“Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence” – Abigail Adams. Everyday I learn something, and experience something like never before. I began my internship May 13th in the emergency room working 12 hour shifts with the nursing staff at Parmer Medical center, and in July will begin working in their clinic shadowing physicians. Working in the hospital and emergency room has brought a vast amount of knowledge and growth into my life. There were three things I specifically wanted to build on even more: bettering my people skills (by that I mean reducing my shyness), being more punctual, and finally, I want to get involved more with the providers.
I truly and desperately need to work on putting myself out there and being less timid and shy. Once I get used to somebody after weeks of being around them, I open up more; however, with those I do not know well or at all I am extremely shy. I have begun speaking with co-workers, the patients, and their guests more and am trying to really push myself to be less shy and kept to myself. I will have to work even more on this by making it my obligation to talk to a least one new person each day to work on this shyness.
I want to work on my punctuality as well. In the emergency room time is key and being late can cost you. So, to improve on this I have made it my obligation to show up five minutes early every day and will continue to do this throughout my internship and school as well. My other areas of meticulousness aide me in this a bit, but I will need to continue to build on this and plan my mornings to leave my house sooner, especially since the drive to PMC is a bit of half an hour. I will continue to take these steps and improve on this area.
Finally, I would like to interact more with the providers to learn more about what is going on and learn more about medicine. So, to build on this area, I have made it my goal to start taking more initiative and asking more questions about patients, and diagnosis with the providers in a respectful way. I will specifically ask at least about one patient or diagnosis per day I am here and hopefully this will increase my knowledge and understanding of what is occurring with that patient and more about medicine.
