Year Three, Part III

As I alluded to here, there is something that happened this past summer that was pretty significant for me. I came back to my hometown to shadow the same family practice guy (Dr. Parks) from summer 2005. In addition to hanging out at the clinic, I got to shadow two surgeons in the OR and the clinic. The OR was just flat out cool. I may not have known what was going on all the time, but it was pretty exciting to see what was going on. Seeing somebody's real, live abdominal cavity exposed was a phenomenal experience.

As sweet as the surgery experiences were, they were trumped. After shadowing Dr. Parks for a few weeks, he offered me a position as a medical assistant. I was elated at the offer and took it in a heartbeat. Initially, my job started out by accompanying Dr. Parks on his morning (read: 5 AM) hospital rounds and making and entering SOAP notes into patients' charts. After a few days, his regular clinical medical assistant took a vacation, and I was offered the chance to cover for him also. Best vacation not taken by me, ever. Yeah, I still worked with SOAP notes. But, I got to work with patients...a lot. I took care of patients before and after being seen by Dr. Parks - taking vitals, noting presenting complaints, and working with them/explaining to them Dr. Parks' orders. I loved this job and am looking forward to working there over winter break (a little money never hurt either). I loved the patient interaction, the nurses were great to work with, and I've learned a decent amount about medicine (as much as can be learned as an MA).

The highlights of my time as an MA this summer involved the patients. There was one patient, CLS, who I first met on morning rounds. He'd been dealing with chronic diarrhea and infections in his large intestine. Eventually the recommendation was made for him to have part of his colon removed, albeit after some treatment for his gross malnutrition. However, it's always the patient's call, and he wanted it done now, not later. So the surgery proceeded against his doctors' recommendations. I sat in and watched his surgery and being in the OR again was pretty cool. After the surgery, I saw him again on rounds as he recovered and after a week he was well enough to return home. Over the course of the next six weeks I saw CLS as an outpatient and got to see him improve greatly. Being able to follow a patient from preop, through surgery, postop, and in office followups was an amazing experience. Watching him and picturing myself as that guy who gets him from dealing with months of diarrhea to being able to talk about his turnips was both a phenomenal opportunity and an exciting thought.

As great as summer 2005 was in letting me know that medicine is what I want, summer 2006 was that much greater. I loved being immersed in a medical environment, especially working with patients. It was icing on the cake in that it solidified medicine as my career choice - I loved the job and am ridiculously excited about eventually practicing medicine.