Tri 4 Complete! — An Update from Hannah

Somehow, another trimester has come and gone, and Tri 4 is officially complete! I'm now almost halfway through chiropractic school, which feels slightly insane to type.

This trimester was probably the most clinical and applicable our coursework has felt so far. In Clinical Methods, we worked through regional examinations of pretty much the entire body. In Diversified and Activator, I continued refining and learning new adjusting skills. I learned the basics of diagnostic imaging, learned a lot about nutrition, and continued adding approximately 5,000 random clinical facts to my brain.

Okay, maybe not 5,000. But some weeks it certainly feels like it.

My favorite part of this trimester was how often something I'd previously learned was suddenly relevant again. Anatomy wasn't just anatomy. Physiology wasn't just physiology. An orthopedic test wasn't simply something to memorize for Friday's practical. All of these random pieces I've been collecting for the last year are slowly starting to fit together—and I LOVE that.

Becoming More Clinical

Clinical Methods was probably the best example of that this tri. Every week, we went into the simulation center knowing which regional exam we'd learned, but we didn't necessarily know what our standardized patient was going to give us.

And there were definitely some curveballs. One week, my patient had a head injury, and suddenly I was working through a concussion exam for the first time. Other weeks, I found myself doing an abdominal exam, a gallbladder exam, or a cranial nerve exam I definitely wasn't expecting.

Those curveballs taught me how important it is to get a good patient history and ask good questions. I could know every step of a regional exam, but one answer from my patient could completely change where I needed to go next. And that's the fun part—no two patients are identical, and you never know exactly what to expect.

There's also one lesson from the sim center I don't think I'll ever forget. I was doing deep tendon reflexes one day, tapping my patient's tendon with my reflex hammer, when I hear my professor: “Hannah. Hit them.”

So I did.

And now, every single time I pick up a reflex hammer for DTRs, I hear her voice in my head: Hit them. Apparently that's all it took, because I have not forgotten since.

All of that eventually led to our Objective Structured Clinical Examination, or OSCE. I walked in without knowing which region of the body I was going to get and had 15 minutes to execute the appropriate exam—vitals, inspection, palpation, neurological testing, range of motion, and orthopedic testing—all while communicating with the patient and staying professional.

The morning of my OSCE, I sat there reviewing an absurd number of orthopedic tests, ranges of motion, reflexes, and dermatomes, just hoping I could keep it all straight. Then I walked in, got my region, and executed it—and I realized just how much I've learned.

And you know what? That's pretty impressive. I spend so much time looking toward the next thing that sometimes I forget to look up long enough to see how far I've already come.

Learning to Adjust

This trimester also meant cervicals. And cervical adjusting was intimidating at first.

It was our entire focus in Diversified this tri, and I spent a LOT of time focusing on what my hands were actually feeling and on patient setup. What part of my hand am I using? Where are my contacts? What am I feeling? Where does the patient need to go next? And, probably the biggest one: what does lockout actually feel like?

What really helped was when one of my professors compared adjusting to getting onto the highway, and for whatever reason, it completely clicked. When you merge onto the highway, you don't accelerate down the on-ramp, get almost to the highway, stop, and then try to merge. Obviously. You keep accelerating.

The adjustment is similar. Every motion should flow into the next, so that by the time I get to lockout and I'm ready to thrust, it's the continuation of everything I was already doing.

So much of adjusting right now is learning what things are supposed to feel like. But I'm starting to have those moments where I get my hands where they need to be, take the patient through the setup, and know something feels right before anyone tells me it does. And those moments are pretty exciting.

Fridays at Meyer Chiropractic

One of my favorite parts of this tri was my Friday afternoons at Meyer Chiropractic, Acupuncture & Nutrition.

Some of my favorite learning happens just from observing our doctors—listening while they take a history, watching which exams and orthopedic tests they choose, and seeing what they find and where they go next. And now my brain is starting to make those connections while it's happening. I'll be sitting there thinking, Oh, THAT'S why I learned that. Or, Wait—I know what we're testing for.

Sometimes I'll learn something in class and then see it on a patient a few days later. Other times, I'll see something at the office and learn about it at school afterward, and suddenly think, Ohhhhh. That's what we were doing.

And that's when all of this becomes fun. Because eventually, somebody is going to sit across from me and expect me to figure out what's going on. And I really want to be good at that.

Life Lately

Tri 4 wasn't all orthopedic tests, adjusting setups, and studying. There were lots of walks with Dallas, random ice cream runs, time with family and friends, and last-minute plans that a year ago I probably would have talked myself out of because I “needed to study.” My best friend also got married this summer, and I got to stand beside her on her wedding day.

And somewhere in all of those normal moments, I realized that taking care of myself isn't taking away from becoming a good doctor. It's part of becoming one. There will always be something else I could be doing, but that doesn't mean I always need to be doing it.

I think that's part of a bigger change, too. The girl who walked into Logan for Tri 1 wanted to prove she could do this. Four trimesters later, the question has shifted from Am I capable of doing this? to How much can I learn while I'm here?

And on the weeks I still wondered whether I was enough, I kept coming back to the same reminder I've leaned on since Tri 1—that I'm here for a reason, and I'm not carrying any of it alone. Jeremiah 29:11 is still a verse I find myself repeating often.

And somehow, today is already Day 1 of Tri 5!

Break was a much-needed mix of reading, spending time at the office, seeing family and friends, and doing a little studying for Part I Boards—which I'll take in just a few weeks.

Apparently, balance can include both. 🤍

So, here's to Tri 5!