Please draw a diagram that relates left ventricular volume and pressure throughout one cardiac cycle.

Describe what is happening at each stage of the diagram you have drawn.

How can you show stroke volume and work done on this diagram?

What is the physiological significance of the shape of the section of the loop that represents the diastolic filling of the left ventricle?

If we took the gradient of this slope what would it represent?

What would the effect of increasing preload in isolation be on this diagram?

Given that the left and right ventricles function as two pumps at different operating pressures how does the heart ensure that the cardiac outputs from the two chambers remain matched over time?

What are the effects on the body of acute anaemia?

What later adaptations will the body make to chronic anaemia?

How is iron absorbed by the body?

What happens to absorbed iron?

How is iron excreted?

What is a definition of the term resting membrane potential (RMP)?

Please draw a diagram and explain how the RMP is set up in a peripheral nerve cell.

What electrical and concentration gradients occur for sodium and potassium during the RMP?

Please draw an action potential in a single peripheral nerve and explain what is happening in the diagram.

What do the terms absolute and relative refractory period mean?

What effect would a low blood potassium level have on the resting membrane and action potentials in a peripheral nerve cell?

How does an action potential depolarisation result in skeletal muscle contraction?

Consider now what an action potential would look like from a compound nerve if a supra-maximal stimulus was applied. Can you draw a diagram for this compound action potential?

What is shunt?

What are the causes of shunt in normal healthy people?

What are pathological causes of shunt?

What is the effect of shunt on arterial partial pressure of oxygen and carbon dioxide?

What is the effect of increasing the inspired oxygen concentration (F_iO₂) if shunt is present?

What is the shunt equation?

How are the contents of oxygen in the arterial, venous and capillary blood estimated?

How is the shunt equation derived?

What is a buffer?

What is the power of a buffer?

How can you define an acid and a base?

What is pH and why is control of pH important in the body?

What does the term pK_a mean?

How is normal pH maintained in the body?

What determines the effectiveness of a buffer system?

What buffering systems are present in the body?

What is the Henderson–Hasselbalch equation? Can you write an equation which could be applied to the bicarbonate buffer system.

How does the body compensate for a respiratory acidosis?

Where is the hypothalamus located and what are its neuroendocrine functions?

What hormones does the hypothalamus secrete?

What are the functions of the pituitary gland?

What is the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis?

How are serum calcium levels maintained?

What are the physiological effects of the sudden loss of 1 l of circulating volume?

Can you describe some of the early responses?

What forces exist across a capillary that determine fluid exchange?

Can you now draw a diagram showing the Starling forces at both ends of a capillary and mark on some values for the various pressures in the equation?

How would this change in the situation when a patient loses 1000 ml of blood?

Can you explain how degrees of hypovolaemic shock can be graded? What clinical signs and symptoms might you expect?

What types of shock are you aware of, and how will each type affect a patient’s haemodynamic profile (e.g. preload, cardiac output and afterload)?

Please can you draw a spirometry trace of normal tidal volume breathing followed by a maximum inspiration and maximum expiration breath and explain your diagram?

What lung volumes cannot be measured with a spirometer and why?

What is lung compliance?

What is total thoracic compliance?

Please can you draw a pressure–volume curve for the lung and explain how the pressure measurements are made?

What is hysteresis?

Please can you talk me through a diagram of the foetal circulation, explaining the direction of flow and approximate oxygen saturations?

Can you explain ‘streaming’ in more detail?

What physiological changes occur at the first breath and when the umbilical cord is clamped?

Can you describe the ductus arteriosus in more detail?

Can you describe the foramen ovale in more detail?

How does the oxygen in room air get to your tissues?

What role does haemoglobin play?

Which parameters can we modify to improve oxygen delivery to the tissues?

What effect does increasing altitude have upon blood oxygen content?

How can you classify the autonomic nervous system?

What are some of the key functions of the parasympathetic (PNS) and sympathetic nervous system (SNS)?

Can you describe the anatomy of the outflow of the PNS and SNS?

Describe the ganglia of the autonomic nervous system

Which neurotransmitters are involved?

Can you name any drugs that potentiate the effects of the autonomic nervous system?

How is glucose absorbed from the gut?

How is our blood glucose level controlled?

How is insulin produced?

What is its mechanism of action?

What are the effects of insulin?

What hormonal changes occur in hypoglycaemia?

How is glucagon produced?

What are the effects of glucagon?

Are there any other substances that affect blood glucose levels?

What can you tell me about the renal handling of glucose?

What classes of muscle relaxant drugs do you know?

What would the effect be of giving a dose of neostigmine/glycopyrollate ‘reversal’ to a patient who has received suxamethonium compared to one who has received rocuronium?

The onset of malignant hyperpyrexia (MH) is an anaesthetic emergency – what clinical features would make you suspect this condition intra-operatively?

What anaesthetic drugs are recognised trigger agents for malignant hyperpyrexia?

What drug would form a key part of your management of this condition?

Tell me about it?

How could you investigate someone with a history suspicious of malignant hyperpyrexia?

Tell me about the pharmacokinetic fate of a single IV bolus of propofol?

Draw a concentration against time graph to illustrate this.

Now reconstruct this diagram as a semi-log plot of concentration against time.

What is the definition of half life?

How is half life different from the time constant?

How are clearance and half life related?

What drugs can you use intra-operatively to provide hypotensive anaesthesia?

What other general considerations should you make when requested to provide hypotensive anaesthesia by a surgeon?

What are the advantages and disadvantages of using remifentanil for hypotensive anaesthesia?

How do beta-blockers mediate their effects for hypotensive anaesthesia?

Under what circumstances might you consider using alpha-blockers in anaesthetic practice?

How is hydralazine administered and what is its mechanism of action?

Tell me about the use of sodium nitroprusside (SNP).