Today’s overarching theme seemed to be centered around emotional and mental health. Hearing how Helen and Carol wrestled with their feelings of guilt and constant search for answers tugged closely at my heartstrings. As providers, we are so focused on healing patients and family members physically that sometimes we struggle to consider how people may need to heal mentally. I was astonished at how Helen and Carol expressed their concerns about the feelings of the healthcare providers involved with their loved ones care. It wasn’t even something I would have expected to cross their minds or ever be a concern to them. In truth, it made me disappointed in myself because, despite Helen’s and Carol’s experiences, they cared more about our healthcare provider’s emotional and mental well being probably more than we even do for ourselves on a daily basis.
The past two days have been amazing. I have learned so much. In some ways I am heartbroken because I have missed so much at home, including my oldest sons first day of third grade-which at this moment I do not think he will let me live down. However, I am here because I understand the value of investment. I am here to learn how to make health care a safer place. I am here to figure out how to right the wrong that took place over ten years ago when my father was still alive. You see, I live with the guilt that I didn’t do more and in a way I feel like I didn’t matter enough. This is something that I have struggled with for a long time, but have never found the right outlet to express my feelings.
Over… Continue reading
It was another amazing day in Napa. Some of my favorite parts of the day involved our guests and faculty that shared their stories and served on a panel. We were introduced to Jack’s story today and I was inspired by his positive outlook after his medical error occurred. It shows pure determination and supports the premise that be open and honest as a provider, such as his provider was with him, can preserve a patient-provider relationship. I also really appreciated the panel discussion that we had with Carol, Helen, and Jack. They each had there own input on a variety of patient safety questions and how the family responded to their specific events. They also highlighted the importance of communication between providers and families. After our programming today, we were able to go to a reception offered by The Doctor’s Company. It was such a nice experience and… Continue reading
The second day of the Marseille Experience added fuel towards my interest in patient safety. Dr. Mayer had another great introduction as he open the meeting with a lecture format focused on reflection. Dr. Mayer state, “Be very mindful. This means when you notice things that are not right act on it”. This message had a positive impact since majority of individuals in the healthcare field would not speak up either because they are afraid of the pressure or they do not want to get out of their scope of practice. Another thing that stuck out to me was when John Nance spoke up and said, raise your hand if your institution trains you to be perfect” and 90% of the students raised their hands. Following that question, John asked again, “How many of you are perfect” no one raised their hand. This showed a good example of what the… Continue reading
These past two days have been a whirlwind of emotions and reflections on my own personal experiences. The stories that have been shared and the thought provoking discussions have been eye-opening. There is so much the healthcare systems needs to fix. To be honest, at times it seems more overwhelming than inspiring. But I figure if there is just one simple thing I can do to make one patient safe, than I’ve made a difference. If I do multiple simple things to improve my patients’ safety, then an even bigger impact can be made. I want to take it one step at a time and there are already ideas that have been shared that I hope to bring back to my medical school so at least introduce my classmates into the essential world of patient safety.
As I reflect on Day 1 in Napa Valley, I was amazed with how much I learned and how much my perspective changed. I realized that it takes a lot of courage and energy to be a leader. I thought about our purpose as a health care worker. Often we are focused on getting the work done (task oriented) as opposed to mindful purposeful engagement. I agree that often we want to hide our mistakes because of shame or fear but the reality is we need to learn from our mistakes if we want true growth to take place. I thought about working in Bronx, New York where it is a true melting pot of different cultures. We work with so many different people from different cultures and races. Have we done our best to take into consideration cultural issues and gender issues when it comes to communication. Can we… Continue reading
I was very excited to see what was in store for us. I believe the first day exceeded my expectations as it was filled with inspirational speakers that had personal encounters with health care error leading to a lost life of someone very dear to them. Dr. Mayer did a good job of setting the tone making us think and reflect of why we applied to this program and what we want to gain from this experience. When I took a moment to reflect on my purpose for attending this program, I thought there are numerous of Pharmacist, medical doctors, and other healthcare professional that have near miss errors and some errors actual lead to patient harm and this needed to be addressed. I want to gain information about how to address this problem and be an advocate towards other Pharmacists which can ultimately help in improving patient centered care.… Continue reading
What a privilege to hear the personal stories of those affected by medical errors today. The events surrounding the death of Lewis Blackman serve as the ultimate reminder to deliver patient-centered care and to be present with the whole person, not simply the condition. I can imagine that too many of the providers saw only the “15 y.o. with post-op constipation in room X,” and not Lewis, the bright young man who dreamed of travelling.
Helen Haskell specifically mentioned that no one sought to foster a relationship with her son. My first two years of medical school I planned to prioritize this. Developing partnerships with patients to restore their health was the motivation behind starting this career! But only three weeks into clerkship I am already collecting moments where I have failed at this goal. I will strive to do as Chris perfectly stated today and treat everyone like family.… Continue reading
“The patient is the most important visitor on our premises. He may be dependent on us, but we are also dependent on him. He is not an interruption to our work. He is the purpose of it. He is not an outsider to our work, he is central to it. We are not doing him a favor by serving him. He is doing us a favor by giving us the opportunity to serve him.” —Mahatma Gandhi.
I remember reading this quote in the book, Wall of Silence by Rosemary Gibson and Janardan Prasad Singh, on my way to the conference and bookmarking it because I really liked it. As only a rising second-year medical student, I feel like the effects of burnout were already starting to rear their ugly heads by the time my first year of medical school finished back in May. As awful as it sounds, I… Continue reading
It only took one day to muster up many of the feelings I’ve been taught to compartmentalize or simply accept as “part of the job”. This morning we were asked, “Why are you here? What do you want to take with you”? In the beginning, my imposter syndrome overwhelmed my mind with anxiety that I couldn’t figure out the answers to these simple questions that I knew deep down inside. The truth is: I’m tired, I’m fed up, and I don’t want to sit by and accept this anymore.
I’m tired of writing the Incident Reports that never seem to produce a change in the operating room. How many needles have to go missing until we realize our system of popping them off the suture into the air is ridiculous? How many more times will I have to hear about a fellow nurse fudging the count or the chart… Continue reading