By: Ellie Kleve
I’ve really enjoyed my internship in these last eight weeks in learning new things as well as having a blast. Scott, one of the physical therapists I worked with, shot mini hoops with me whenever he wasn’t busy. Every time one of us made a basket, the other had to either do 10 push-ups or 20 squats. He already had a lot of practice, so he made me do a lot of squats. I finally made it twice and I didn’t know what he should do. Megan, one of the occupational therapists, chose for him to do handstand push-ups. He said he couldn’t do them, so we told him to do it on the wall. I also got to play balloon volleyball with him and one of his patients. In the clinic, I got to joke around with Melissa who is one of the nurses, and Derek who is a doctor. I really enjoyed talking with the front desk people, because they had amazing stories to tell.
One time, the hospital had a low-key or fancy day. All the workers got to dress up either fancy or super low-key and one of the doctors gave anyone who dressed up low-key a Loki sticker to wear for the day. Everyone thought it was hilarious. In the pharmacy one day, they had just gotten a visit from one of the colleges for pharmacy. They wanted to check out the place to see if their students would benefit from shadowing for a day. To show their thanks for letting them come, they gave our local pharmacy some of their (as we called it) “swag”. Everyone was a lot more relaxed and laid back than I thought they’d be. The actual work part of my internship gave very good experience to me. In physical therapy, I got to learn how to run an ice machine. The machine is for certain areas of injury. I had to put on the bandage on the patient, set a timer, and run the machine. That was one of the more interesting things I learned about in PT.
In the clinic, I got to learn how to take blood pressure and see what the results meant. I also got to learn how to figure out which patients need an annual checkup from a graph chart. In the pharmacy, I learned how to make calls to people to tell them that their prescriptions were ready. I also learned how to find certain medicines on the shelves and how to read the NDC code. This is a code that each type of medicine had. This way, you can make sure that you are getting the right company and prescription drug to the patient. I am very thankful for all the people who supported me and encouraged me to do this internship. And I am thankful for all the people who attended my harvesting ceremony.
