Case-Based Cardiovascular Physiology

This course in case-based teaching reviews, integrates, and applies the physiology students have learned in their lectures on the heart and circulation with the physiology of the kidneys, lungs and other organ systems. Students are asked to put themselves in the shoes of a country doctor who is called upon to solve a variety of problems with the knowledge gained from a previous course in human physiology. In the first case a rider falls from her horse rupturing her spleen; in the second case a painter with aortic stenosis has a heart attack; in the third case a farmer with aortic insufficiency can’t breathe because of congestive heart failure; in the fourth case a man with a bleeding nose has hypertension; and in the fifth case a pregnant woman with mitral stenosis delivers an infant in respiratory distress. Students are asked to answer two essay questions for each case in preparation for a graphic essay examination at the completion of the course. Each case is presented by the author in a one-hour video lecture. Following each lecture, short passages and videos in other iBooks by the author are recommended for reading and viewing to help students further integrate their understanding of cardiovascular physiology with the physiology of other organ systems.