of inputs and other systems' interconnectedness
  • Week 24:
    • Revised treatment list
  • Week 25:
    • Revised lists
    • Revised system diagrams
  • Week 26:
    • Revised report form
  • Week 27:
    • Revised list of data required in order to answer customer's questions
    • Revised query form for app
    • App creation
  • Week 28:
    • App creation
  • Week 29:
    • Choose a disease to cure
    • Research submission guidelines for professional/scholarly publications
    • App refinement
  • Week 30:
    • Initial draft article on your proposed disease cure
  • Spring Break: 13 - 21 April 2019
  • Week 31:
    • Critique classmates' cures
    • App refinement
  • Week 32:
    • Revise cure based on feedback
    • App refinement
  • Week 33:
    • Submit cure article to appropriate publication(s)
    • Beta test app
  • Week 34:
    • Journey of Learning Narrative (JOLN)
    • Limits Bounding Analysis (LBA)
    • App refinement
  • Week 35:
    • Revise App based on beta testing
    • Socialize cure proposal for public critique and review
  • Week 36:
    • Publish and release app
    • Turn in copy of app to Frontier Christian Academy
    • Turn in final cure proposal to Frontier Christian Academy
    • Socialize app and cure proposal and respond to commenters
  • Course End: 31 May 2019

Expected Workload

  • Typically one or more tasks that you must perform to move your project iteratively "down the road"
  • One or more discussion questions from the teacher to answer
  • Responding to classmates' answers to the discussion questions
  • Ensuring that you go through any of the learning activities for skills where you are not yet proficient to help you in future weeks' tasks

***All of this is designed to take you about 5 focused hours per week, which is less than you would have if you were attending class in a traditional school.

How can I write this course up on a high school transcript?

  1. As a Biology credit, given the amount of study of the human body systems that the students will have to digest in order to design their app
  2. As an Anatomy and Physiology credit, given that the students are looking at anatomical interactions, as well as malfunctions and their symptoms in order to design their app
  3. As an Organic Chemistry credit, given that all of the systemic interaction that is described gets broken down to the level of the chemical reactions that are happening in the body
  4. As a Computer credit, given that the students have to design an app, with user interface, that pulls on the database that they are developing for diagnostic purposes