How to Study Pathology as a Discipline: 55 Flashcards on Specialties, Lab Methods and Informatics

Read this deck's title, then read its cards, and you will notice they disagree. Pathology: Hematologic & Vascular Disorders (code BI6999, 55 cards) has no anemias, no sickle cell, no coagulation cascade, no thrombosis, no atherosclerosis, no vasculitis. What it holds instead is the map of pathology as a profession: who examines what, with which instrument, after which fellowship. Study it for that and it is genuinely useful. Study it expecting hematology and you will reach the exam empty-handed.

What the 55 cards really cover

The vocabulary you will pick up

Anatomical and clinical pathology, general pathology, pathogenesis, morphologic changes, surgical pathology, cytopathology, histopathology, formalin fixation, frozen section, counterstaining, biopsy versus surgical resection, tumour grading, benign versus malignant, molecular pathology, qPCR, multiplex PCR, DNA microarray, in situ hybridization, DNA sequencing, immunofluorescence, antimicrobial resistance genes, flow cytometry, immunopathology, dermatopathology, forensic pathology, coroner and medical examiner, toxicology, neuropathology, pulmonary pathology, transbronchial biopsy, video-assisted thoracic surgery, renal pathology, electron microscopy, oral and maxillofacial pathology, pathology informatics, digital pathology, slide scanning, telepathology, psychopathology, veterinary pathology, zoonotic disease, phytopathology, oomycetes, viroids, phytoplasmas, elastography, thermography, nuclear medicine and PET.

Check the overlap before you start

Twenty-one of these 55 fronts are word-for-word identical to cards in deck NE5872, the subspecialties deck. If you have already worked through that one, suspend the duplicates and keep only what BI6999 adds on top: pathology informatics, LIMS, digital pathology, telepathology, germ theory, the imaging modalities used alongside pathology, the molecular technique list, ENFD testing, and the training pathways (a pathology residency plus one fellowship year for hematopathology, three post-doctoral years for oral and maxillofacial pathology). Roughly fifteen cards of new material: one short session instead of a repeated one.

Two tips specific to this deck

Write the missing hematology yourself. The deck names hematopathology and defines the hematopoietic system, then teaches a single blood disorder: erythroleukemia, twice (cards 8 and 14 say the same thing from two angles). If the title is what drew you here, add the cards it promised — iron deficiency versus thalassemia, sickle cell, the intrinsic and extrinsic coagulation pathways, DIC, Virchow's triad, atherosclerotic plaque stages, the large-vessel vasculitides. Guaranteed exam items, and the deck has none of them.

Sort the non-medical suffixes out on day one. Psychopathology (mental illness), veterinary pathology and phytopathology (plants, oomycetes, phytoplasmas) sit in the same pile as neuropathology and renal pathology. Split them off immediately, or they will blur your recall of the medical subspecialties under time pressure.

Finally, pair every subspecialty with its sampling method — lung with transbronchial biopsy, skin with punch biopsy, kidney with percutaneous biopsy and immunofluorescence, blood with bone marrow smear. Paired facts cost half as much to retain.

Find deck code BI6999 in your library at flip-it.app.

Related: Master Pathology Subspecialties and How to Learn General Pathology: Cellular Injury, Inflammation and Neoplasia.