Reflection Paper

1. Introduction

Hello, my name is Caitlin Donahue, I’m a Public Health major here at Georgia College

and State University. This semester I had the opportunity to intern at Macon Coliseum

Health Centers on the ICU/CVICU floor. The Coliseum Health system serves Macon and

Middle Georgia communities at one of their two facilities, Both these hospitals have been

around for over 40 years caring for many families in the community. These two facilities

are full-service medical and surgical hospitals that employees staff and physicians that

are trained in the most advanced health care available. Areas these hospitals are advanced

are cardiology, birthing services, emergency care, inpatient/outpatient care, psychiatric

care, and more and then specialties that are represented in our medical staff from

orthopedics, pediatrics to family practice, neurosurgery and more. The patients that are

served of one of these two hospitals are offered non-medical and community services as

well. Community services include a variety of support groups and free educational

lectures on various health topics. Specifically within the ICU/CVICU I see lots of family

struggling to afford their medications, surgeries and have multiple comorbidities that

aren’t very monitored leaving them to expense stays in hospitals and more health

problems as a result. Since the hospital knows the patients that come to these facilities

aren’t always able to afford their healthcare they have become a vital part of the

community here by organizing food drives, participation in health fundraisers and

sponsor health events in the middle Georgia area. Coliseum Health System not only cares

for the people that come through the doors, but supports the community by improving

human life, and strives to deliver high-quality and cost effective health care to their
 patients. Because of the approach Coliseum Health Systems uses it’s what sets them apart

from other health systems with their maximizing resources for caring hearts, hands and

minds that are committed to the excellence of their patients. Coliseum Health Systems

prides itself on the mission, vision and values it withholds at both of the facilities. The

mission statement is “Above all else, we are committed to the care and improvement of

human life” The vision of the Coliseum Health Systems is to strive to be the most

exciting, innovative health system in middle Georgia providing signature customer

experience, and their shared values are through ownership, compassion and excellence.

2. Description of Experiences

As an intern at Macon Coliseum I was essentially a non-paid patient advocates employee.

Each day I would have to dress business casual every day, report to our supervisors office

to get the tasks for the day and then get started on the day. Each day we did rounds on all

the patients who weren’t transferring, through the ICU and the CVICU. After rounds, I

would check the CVICU medical board for surgeries for the day which would never be

more than 2 and check to see who the nurse was, I would introduce them to the family

and get updates from. Everyday whenever I was going to or from the units I would stop

in both the waiting room to check for any families or family members who I could bring

a drink, snack or tissue to while they were waiting in there. After that I would go to the

office and start the paperwork for the surgeries of the day and contact sheets needed to be

filled out by the family members who would be waiting after surgery. After this

depending on the time the surgery was I would go to the waiting room in CVICU and see

if the family was waiting and if they were I would introduce myself, explain to them how

the process of once their family member was out of surgery they would meet with the
nurse to explain what will happen in the following hours and how to contact the nurse if

the member decides to go home and want to keep updated on the patient. This could

happen twice a day but I was in a group of 4 other girls as interns so I would never have

to do it twice in a day because there were so many of us. The rest of the day was

dependent if there was a code, death, caregiver class, or an assignment Franchetta had

assigned me to do outside of the work already assigned within the class. I would also do

report of what was going on with each person in the units so in case I needed to be there

for the hospice transfer or to talk to the family after rounds I would be on the same page

with all the other interns. I think the best part of the internship for me was getting to

watch and hear rounds every morning. I loved listening to the neuro, nutrition, diagnosis,

PT, and pharmacy employees talk about each patient in the mornings, it really shows how

so many people go into making the experience of a patient and the family as satisfactory

as possible. It was really a team with the medical professionals and then the social

workers and interns that made my experience really rewarding for me. I also felt the

rewarding feeling when I got to talk to families throughout their stay with their family

member that is a patient and then watching them go home from the hospital and them

thanking me for making their stay as comfortable as possible it was always an honor

getting to serve these families every day. The most challenging part of the internship was

the days where just about all the people we were assigned to that day had terminal

illnesses or were not advancing well and probably weren’t ever going to get out of the

hospital. Those days were always challenging and then having to comfort the families

that knew the extent and were still there just waiting for a turnaround or just waiting out

the inevitable. I wish I got to finish out the semester at the internship, I know most
 students will probably say that but I truly think that is my one wish I could have done

more, I really just wanted the last weeks of experience to really allow me a full exposure

to what I could experience if I was an employee here in the future.

3. Perception and Evaluation of the Internship

I really do think this internship met my personal expectation and even really excelled

them. I got to interview over the summer and shadow those interns and then this fall I got

to shadow that interns so I feel like I had a good idea of what to expect and they got me

really excited for my semester here. I think for this internship I was thinking I would

never be acknowledged by the doctors or high up directors but I got to have a

conversation with my supervisor’s boss and even some of the doctors spoke to me too

and asked me questions which was really cool to feel like I had a contribution. When it

came to ideas my supervisor was really open hearing my thoughts when we weren’t in

her office and what we could change from previous interns or work on in the future so

that acknowledgment felt really good to have my contribution mean something. My

supervisor was really effective with my site supervisor, every day we did rounds with her,

meet with her in her office, got taken with her when she had to go visit a room about after

hospital care whether it be hospice or a nursing home. She really included us in daily

tasks, introduced us to other staff members we wouldn’t have met in the ICU/CVICU, but

also gave us the chance to lead ourselves with our caregiver group and within the other

