For my internship this summer, I will be working at the Pampa Regional Medical Center as a nursing intern. I will be there to practice some nursing skills as well as to observe the nurses role throughout the hospital. Each week I will rotate to a new floor for a different nursing experience.
So far I have completed thirty-six hours at the hospital. The first day of my internship I spent in the operating room (OR). This was such a neat experience because we do not get to do an OR rotation during nursing school. I stood in and observed five different procedures where I learned the nurse preps the room for surgery and also acts as the patients advocate while they are under anesthesia. It is also the nurse’s responsibility to document the quantity of each item and assess that they are counted before and after surgery to ensure that nothing has been left in the patient. This week I got to rotate to the intensive care unit (ICU). In this unit, I learned how to care for a patient that is on a ventilator. I also learned how to read the monitors patients in this unit were hooked up to and interpret whether their numbers were good or bad. While in this unit I ran into staff from the OR and they told me I should come back to surgery the next day. I reported to the unit at six thirty a.m. and was able to help set up the rooms and stood in for some very unique procedures.
I have only worked at the hospital for thirty-six hours and I have already seen and learned so much. This is going to be such an exciting and beneficial summer. I look forward to many more days of learning and practicing.
