When I was on my orthopaedic inpatients placement earlier in the semester, there was a severe shortage of strictly orthopaedic patients on the ward that my facility supervisor was in charge of. The ward was being filled up with cardio, neuro and outlier patients. For the 1st 2-3 weeks of the practicum I was not seeing many patients at all, since my supervisor was only allocating me patients who were more strictly orthopaedic patients. I was keen to follow my supervisor to see the other patients with her, but she was rarely on the ward, and was usually too busy to spend any time with me when she was on the ward.
Therefore I tried to see more patients with the junior physiotherapist on the ward, and this was a good learning experience. However, it did not really test my ability to assess patients from beginning to end in the detail that I would later find my supervisor was after. Neither did it help me gain a better understanding of orthopaedic patients, when I was just seeing outlier patients being treated by the physio.
It was only in the last couple of weeks that it came to my attention that I could take patients from the adjacent ward, since this ward was more strictly orthopaedics. And even though my supervisor was not on this ward, it gave me greater opportunities to develop my assessment and treatment skills of orthopaedic patients.
The lesson I learnt was to take the initiative to seek whether it is appropriate to see patients from another ward if your own is inadequate. And to seek as much information from other physios if your supervisor has no time for you.
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1 comment:
It sounded like a pretty unlucky placement, but its good to know that you managed to learn something, and be proactive about it.
This sort of situation highlights the realities of the hospital system, and the stress your supervisor was probebly under. I'm sure she didn't mean to 'short change' you on your prac.
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