interns. My experience was really truly such a learning experience and I loved every

minute of it, the only way my experience could have been improved was if there were

less interns. While I got to talk to many patients and families, go through multiple

surgeries, hear rounds every morning, I feel like sometimes I couldn’t get all I wanted out
 of my time there because there 5 of us and that met we all had to have equal time doing

all the tasks so I felt if there was 2 or 3 I could have really thrived more, but I got the

opportunity to meet 2 other girls I hadn’t gotten to meet through my classes. I have

already recommended this internship to two girls I knew that wanted to work in a hospital

but wanted to stay in the area. I liked to recommend it especially if you aren’t sure if you

want to be more clinical in a hospital or less this can give you a good chance to see the

not clinical side but at the side time you get to see the nurses work daily and talk to them

so it was just a really cool opportunity. I think I’m currently considering a career in this

setting because I’m getting a chance to see how impactful CVOID-19 is on our healthcare

system and how my internship was and how that is intertwined so I really am considering

a career similar to my internship in the future.

4. Internship Preparedness

I believe I was very prepared for this internship academically. I took Anatomy,

Microbiology, Epidemiology, Healthcare Delivery Systems, Intro to Public Health,

Public Health Policy Systems, Community Health, Global Public Health and many more

classes that really gave me the skills and knowledge to really understand and excel in this

internship. Because of all these classes when they were saying diagnosis, comorbidities,

multiple people suffering from the same sickness, healthcare, Medicaid/Medicare, and

other topics I felt really confident in my knowledge and it only added more knowledge on

what I knew. I feel the most prepared and confident in the comorbidities and healthcare

system topics that were frequent in the hospital. I think because I had already learned

about them extensively and then seeing it in person multiple times a day, like with a

patient that had hypertension would follow with heart problems, obesity, diabetes, and on
and on I knew why they had one could mean other were there too that added to why they

were in the ICU/CVICU. With healthcare I was prepared because we learn about the U.S.

healthcare system and then other countries and the different part of the U.S. healthcare

system, then I see the population in the ICU/CVICU and lots of time these patients have

been seen there before, addicted to something like drugs/alcohol, or can’t afford

healthcare so they wait until they are so sick they have nothing else to do but come to the

hospital and be on ventilators and intubated. I know how privileged I am with my family

so I really understood what it was like for families to not have it the same way, and then

the doctor comes from another country and tells how different healthcare is there. I

always thought I had a good grasp on the healthcare system and how it isn’t a working

system to people of a different population that aren’t getting the help they need. I think

the academic part I was the least prepared/confident on was the exact medical terms with

diagnoses. I know I can understand certain words like heart surgery and incubated and

Foley that are important but beyond that I’m not as sure and end up writing words down I

want to look up later especially if they say them often I’ll want to know what they mean.

The courses I used the most and found the most helpful were Anatomy, Epidemiology,

and Health Systems. I think they were the easiest to link with what I was hearing,

learning and seeing everyday that I had a high baseline of knowledge that helped me

catch on quick with rounds. I quickly found that even the anatomy I took sophomore year

skills have helped me my internship placement. I learned how to work efficiently

knowing everything I need to get done before I go home that day helps me prioritize the

tasks I need to do, time sensitive but always remembering that the families and patients

come first. Another skill I found relevant was speaking in almost all my public health
 classes we have had to do multiple presentations and debates, making me comfortable to

speak up at work. I think the GCSU school of Health and Human Performance can just

work on doing real-life applicable health concepts in class, sitting and learning by notes

is fine sometimes but for going into the real world experience inside the class would help.

5. Internship Performance

New skills that were acquired at my internship starting with organization, each day I had

to make sure I had printed copies of all the paperwork I could need throughout the day,

like visiting hours and rules, or contact sheets and my patient list which changes every

day, I became very organized very fast. And my medical knowledge grew very fast,

which allowed me to form new problem solving skills, since each patient is different, and

I’m faced with different challenges and use new skills to help find solutions. I think all

my assignments, journals, discussions and so on, I was pleased with my performance of

all the work assigned. I always turned my assignments in on time, and the grade has

reflected the effort I have put into it. This class probably has my highest quality of work,

because its 12 credit hours and my last class to graduate I find that I really want to finish

strong and am putting the quality work and effort in to get there. The skills I want to

develop to be successful following graduation is computer skills, I usually struggle with

anything more than the usual Microsoft and PowerPoint, but after that I really struggle

and want to work on improving those skills.

6. Personal/Professional Insights

This internship has impacted my professional goals because it has made me look really

forward to the future, the beginning of the semester started I didn’t want to think about

what I was doing after graduation because it made me sad. However now I’m so pumped
for the future, I’ve been looking into graduation programs and nursing programs to see

my options going forward. Personally I have seen such a growth in my confidence on the

impact I can make on the field and in the people I meet. Since we have been home during

this quarantine I took the opportunity to help by making 60 washable fabric masks to

send to hospital workers that were in need of masks with CVOID-19. Something as

simple as spending a week making masks could have not even come to my mind in my

high school times but now that I think with a public health mindset it’s so important for

to see myself as having the confidence to help in times like this. The insights I have

gained working with the population I did in the ICU is how important it is for a team to

evaluate every patient to them to be one on one with a nurse. Since these are usually are

intense situations it’s important to know their history, speak with the family to have the

best chance of getting better and moving to the general floor. All of the people here in the

unit from medical personnel to the case workers and interns add to the experience of a

patient experience and make sure they get all the medical advice and attention they need

regardless of if they can afford it or not.