REFLECTION

One week ago, I finished my summer duty at Dr. Jose N. Rodriguez Memorial Hospital
and Sanitarium. They're known for accommodating leprosy and COVID-19 patients.
After cramming medical information through books and exams for three years, I'm
finally make it to the hospital wards. I spend my almost one month to OB-Gyne and
medical wards, meeting a new team and discovering my role. In the meantime, I finally
get to do what I came to do: I get to take care of patients. It's almost astounding how
many transitions there are in medicine. How many firsts. How many occurred and how
many still remain. I've formed meaningful relationships with patients, and I've struggled
with building rapport. I've felt incompetent and I've felt proud. I've developed my own
style. I've been comforted. I've been able to comfort. I've laughed. I've been moved,
scared, confident, anxious, overwhelmed, overjoyed, insecure, humbled, sad. The
hospital is a world in itself, with many moving pieces and emotional overload. And then
here I am, the third year nursing student, trying to navigate it – sometimes playing an
active role and sometimes being a shadow, sometimes making mistakes and sometimes
doing well. Now, as I begin my last year of nursing school, my goals are humble. From
wanting to learn everything possible to the one goal riding above it all: to do good. I
want to do right by my patients. There is so much I can pour into patients care. At times
there will be puzzles, but I will try to make sense of them. I will make mistakes, but I will
learn from them. I will work hard. There will be inevitably be countless moments where
I will not know the best course of action, tiny decisions peppering the day with each
having potentially dire consequences. I will do right. I would like to express my deep
gratitude to the nurses, staff nurse, chief nurse, nursing assistant, for their patient
guidance, and enthusiastic encouragement on our duty. I would also like to thank our
clinical instructors Dean Ramona Galicia (OB-gyne ward CI) for her advice, assistance
and for teaching us to do FDAR and Sir Aji Gigante (Medical Ward CI) for guiding on our
NCP and Drug study especially on how to calculate the drugs.

Jenny Lyn O. Janda

BSN-4
GROUP 3