Describe how FlexMed will change your educational plan and enhance your future career in medicine. Please concentrate on how you will use the flexibility afforded by FlexMed, and not on the FlexMed requirements.
“What stage is the cancer in?” I asked, supposing I should give the doctor a good first impression with professionality. It was my first day interning at Lopburi Cancer Hospital in Thailand. In my memory, being diagnosed with cancer itself meant death and being able to live longer was all that matters in cancer treatment. However, the doctor refused to answer my question with a simple number, continuing to describe the varies treatments he had used. “I usually check curative (instead of palliative) when I am unsure, so that the patients would feel better.” He added before we went on to the next patient.
In the two months, rather than merely learning about medical knowledges as I expected, I gained a fresh understanding of healthcare and the importance of health policies.
After a week working in the hospital, I went on home visits with nurses, doctors, nutritionists, psychologists and a monk. The first patient lives in a shabby wooden house. A great contrast could be seen between the room that the patient lives in and the rest of the house. “The patient is diagnosed with prostate cancer with bone metastasis. The room is specially built for him by the hospital and his family. He won’t live long.” A nurse told me. On another visit, I met a man with esophagus cancer.
The FlexPath program aligns with my career goals of growth in the hotel sales department of MGM Resorts International. As an assistant of the following three individuals that hold these positions as Manager Executive Meeting Sales, Senior Manager National Meeting Sales and Manager Sales Systems/Reporting it is an essential part for me to have the same mind set as my managers to fulfill all required tasks. My goal is to become one of the Manager Executive Meeting Sales and with the addition of the Business Administration Curriculum I will be able to practice and apply the resources learned. The FlexPath program includes courses such as fundamentals of management, leadership, business law, supply chain management, marketing and sales, human resource management, organizational communication, accounting, and finance. Then there are specialized courses such as virtual team collaboration, leadership in organizations, organizational structure, leaning, and performance, operations management for competitive advantage, strategic planning and implementation, global business relationships, ethics and enterprise, change management, and a culminating business capstone project. The responsibilities of the Manager Executive Meeting Sales include responding to client’s inquiries whether through email or phone. Prepare and send Request for proposal(RFPs) to clients including catering menus, brochures, meeting room layout,
Patient’s stay in the hospital can become a pleasant experience when nurses let them create their healing environment. Billadeau (2013) writes about her experience during her recovery at a skilled-care facility following a surgery to remove a malignant melanoma in her foot. She realized that, “the staff were all kind and wanted her to recover”…and “they commented on the uplifting music, and the nice lavender/lemon smell in our room””. This was a challenging but pleasant experience for her because “I focused on my own healing environment” (Billadeau, 2013).
If you would have told me ten years ago that I would be writing this essay and planning yet for another years into the future, part of me would have been surprised. Years ago I would have never envisioned myself going into the health field. Growing up I always heard stories from my parents and grandparents of how lucky I am to be alive and how thankful they were to the doctors and nurses. After hearing these stories for so many years it then made me realize that all I wanted to do was help people.
In the next stanza, the poet describes “A figure walking towards cloaked in blue/ Beeping/ Tubes/ Needles.” The poem addresses the routinely and monotonous aspect of being in the hospital for long periods of time. It is a critique of the biomedical model and how the hospital system is created where patients are tended to by multiple doctors, nurses, and allied health professionals. The patients and healthcare professionals are unable to form a relationship that consists of what Kleinman describes as “empathetic witnessing” (Kleinman). Therefore, detachment between patient and health workers is developed and established, to which the patient cannot recognize or know the people assisting them. In addition, Grealy discusses this in her earliest accounts and appointments with doctors. She states that there is a layer of “condescension” and is an “endemic in the medical
Prominently featured in the mission statements of virtually of every medical school and medical institution in the world is the call for empathetic doctors. These institutions wish to train medical professionals that possess qualities of sympathy and compassion, and hospitals wish to employ health professionals that showcase similar qualities. The reality, however, is starkly different, as physicians, jaded by what they have seen in the medical world, lose the qualities that drove them to medicine in the first place. In Frank Huyler’s “The Blood of Strangers,” a collection of short stories from his time as a physician in the emergency room, Huyler uses the literary techniques of irony and imagery to depict the reality of the world of a medical professional. While Huyler provides several examples of both techniques in his accounts, moments from “A Difference of Opinion” and “The Secret” in particular stand out. Huyler uses irony and imagery in these two pieces to describe how medical professionals have lost their sense of compassion and empathy due to being jaded and desensitized by the awful incidents they have witnessed during their careers.
It was his first time to work in a hospital. He started to work as a doctor. Giving prescription and diagnose patient were easy to him. All of medical science had been mastered by him. But there was something that he didn’t have. The sincerity never followed him as a doctor. He couldn’t felt the happiness when he healed his patient. He became as cold as ice. The smile didn’t come to his face as often as before. For him, since he was studying medical, he was not him anymore.
