During our first and second year of medical school, students were designated into groups of 2 to 3 to create a community health education project at our longitudinal preceptorship sites. I was assigned to the Stefanie Spielman Breast Center. Our group met with a nurse practitioner/researcher to discuss interventions that were necessary at the breast center. Though many interventions have already been implemented in the center such as support groups as well as fitness classes and nutrition consultations for patients and family members, there was yet to be a comprehensive information session for newly diagnosed breast cancer patients. Fortunately, the breast center had just started creating information sessions for breast cancer patients and family members that were usually scheduled several days after a patient learned about their diagnosis. This was important because at the day of diagnosis, most patients and family are overwhelmed by the new information and cannot process all the scientific terms and treatment options that are discussed with the doctor and nurse. Therefore, this information session provides a way to go over the disease process, the treatment options, and the amenities offered at the breast center in a calmer setting. Afterwards, it also provides a space for patients and family to ask questions they may have to doctors, pharmacists and nurses.
Our role was to determine whether these information sessions were indeed effective and the most direct way was through pre and post surveys. The idea was discussed with nurses and a brief meeting about the implementation of the project was posted as an audio file on the “OSU breast channel” podcast. The survey drafts were finalized and we also did an online search to refer to other institutions’ surveys but there were only one or two published. Therefore, this was a relatively novel endeavor for this specific patient population. In a course of a month, we had gathered several surveys and found that indeed the information sessions were effective. This whole process helped me learn about the steps involved in clinical research and it was very satisfactory to find answers to our clinical question. Finally, this project opened a pathway for more questions and research to be implemented in the breast center which I am looking forward to reading about in the future!
The CHE project fulfilled the “systems-based practice” competency by teaching me about the interdependence of different fields in the healthcare system such as medicine, nursing and pharmacy. Furthermore, this project showed that appropriately using system resources can improve health care.
I will be reading more about system-based practices and conducting CHE projects in the future to further develop this competency.
**Please click on the image or link below to take a closer look at the poster.
Community Health Education Poster