As part of this rotation, we have to do an interprofessional experience. I was assigned to spend the morning with a Child Life specialist. I took a course in Child Life during my gap years so I had some idea of what I would be doing (in addition to what I heard from my classmates who already did their day in Child Life). The general idea behind Child Life is recognizing the role that “play” has in the normal, healthy development of children and in helping children cope with and process significant medical events. Sooo I pretty much spent the whole morning playing.
The vast majority of my time was spent working with a 5-year-old patient. She only spoke Spanish, which made it a really great opportunity for me to put my 933 Duolingo streak to use. I faired pretty well and made it through few hours of coloring and pretending to be a customer at a restaurant without having to reference a translating app more than 3 times. I had a lot of fun and learned a few new Spanish words (at one point she was asking for Play-Doh and I brought her a toy banana, bonus point’s if you know what the Spanish words for both). It reminded me of my time working back at MOXI and of how much I love “teaching” (I use quotes because I mean teaching through playing) and working with kids.
Not sure if I mentioned this before, but for this rotation I’ve been trying to do a more business causal dress as my daily attire, so dress shirt and tie. We have the option of that or scrubs, and I wanted to try doing the former, partially inspired by a MD I used to work with when I volunteered in the NICU. Anyways, today was the first time this year I donned one of my bowties.
In the afternoon, I was back in neurology. Got to see a couple more interesting cases. I definitely need to pick-up on my studying though. With all the fun of working with this patient population, it’s easy to forget how much material is covered in Peds.
nANIMOv 