BLOG N˚9 | Advisory Prep N˚3

1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).

At this very moment, I am in the middle of switching mentors. I used to intern at Dahiya General Practice Clinic in Carson, CA whereas now, I will be volunteering at Queen Of The Valley Hospital in West Covina, CA (working in the maternity department). I haven't scheduled an interview as I am not sure who I will be interviewing for my second interview as I am in the middle of switching mentors. However, I will most likely be interviewing with my first mentor who is a registered nurse at the Carson clinic.

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic.  Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.  

Specific studies in my research is going towards nursing and becoming a registered nurse. Whenever I am at my mentorship, I am always following the registered nurses instead of the doctors for a number of reasons. For one, doctors simply do not have the time to stop and explain to an intern what exactly they are doing. Since there are usually several nurses to one doctor, I would be able to help out with the nurses with a number of different tasks. Furthermore, my very first mentor (and my first interviewee) is a registered nurse working in the emergency room department at Queen Of The Valley hospital. Being able to interview an RN and work closely beside many registered nurses has given me an extensive idea of what role nurses take part in to delivering patient care. Although doctors may be the leaders of the healthcare team in a hospital or clinic, nurses tend to spend a lot more time with patients than the doctors do themselves. This would be because the nurses would have to prepare the patients before they see the doctor, communicating with the patients by asking questions about their condition, taking their blood pressure, etc. With a topic as general as patient care, from what I've observed, no health care provider works closer with individual patients than the nurses.

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth?  Where will you go to get them?

There are many medical journals by registered nurses and podcasts that I could definitely look into. Podcasts are usually found online (a podcast by the name of MediCast is found in iTunes for free and is hosted by different paramedics each week discussing recent innovations in effective patient care) and different online medical journals (such as The American Journal Of Nursing - the oldest and longest-running nursing journal in the world - and Medscape, which provides an archive of medical journals from different sources, decades, and a variety of topics). With technology today, extensive research can be completely done from the internet as long as sources are reliable.

4. Write down a possible EQ.  Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers.  At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.

With my extensive research on patient care, many possible EQ's have come up to my mind. However, one I am most interested in and will be working towards to answer through extensive research is:

What is the most vital component towards delivering effective patient care?

Now this questions brings up many things with specific words. "Most vital component" is is crucial the question specifically asks for what is the single most important element. "Delivering effective patient care" implies that healthcare teams should be not only patient-centric, but most importantly an emphasis on the word "effective." 

BLOG N˚6 | Advisory Prep

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year?  What has made it a positive experience for you?

What has worked exceptionally well for me is that I got to learn a lot more about a topic that I am genuinely interested, and we're only two months into the school year! Reading checks, at first, seem incredibly dull and pointless but they actually have helped me learn quite a bit from what my topic is. Reading material that were published by magnificent people with different achievements and occupations at some of the world's most recognized facilities gave me a more in-depth perspective on medical knowledge. However, working in the field itself has been a much more interesting and without a doubt, awarding privilege. From gaining these experiences, I've learned so many things that can not be learned by simply reading some articles.What has made it a positive experience with the senior project is going out of my comfort zone and getting experiences out in the world. It's also the most interesting thing to hear other classmates' stories of them in their own mentorship and how exciting it is to be a part of something we're passionate about.

2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project?  How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you?  How might the senior team help?

The most difficult part concerning senior project is how far I have to travel to do my senior project. It is extremely hard to acquire mentorships in the field I am in as many medical students are also in competition for the internship spots that involve patient care in many clinics and hospitals. However, I am truly blessed to even have found a spot in a city that is an hour drive and another hour going back. As time goes by, I will have to get to eventually get used to driving such a distance.