All 167 entries tagged Student

Reflections

As I approach the last 2 weeks of my research module, I have been reflecting a lot on research so thought I would share some of my musings with you all! Both during our studies at medical school and throughout our careers as doctors, we are expected to practice reflectively. This involves looking over our experiences, considering what went well and what could have been improved, and reflecting on how we can learn and grow both professionally and personally going forward. Personally, I find it useful to have a model to help structure my reflections, one of my favourites is Gibb’s model. This model breaks down the reflective process into; describing an event, considering your feelings about the event, separating the positives and negatives, and finally analysing it to ultimately figure out what you could do better next time. It’s not important to stick to this structure rigidly, but it can give you a helpful guide to gather your thoughts.

As part of my teaching certificate and research project I have had to write reflections for grading, which, whilst it sounds scary, I actually find useful in organising myself and getting things off my chest. I know many of you reading this will be aiming to get into medical school, and at your interview, you will be expected to have reflected on your experiences from work experience and during your previous degree, explaining how you have learned from what you have done and how this has helped your personal development.

To give you an example of how I write a reflection I have shared one with you below from my research project.

‘The most challenging aspect for me was the period of drafting the protocol. One of the most difficult aspects of this was the fact that at the same time as writing the protocol, I also still had my second-year academic commitments, so was still attending placement and trying to get signoffs to complete my engagement criteria. At times I felt as though because I was juggling two workstreams which were equally demanding [albeit in different ways], I could not give quite 100% commitment to either. At times this was frustrating as my personality is that of a perfectionist, so I find it unsatisfying to not produce work up to the highest standard. Overall, although difficult at the time, I now accept that it also taught me an important lesson on that of the life of a doctor in the 21^stcentury – increasingly doctors are embracing ‘portfolio’ careers with several themes and have to be the master of many trades. In hindsight, I should have accepted the iterative process that research is and accepted that improving upon each redraft is enough. Work doesn’t need to reach the unrealistic standard that I sometimes set myself and I also need to ensure I maintain my time for wellbeing when under a heavy workload. Being more aware of my personal tendency to perfectionism is a personal lesson I will take away and as a result in future when needing to balance many competing interests. I would take a more relaxed approach and try and get less stressed, perhaps being kinder on myself and more realistic about the quality of a 7-week research project.’

By reflecting as I go through in this way, I can think about how things are going and overall grow, in both confidence and abilities. The research module has been slower in terms of pace but it has given me a calmer period to take stock of everything I’ve learned so far and how far I’ve come from the first work experience I had in a local GP surgery when I first “tasted” medicine and realised this was what I wanted to do. The first step is a big one, but if you have an inking it may be for you; take the leap. And don’t forget to reflect on it!

Eden Villiers : 13 Nov 2019 13:59 |  Tags: Jordan Mbchb Patients Student Wards Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

The Life of a Researcher

This week I continued to teach first year students Basic Life Support. Over the last few weeks we have covered basic first aid, as well as skills such as dealing with bleeding, choking and drowning. Next week my group of first years have their exam to earn their qualifications and I have to say I’m nervous for them!

This year Warwick Medical School have established a new programme to develop our teaching skills, having the opportunity to work towards a certificate or qualification in teaching. This also includes lectures and workshops from members of the faculty on how to teach effectively and be the very best teachers we can be. Over the last few weeks I’ve attended a session on teaching theories and soon I will be attending workshops on group work, giving lectures and giving feedback. These are delivered by faculty members who have been involved in medical education and have years of experience in teaching medics, so we get a chance to learn from the best! It’s really exciting that all the peer teaching we do is recognised and supported by the medical school and that we also get a certificate for our portfolios and develop teaching skills for our future careers.

During this time, I have also been carrying on with my research project module and have been conducting further interviews over the last few weeks. The people I am interviewing have freely given their time, for which I am hugely grateful! I was supposed to be doing 10 interviews but have really struggled to get participants to take part, which is one of the challenges of doing a student research project where there is no funding and only 8 weeks to do the research. Added to this, my research is interviewing an underrepresented population who are traditionally hard to get to take part in research. I’ve certainly given myself a challenge! I have however enjoyed the slower pace of this module, with pretty much all of my time free for self-directed learning. It has been a welcome recovery period after the rollercoaster of first- and second-year medicine.

We also received our timetables for all of Phase III recently as well. Phase III is third and fourth year and makes up the final part of our course. We are split into streams and rotate around areas of medicine and surgery over the space of 18 months. My first placement is in Psychiatry, starting in January and lasting 6 weeks. I’m glad to have Psychiatry first as it is certainly one of my weaker areas and Psychiatric issues appear in other clinical settings such as GP, A+E etc. Getting a good strong ground in Psychiatry from the start will hopefully stand me in good stead for the rest of Phase III.