FlexMed will afford me the opportunity to gain more theoretical and practical skills in global health and health policies and enhance my future career as a doctor devoted to the quality of healthcare in the developing world. Should I be selected for the FlexMed program, I would change my major to Public Policy Analysis/Biology, a special major that would offer me the opportunity to intern at a local public health institution during the fall semester of senior year. I hope to focus on the health issues of underserved populations in LA and develop projects with MEDLIFE Claremont to address the issues. In addition, I plan to learn Thai and go back to Thailand during a summer to start a health education program in the school I volunteered with last summer. The program would primarily focus on sexually transmitted diseases in response to the new rise in HIV/AIDS cases among young people in Thailand. Because of the flexibility the program offers, I am also interested in studying abroad in Copenhagen, Denmark as a junior to study the health system in Northern Europe.
he AIDS hospice reeked from disease and neglect. On my first day there, after an hour of "training," I met Paul, a tall, emaciated, forty-year-old AIDS victim who was recovering from a stroke that had severely affected his speech. I took him to General Hospital for a long-overdue appointment. It had been weeks since he had been outside. After waiting for two and a half hours, he was called in and then needed to wait another two hours for his prescription. Hungry, I suggested we go and get some lunch. At first Paul resisted; he didn’t want to accept the lunch offer. Estranged from his family and seemingly ignored by his friends, he wasn’t used to anyone being kind to him — even though I was only talking about a Big Mac. When it arrived, Paul took his first bite. Suddenly, his face lit up with the biggest, most radiant smile. He was on top of the world because somebody bought him a hamburger. Amazing. So little bought so much. While elated that I had literally made Paul’s day, the neglect and emotional isolation from which he suffered disgusted me. This was a harsh side of medicine I had not seen before. Right then and there, I wondered, "Do I really want to go into medicine?"
Despite Trinity's plans to go ahead with work, having developed a five-year plan that lays out what would be accomplished in a certain bracket of time, the truth remains that healthcare does not operate in a vacuum. Trends that emerge in the national market are influenced by legislation, delivery of care, changes in payment methods, and social and economic conditions. Healthcare professionals monitor policy at the national level by reviewing legislative initiatives and analyzing rules and regulations. Understanding healthcare policy helps in facilitating grant reviews and in developing program initiatives,
I stood with a look of wonderment as I watched the beehive of physicians, radiologists, nurses, and paramedics collaboratively save a man’s life. The scene initially appeared chaotic with scrubs flying around and doctors swarming all over, but in actuality the team was extremely single-minded—as if driven by instinct. I was amazed by the speed and conviction with which the attending doctor made his decisions; his training and experience was evident with every move. Seeing the tearful wife thank the doctor highlighted the impact of his work—his actions had saved a husband and a father. I left admiring both the competency of emergency physicians and their ability to touch lives in such a dramatic way. While my enjoyment of high school biology sparked my original inclination towards medicine, my first hand experiences in the hospital deepened my motivation and left me steadfast in my decision to become a doctor.
“Right this way,” the nurse ahead of me was prompting me to a brightly lit hall that was completely foreign to me. I couldn’t help but be terrified by the sights and sounds around me: people chattering, machines methodically beeping, gurneys rushing past. It was my first time in a hospital and my eyes frantically searched each room looking for any trace of my father. She stopped suddenly and I turned to the bed in front of me but I could not comprehend what I saw. At such a young age, I idolized my father; I had never seen him so vulnerable. Seeing him laying in a hospital bed unconscious, surrounded by wires and tubes was like witnessing Superman encounter kryptonite. My dad’s car accident not only made him a quadriplegic, but also crippled
As I said before I used to be a cancer hospital nurse. I love my job but I feel tired. Too much pressure on my shoulder when I was working. In Death and Anger on Everest Jon Krakauer mentioned, Sharpas help mountaineers to carry food, medicine, oxygen bottles, and equipment. However, they put their own lives in great dangerous without any supports (Krakauer, p19-27). People will remember the mountaineers, not Sharpas. I think nurses and Sharpas have something in common. Nursing cancer patients is a hard work. You have to focus on every detail while work without any tiny mistake. One mistake would kill your patient. The number of patients is growing rapidly, and the number of nurses is inadequate. That means you have to undertake more work and responsibility. On the other hand, the medical environment in China is becoming strained. That makes me upset and scared. I come here not only for knowledge but also for time. I want to give myself some time to make me become better and stronger enough to face all the problems I might meet in the
My interest in health policy has emerged from the desire to empower those who have a lesser ability to change their own personal circumstances. Throughout my life, three characteristics have driven my goals and choices: (1) an appetite for travel and broad exploration; (2) an enjoyment of problem solving; and (3) a deep-seated desire for equity and justice. For as long as I can remember, it has been my goal to integrate these three core values into my career, and they have fueled me to become a more effective researcher, teacher and practitioner.
After my observations, I have learned a lot about how the the medical aspect of the health care system worked. I always had the mindset that the doctors were the ones who ran everything in a hospital or a clinic. Upon observing, I realized that this was false and that it took teamwork, cooperation, and communication to help create an environment to best serve its patients. When I came into the University of Michigan as well as the Health Sciences Scholar Program, I had set my target to go into family medicine in order to pursue a career as a family physician. I also saw that there were many health disparities and inequities among patients in hospitals as well. I thought maybe I could help fix this if I became a physician. After my observations, I had an ambivalent feeling if I should still continue with what my heart was set on. I never really thought about exploring the vast array of other health-related professions. There were many fields of health professions I had really never thought about and this class as well as my observations had really helped open my eyes to the complexity of the health system to make it work.
For as long as I could remember, I have seen my father rushing to the hospital in a white coat, answering pagers in the middle of important family conversations and attending night calls even in the most terrible weather. I had always wondered; what could be so important that it belittles every other responsibility in his life. It was only after many years of anguish and protests that it finally made sense to me. This defining moment of realization occurred when I first met a patient in his office. I saw how the gratitude in the patient’s eyes can provide a sense of fulfillment that triumphs all other feelings in the universe. It was human life that was most important. Being a doctor does not make you a mere healer but also gives you the responsibility of a caregiver. I had never felt more proud of my father and that was the day I felt the urge to relive this feeling many times over. It was there in that moment that I decided to pursue a career in medicine.