You'd think I was back in middle school but for the impressive vocabulary, no?

So, this week in my anatomy and physiology class, we are learning about the circulatory and respiratory systems of the body (And of course how they relate and effect women in labor). Below, I am proud to present a short narrative told from the perspective of a red blood cell on its journey through the circulatory system.... (not so proud am I of the fact that until this week none of this was really familiar to me! What about you??? let me know if you learned anything)

THE ULTIMATE JOURNEY

Well, are you ready for another round? I’ve just returned to the Right Atrium of the heart loaded with Carbon Dioxide that I exchanged for the oxygen I dropped off at the local capillary beds of the brain. The journey wasn’t so bad, just up the aorta and back down the Superior Venae Cavae, deoxygenated and ready for another Circulation – first Pulmonary to get more oxygen then Systemic to deliver it…again.

Here we go, down the Tricuspid Valve into the Right Ventricle. With the next Ventricular systole (contraction) we’ll be headed up the pulmonic val…Woah, here we go!…looks like we’re going left through the Pulmonary artery down into the left lung off through the capillaries to meet up with the alveoli to exchange this CO2 for some fresh oxygen.

Ooh, tight squeeze, we got a small capillary this time, it’s gonna be single file to get this load of oxygen. And, we’ve got oxygen!! We’re off, through the cardiac veins up to the Pulmonary veins, and gathering back in the heart, this time in the Left Atrium…

Wait for it… Diastole time!! …down to the Left Ventricle via the Bicuspid or Mitral Valve. Now that we’re finished with the Pulmonary circulation portion of our journey, we’re about ready for the Systemic circulation – go exchange some nutrients and oxygen for some carbon dioxide and other waste products, sounds like fun!

Are you ready to head up the Aorta? With the next systole we’ll head up through the Aortic valve around through the Aortic arch and… I have a feeling we’ll be descending this time, taking the oxygen we picked up to the tissues of lower legs or something. We’ll see...

Hm, I guess we’re stopping here somewhere near the knees. We’ll first make our way through the arteries then arterioles all the way to the capillaries where we’ll diffuse some oxygen and nutrients with the surrounding cells and pick up their waste and carbon dioxide.

We’ve completed our task! Now that we’ve left the capillaries we’re back in the Venous system, heading through the venules back to the veins, I think we might be in the popliteal vein and ultimately in the Inferior Venae Cavae and back up to the Right Atrium of the ole’ heart where we’ll start this journey all over again…

Thanks for tagging along! (the last two web references probly won't work since they are in our 'classroom')

www.med.umich.edu/1libr/aha/aha_circ_art.htm

http://www.globalclassroom.org/hemo.html

http://www.avivamoodle.org/moodle/mod/resource/view.php?id=8542

http://www.avivamoodle.org/moodle/mod/resource/view.php?id=8544