Personal Narrative: 450 Clinical Hours Of Internship

In 1978, the Medical program of the University of California had a dual admission’s program, one fore regular students and one for minority’s. The applicants for the minorities did not have to meet the standards that the regular admissions did. The special program was offered to African Americans, American Indians, Asians, and Espanics, but no white students were admitted. When Allan Bakke, a white male, submitted his application, he was rejected

and the Providence Hospital had to take all the responsibilities of funding the agency many budget cuts had to be done in order for the agency to stay open. Due to the lack of funds the majority of the employees had to be laid off, the English teacher and the parenting class teacher had to be let go, also they had to move Mobile from Semmes. Because of this changes the number of individuals the agency can serves has become lower, the agency relies on volunteers to help with the interpretation in medical appointments. (S. Vaca-Diez, personal communication, November 12, 2014). The agency accepted Social Work students from the University of South Alabama to do their internship with them. The author started her internship for the fall semester of 2014. While on the agency, the intern’s job was to schedule appointments, interpretate in medical appointments every Monday and Wednesday at the women health center, or at other via phone with medical appointments and governmental interviews the rest of the days. The intern meet her client “Susana” for the first time, when she was seeking help scheduling an appointment for the women health center to get a pregnancy test. Since that first meeting the intern was assigned to “Susana’s” case.

I have been volunteering at the University of Maryland Medical Center since the summer of my freshman year. As a volunteer at the Cardiac Surgery Intensive Care Unit at the hospital, I am committed to provide excellence in service, work independently and efficiently, and exhibit patient interaction skills. Ever since I have started volunteering at the hospital, I have learned to become more patient and understanding toward the people who I interact with, and consequently, I have become a more sympathetic and compassionate person.

I decided to do my practicum at the ASANTE Ashland Community Hospital. My site supervisor is Dawn Dille, who is the volunteering coordinator there. I chose ASANTE Ashland Community Hospital as part of my practicum experience because I am interested in becoming a nurse one day. I like what ASANTE stands for and how community orientated they are. I also had previous volunteering experience there. The location is easy for me to commute back and forth between school and work.

My OB clinical rotation day at Tri-City Health Center comprised of a slow day at first, then busy day towards the end. I feel lucky to experience my OB rotation at Tri-City Health Center this Tuesday. Tri-City Health Center is a clinic that serves the community by promoting optimal health to patients and provide preventive measures to eliminate diseases. During my rotation at this clinic, I learned that Tri-City serves a wide variety of patients without regard to financial position, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. In my rotation at Tri-City, I spend the day at Suite D which is their OB and women’s health clinic where I met their wonderful staff. Dr. Martinez was the only doctor in the clinic at the time and she was accompanied by two medical assistants (MA).

In the process of me completing an internship at the Department of Human Services, (DHS) in the department of children and families, I was asked to supervise a home visit with the non-custodial parent which in this particular case (father). So in this case the visit always takes place at the local park within the community. The custodial parent (mother) drove by the park and seen that the child’s father brought along his present girlfriend’s daughter to accommodate him with his visit with his son. The mother got upset because the father brought along his girlfriend’s

For a split second I caught myself reconsidering my future that I have thought for so long I had all figured out. As the President of the Ole Miss chapter of AMSA began the meeting, I found myself starting to relax a little. I listened to all the things that most medical school reviewers look for on a transcript and application, and all the things she talked about were offered through this organization or were made much simpler with the aid that it provides. The speaker went on to say that AMSA was not simply a “medical school prep”, but it was heavily involved in community service. Following the speech by the President, Dr. Gray got on stage to tell us about his experience as a member of the review board at the University of Arkansas Medical School, and he shared some of the things that he, as a reviewer, found as positives and negatives in an application. When the meeting was coming to an end, we were encouraged to join the national chapter of AMSA as well as the Ole Miss

I completed my internship at Saint Agnes Home, Inc (SAH) located in West Hartford Connecticut. I was assigned to single Teenage Mothers. The Saint Agnes is a non-profit program licensed group home run by the State of Connecticut Department of Children and Families for pregnant and/or parenting adolescents and their babies. The mission of the Saint Agnes program is to provide residential care and support services to single pregnant and parenting teen mothers and their babies. The Saint Agnes Home program emphasis values, respects life, and recognizes the unique dignity and optimum potential of each person served. The program is staffed by licensed clinical social workers, registered nurse, and other college prepares professionals.

Sept 10 & Sept 17 Sept 24th: On the 10th, it was orientation day because it was the first day for clinical. Gretta took us around BMC. It was nice to walk around and see each floor. We go our picture taken for our ID. On the 17th and 24th, we were not allowed to be on the floor yet because our ID was not ready.

I had to work- most people do- but I really didn't like my job. In fact, I hated it. I was over worked and under paid and my coworkers didn't make the working environment pleasant. I was working in a high stress situation because the office was understaffed. I was physically sick and emotionally finished with my job. There was just one catch. I was working for my sister-in- law’s aunts who treated me like family- making quitting my job nearly impossible. Day in and day out I dragged myself to work from 8:30 a.m. till 7 p.m., listening to kids fight, scream and cry. This was my life as a pediatric dental assistant. After many weeks of contemplation and talking to others I finally got the strength to quit. My bosses were surprised that I did it, but not why. In less than 24 hours, they offered me another position in the office. The choice was mine. What would I decide? They offered me better pay, a different position, and now I had leverage. What should I do with it?

When I heard about Generations during one of my AMS First Year Intern meetings, I quickly found myself connected with the club’s motive to integrate and support the Kingston senior community through one on one interactions. Specifically, I was excited to hear about the opportunity for the club to assist seniors at Providence Manor. Being highly interested in the medical field as well as with my experience working with the elderly, I believe that I am an excellent candidate for the Facilities Coordinator position. Starting off, throughout high school and my current years at university, I have collaborated and assisted with seniors on multiple occasions. For example, I was the club President for an organization named Junior Civitan, during which

that interested me the most was helping those having a hard time day to day

An experience I have which has pushes me outside of my comfort zone is my internship at the Michigan Academy of Family Physicians (MAFP). In this role, I am the youngest person on the team and am working with a wide range of professionals, such as medical school students and faculty, residency program directors, family physicians, and fellow MAFP staff. At first, I felt like an outsider in this role because I was so young and did not have the knowledge of someone who had completed medical or graduate school, like many of the people I interacted with. I felt unable to contribute significantly to the group outside of completing typical intern tasks like logging and organizing information. Additionally, I felt like I was continuously behind everyone

Starting my clinical internship at the Crisis Stabilization Unit brought many emotions. The realization that this internship was one of the final steps towards identifying myself as a professional social worker hit me. During the first two weeks, it did become apparent that one of my challenges is my self-confidence as a social worker. I still struggle knowing if I am making a right decision or saying the correct thing to a client. That is shown when I am doing group therapy. I start to get anxious when I speak to clients as a group. I hope that the more I practice and interact with the clients that I will be able to gain more confidence and comfortable doing group sessions with them.

Furthermore, my internship experience at Valley Caregiver Resource Center (VCRC) helped me gain knowledge in working with caregivers and their families. My experience at VCRC helped enhance and strengthen my ability to provide professional and quality services for clients. In case management I provided counseling, resources and information, assessment, developing care plan, specialized information to meet the caregiver’s needs to promote healthy and quality life for the caregiver and care receiver. My field internship provided the chance for me to facilitate caregiver support group, which was a great experience that I gained. I also had the chance to do outreach for community health fair and learning about the resource that are available.