1)Please provide a brief description of your STEP Signature Project.
2)What about your understanding of yourself, your assumptions, or your view of the world changed/transformed while completing your STEP Signature Project?
3). What events, interactions, relationships, or activities during your STEP Signature Project led to the change/transformation that you discussed in #2, and how did those affect you?
4). Why is this change/transformation significant or valuable for your life?
1) For my STEP project, I traveled to Tennessee to shadow a Respiratory Therapist at two different hospitals. I visited St Jude Children’s in Memphis and Parkwest Medical in Knoxville.
2) I think I learned the most about what I am looking for in my future in relation to my career. Respiratory Therapists can work in a variety of settings and this trip really opened my eyes to the different options I have. I thought I knew a lot about my career field going in, but being able to speak to different RTs that went through various programs and who work in unique departments, I realized my area is much larger than I thought. This has led me to rethink what I want to specialize in when I graduate and definitely gave me some insight on all the possibilities that are available to me. This would not have been possible without this STEP project and I know my future self is very grateful I was able to experience it.
3) On my first day of shadowing at St Jude Children’s, one of our patients coded causing a response team to be called and us having to rush upstairs. I have never seen a code before so I was eager to learn what exactly happened in these intense situations. Teamwork is the key to success with these events. Many professionals have to work together to get the right equipment, transfer information to each other, and plan for the next steps. I watched the doctors communicate and create a plan for the patient that would entail moving them to the ICU. Also, their grandmother was watching the whole time and to see how the nurses took care of her and comforted her after was really heartwarming. Although scary, this really showed me I picked the right career because it is fast paced, team oriented, and involves helping others.
Another day at St Jude Children’s I spent some time in the pulmonary function lab, which is another area where RTs work. It is not on a main hospital floor, so it is not as fast paced, but still consists of working with patients. Since this hospital focuses on research, the pulmonary lab runs tests with current cancer patients as well as those that are in remission in order to study what chemo causes permanent damage in the lungs. They perform various breathing tests that produce graphs that the technician analyzes to see if any adjustment in the treatment plan needs to be made. The specific technician I shadowed worked in the lab for part of the day and then moved up to the ICU to finish it. I really liked the idea of that because it seems to make the 12-hour day go by faster and it gives you the best of two of the environments where RTs work. She answered all of my questions and I am really glad I was able to watch her appointments because it really peaked my interest to look into working in these labs in the future.
At Parkwest Medical, I shadowed a RT who was working on the intensive care unit of the cardiac center. Therefore, I was able to see a lot of different cases than I did at St. Jude Children’s because it is not as specific as just cancer patients. I was able to see more of what an RT would do at a normal hospital. One of the main things an RT does is check on every patient with a ventilator and I even was able to see someone be extubated. We work with many different machines, so she even showed me a few of them and gave me the summary on how they work and what exactly they do for each patient. I really enjoyed those shifts because an RT deals with many patients at one time, so I was able to see what a typical day is like and how their rounds work. She also told me a lot about the hospital dynamic between the workers especially the relationship between RTs and nurses.
4) This change is valuable for my life because it sets up my whole future. I will be starting RT classes in the fall and this experience has really prepared me for all the information I am about to have to learn. Starting out in labs, I will already be familiar with some of the equipment as well as the different terminology used. Even though I was only shadowing, this experience taught me a lot about my field which will aide me when taking my courses. Also, when clinicals start and I am actually in the hospital, I will be used to the environment and will feel comfortable interacting with patients. This trip also allowed me to see hospitals in a different state. I love to travel and maybe after I graduate, I will want to move to Knoxville and work at Parkwest. I now have a connection there so this also helped me network and expand my options of places where I could work in two years.