Eden Villiers : 31 Oct 2019 08:43 |  Tags: Jordan Mbchb Patients Student Wards Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

I got to channel my inner Meredith Grey (kinda)

It only feels like two seconds a go since I wrote my last blog on here. Second year is a weird mash of having a slightly slower pace academic side of life, but then taking on everything you can get your hands on outside of medicine. So, it’s no surprise that I am tired already.

I’m still enjoying lectures and I really like this turn towards more clinical thinking. However, I know on the horizon are the transition weeks. I am nervous about these, for the past 4 and half years all I have known are lectures so this change of pace of learning is going to be hard to adapt. However, I am leaving this to November Abbie to deal with.

One amazing thing that has happened was my surgical induction. I had been looking forward to this a lot as I am sure I want to pursue surgery as a career. I know I must start building up my portfolio now, so I was keen to get into scrubs. I managed to get to Rugby for 7:30am (no small feat for someone who does not drive) and spent the next 20 minutes wandering around St. Cross trying to find the theatres before I eventually found them tucked away in the corner. The staff were lovely, and I was soon in scrubs (having taken the classic selfie) channelling my inner Meredith Grey (ok, let’s face it, I am more of a JD than anything!). I was introduced to the surgical team of who I was going to be shadowing and was luckily enough to watch the entire patient journey from them being put to sleep to waking up. I watched a hip replacement and for someone who has only seen Neurosurgery before, orthopaedics is definitely another world away. There is more protective gear to be worn so the surgeons walked in dressed in their normal gear plus these sci-fi type masks which gave them the resemblance of aliens on another planet. I also liked being able to see more of the operation and understand what was going on. Block 4 last year was not my best friend but I was still trying to drag up some memory of anatomy. I could remember the nervous supply, which for a neuro I suspect is good ! I was also chatting to the scrub nurse before asking about all the equipment. They had (for want of a better word) cheese grater like drills to drill into the hip socket. When they were eventually used , I decided that grated cheese was not on the menu for dinner this week. It was incredible to see the power behind this surgery and I really enjoyed my morning. I also got to see someone have spinal anaesthetic which was a slight “fan student” moment as we had learnt the theory behind these in a lecture the week previously.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t stay in the theatre all day as I was pulled away for bedside teaching, but the following week brought another love of mine. Paediatrics. I got to spend the morning with children who were going to have surgery. This meant I spent most of my morning blowing bubbles for children to play with. I even got a health examination by a four-year-old who decided my elbow was broken and preceded to fix it with a toy drill. I’m pretty convinced this is not NICE guideline approved but I’ll let them off this time. I’m not sure who was having more fun with bubbles and make-believe games on the ward that morning, me or the kids.

Outside of medicine I have also just been made the NANSIG rep for Warwick which was a huge moment for me. NANSIG is The Neurology and Neurosurgery Student Interest Group in the UK. They are huge so I was shocked they picked me, there are so many other people here who would have been amazing! I am going to be helping on their studies over the year which I am excited about. It is also going to give me more experience in research which I believe I desperately need! Revue has also started rehearsals for the 9^thof November. I loved this last year and it became a much-needed break from medicine. The script is just as amazing this year and I can’t wait to show it to everyone. It is one of the highlights of the calendar where everyone joins together for a comedy evening but we also raise money for a local charity so in the end, it’s all for a good cause !

That’s it for now, join me in November when I will be even more nervous about transitioning to clinical medicine!

(If you don't know who Meredith grey is or JD - then you need to watch Scrubs and Grey’s Anatomy)

Eden Villiers : 23 Oct 2019 08:48 |  Tags: Abbie Mbchb Patients Student Wards Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Back to Teaching!

People who have read my blog before will know that peer teaching is something I am very passionate about and something I am keen to do at every opportunity. So far, I have found the SSC2 project period to be much lighter in terms of timetable so I’ve had much more free time to get involved with teaching again. This week I have returned to teaching Student Seminars and I have also resumed Basic Life Support teaching.

Student Seminars are hugely important to the Warwick experience and are something that makes WMS very special indeed. Student Seminars are where second- and third-year medical students teach first year students on topics which the first years have found difficult from that week’s teaching. The topics are picked by the first years and then the second- or third-year teachers prepare sessions which break down the topic into manageable chunks and talk through especially important or challenging parts of the topic. When I was in first year, I went to seminars every week, and while I was in second year I taught seminars every week. Now that I’m in third year, I am keen to continue and do some teaching for the current second year students. This week I taught on the pharmacology of anti-arrhythmia drugs which is not an easy topic but not too challenging, especially as I spent a year working in pharmacy before starting medicine.

