Part of Why I Care

I’ve been sitting at my computer work area since 10am working on different assignments off and on all day.  I think it’s time to write a little post for my blog.

First off, let me tell you that this semester is heavy on the amount of readings that the instructors expect from us.  More so than normal and this is the first semester where I’m kind of worried of what to expect if I don’t attempt to look at most of this stuff.  Keep in mind most of these instructors assign a bunch of reading material as complementary resources, but I still feel obliged to read the chapters assigned from the text book. 

Let me just give one piece of advice, if your text book states they offer additional learning activities on their website, you should check it out.  More than likely your instructor has used this resource and incorporated a few questions in with their exam.  Plus there are activities such as flash cards, mini-quizzes, and even crosswords that help the student retain information in a different more creative way.

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Anyway I went to work Friday in the OB dept., but was reallocated to a med/surg. floor to help out.  Now since I work on OB when I get reallocated from that department to other departments, they don’t utilize my abilities as an aide.  Instead I just do basic stuff like vitals, turns, helping feed but I’m not assigned any one patient or group of patients for total care.  So once I got onto the floor I was met with cries of help from a confused patient yelling from her open doorway.  I went into her room and found the patient trying to climb out of bed; she seemed agitated and annoyed as to why she was in the hospital.  So I went in and helped get her untangled from the blankets and we sat down together and talked.  I learned a little about her between her bouts of short-term memory loss.  All she wanted was to go for a walk, and since I wasn’t needed at that moment for anything else, I took her for one. 

When I got her back to her room, I excused myself and stepped out so I could get report from the other aides to see if there was anything else they needed help with.  When I got done helping a few of them with their work, instead of wandering aimlessly around the halls or sitting on a computer surfing the internet (that sometimes happens with other aides), I went back to the confused lady’s room.  I spent the rest of my four hour shift there chatting and walking around her room with her.  It was so humbling and enlightening to talk with this woman who was wise beyond her years and had quite the story to tell.  My time with her helped remind me why I care so deeply for others, we’ve all gone through a lot in our lives and we all have our own story to tell.  I look forward to more times like this in my future.  PS when my shift was over, the RN came and thanked me for my 1:1 care with this patient so she could get other work done.  I wondered why the patient hadn’t been evaluated for more 1:1 care or a sitter.  She definitely could use someone to look into that for her.