outpatient is not as scary as I thought, pt 2!
So I'm almost 3 weeks into this clinical, and I am having SO. MUCH. FUN. I still feel positively awed by how much I don't know regarding physical conditions and how to rehab them, not to mention remembering the countless other aspects of the human condition, like neurological conditions and medical conditions. But I am still learning a ton every day, and I am less afraid of the setting in general. The knowledge is coming slowly and surely, and it is based in experience.
It helps that my CI Amy is, like all the other CIs I've gotten along with, my age and laughs easily. Most of the other therapists are my age, too; one is due with her second kid 4 days before me, one just came back from maternity leave, and one is our age and just started dating her future husband. Needless to say, there is definitely much common ground and many conversations I can finally participate in. I can't remember the last time I felt so comfortable in a group of women strangers so quickly.
And the work, it really is play. Of course the constant attention to how the patient is walking, standing, moving, lifting, kicking, balancing, limping, shifting, twisting, etc. is very tiring work, especially for someone like me whose newness at it is compounded by poor overall observational skills. But I am enjoying it immensely and learning so much. I still feel less secure in diagnosing conditions, but I definitely feel much stronger in rehabing them. My patients all want to be there (if they don't, they just don't show up, and I have time to study or review with Amy -- win-win!), and we have a lot of fun and joke together. The majority of them are black women in the second half of their lives, and with them, ain't nothing taboo :D And all of them are so happy to work with me as a student and let me learn on/with them. It's such a positive environment.
I also worked with a 10-yr-old boy yesterday. I was dreading this session because 1. I was present for his eval, and he seemed to be making it up (or at least exaggerating it for the attention) and not really into therapy at all, and 2. he was generally very sullen and unengaged. And of course 3. child. The only thing I knew to do was to make it "play" and not regular therapeutic exercises like I would with an adult. So after having him do a few basic ther ex, I had him toss a medicine ball (he was there for an arm complaint, and basically he was making it worse by not moving his arm) both overhand and underhand, and then I had him throw an inflated ball like a basketball against the wall. The point was just to get him to use his arm through the full range without his thinking about it. And his home exercise program, his "homework," was to play basketball every day. At his initial appointment, the therapist gave him some home exercises to do, again to get his arm moving. He told me yesterday that he did some of them, but not them all, and not every day. So I told him to forget those and to just play basketball or toss a football with someone every day. I think he liked that better. I think he also liked that I didn't know the term for "lay-ups" and told him to throw "like a 3-point shot or something? I don't know sports" as I made the gesture with my hands. Amy and another student informed me of the correct term, and he seemed amused.
In short: I'm still nervous about learning basic outpatient skills, acquiring the ability to observe a person's full gait pattern and impairments without having them walk for 15 minutes, and also know how to observe signs of deeper involvement. But I have less fear of it, and I'm counting on that fear diminishing as the weeks go on.
It helps that my CI Amy is, like all the other CIs I've gotten along with, my age and laughs easily. Most of the other therapists are my age, too; one is due with her second kid 4 days before me, one just came back from maternity leave, and one is our age and just started dating her future husband. Needless to say, there is definitely much common ground and many conversations I can finally participate in. I can't remember the last time I felt so comfortable in a group of women strangers so quickly.
And the work, it really is play. Of course the constant attention to how the patient is walking, standing, moving, lifting, kicking, balancing, limping, shifting, twisting, etc. is very tiring work, especially for someone like me whose newness at it is compounded by poor overall observational skills. But I am enjoying it immensely and learning so much. I still feel less secure in diagnosing conditions, but I definitely feel much stronger in rehabing them. My patients all want to be there (if they don't, they just don't show up, and I have time to study or review with Amy -- win-win!), and we have a lot of fun and joke together. The majority of them are black women in the second half of their lives, and with them, ain't nothing taboo :D And all of them are so happy to work with me as a student and let me learn on/with them. It's such a positive environment.
I also worked with a 10-yr-old boy yesterday. I was dreading this session because 1. I was present for his eval, and he seemed to be making it up (or at least exaggerating it for the attention) and not really into therapy at all, and 2. he was generally very sullen and unengaged. And of course 3. child. The only thing I knew to do was to make it "play" and not regular therapeutic exercises like I would with an adult. So after having him do a few basic ther ex, I had him toss a medicine ball (he was there for an arm complaint, and basically he was making it worse by not moving his arm) both overhand and underhand, and then I had him throw an inflated ball like a basketball against the wall. The point was just to get him to use his arm through the full range without his thinking about it. And his home exercise program, his "homework," was to play basketball every day. At his initial appointment, the therapist gave him some home exercises to do, again to get his arm moving. He told me yesterday that he did some of them, but not them all, and not every day. So I told him to forget those and to just play basketball or toss a football with someone every day. I think he liked that better. I think he also liked that I didn't know the term for "lay-ups" and told him to throw "like a 3-point shot or something? I don't know sports" as I made the gesture with my hands. Amy and another student informed me of the correct term, and he seemed amused.
In short: I'm still nervous about learning basic outpatient skills, acquiring the ability to observe a person's full gait pattern and impairments without having them walk for 15 minutes, and also know how to observe signs of deeper involvement. But I have less fear of it, and I'm counting on that fear diminishing as the weeks go on.