This Monday I also restarted teaching Basic Life Support (BLS). Last year, about 10 Warwick students got the chance to become trained BLS instructors. BLS is the cornerstone of First Aid in that it trains you to approach a causality, assess their airway and consciousness and then give chest compressions and rescue breaths to potentially save their life. As I’m sure you can imagine, BLS is a critical skill for medical students to gain as it provides such a basis for so many other skills and gives them the confidence to potentially save someone’s life if necessary. At Birmingham Medical School, these essential BLS skills are taught by senior medical students and this model has been commended nationally as an example of excellent practice. Thus, Warwick Medical School decided to implement a similar programme, which gives Medical students the essential BLS skills and also gives the teachers an incredible opportunity to gain teaching skills. As I may have mentioned above, I’m sort of keen on teaching……so I thought I’d love to get involved! Last year I qualified as a BLS instructor, able to teach the course and then this year we decided to run courses to train the new first year medical students. Just in case you’ve never done BLS before, here are the main steps [Split into the handy mnemonic DR ABC]:

D – Danger: check for danger in the surrounding environment. Approach if safe to do so.

R – Response: ask the casualty if they are okay and if their eyes are closed as them to open them. Are they alert or unresponsive?

[Call for help at this point]

A – Airway. Do head tilt chin lift to OPEN the airway.

B – Breathing - LOOK, LISTEN and FEEL for breathing. If not breathing call an ambulance and start chest compressions and rescue breaths.

C – Circulation – are there any signs of bleeding? Treat bleeding if present.

I would highly recommend that if you’ve never done BLS before for you to attend a course if you can. BLS, performed successfully and early on can save a life, and it doesn’t matter whether you are in a medical career or not. Courses are available as part of your workplace if you become a workplace first aider, if you decide to become a first aid volunteer or through various other sources. Get trained if you can!

Eden Villiers : 18 Oct 2019 13:45 |  Tags: Jordan Mbchb Patients Student Wards Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Exams and a long–awaited holiday

That’s it – the exams are over! I had two written exams, one which was a Short Answer Question paper (SAQ) and one Multiple Choice Question paper (MCQ). Overall, I think they went okay, although it is very hard to be able to tell after the fact. For the SAQ, each question requires you to write an answer in prose or bullet points so it tests total recall. The SAQ paper is useful for testing concepts which are lists of things (i.e. list 4 differential diagnoses for central chest pain), or require written argument (i.e. values laws or ethics such as state ethical principles supporting X). The MCQ paper tests fact recall and reasoning abilities, and often out of 5 options, 2 or even 3 may be correct answers, but there is one answer which is most correct. The MCQ then requires you to reason and think about why something is the answer when something else isn’t.

The week after the writtens we had our second year OSCEs. The OSCEs are the “practical” aspect of our exams and test our clinical skills. However, in second year, the OSCEs are very different from first year. In first year the OSCEs focus around being able to do a specific examination or take one history in 10 minutes. In second year, the OSCEs test multiple skills in one station and are true to the clinical environment. So, one station may be 2 minutes taking a central chest pain history, then 3 minutes doing an examination of the heart, then 2 minutes interpreting an ECG. And in addition, each station is now only 7 minutes! This means that time is very tight and we have to be much smoother and slicker with our clinical skills. Overall, I think the OSCEs went okay, they are designed to test you and I was certainly exhausted by the end! I did my best to answer the questions as best I could, but I think the exam conditions make you miss things that you normally wouldn’t. I spent a lot of time in hospital and GP this year and I think this definitely helped, although I would say my performance wasn’t as good as I think it has been on a day to day basis on placement, which is slightly frustrating. I hope that the examiners understand that exam conditions can mean we don’t always perform as well as we are able to.

After my OSCEs ended, so did my exams! It was one of my friend’s birthdays on the day of the OSCE which was unfortunate, but it also meant we could go out and celebrate after our exams were finally over. We went for a lovely meal and a few drinks to celebrate and start off our 2 weeks off before third year starts. I’ve arranged a lovely week in Newquay in Cornwall which is my first holiday in a long time. I’ve been looking forward to kicking back and relaxing on the beach for a long time.

Very soon, we begin third year and our ‘Student Selected Component 2’ module, which is where we undertake a research project. I’ve spoken about this on my blog before - I’m doing a project looking at how doctors and Funeral Directors work together after someone passes away. I know this is a slightly unorthodox project but it should hopefully uncover some interesting results that I can write into a report. We get our exam results on Monday and start our projects on Tuesday, which is slightly terrifying as it means if we need to re-sit we have to continue with third year at the same time as revising for resits. Fingers crossed!!!

Lucinda Sidbury : 19 Sep 2019 13:56 |  Tags: Graduate-Entry Jordan Mbchb Medicine Student Warwick Wms |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem