Goals & Learning

With a lifelong love of puzzles, I have always wanted to take puzzles with me wherever I go. That is why when I was younger, I settled on the career path of Internal Medicine. I have always been interested in knowing and understanding the way illnesses plant their roots in the human body and what we can do to combat that. I have been fortunate enough to have lab time where I get to study slides with cancerous cells and I get to assess them. I want to go to the top teaching hospital with a strong program specialized in internal medicine–Mass. Gen. in Boston. Through studying and working in this current program, I know I will be able to make it there. This career choice satisfies every medical desire I have ever had.  

My goals have changed a lot since starting a year ago. I will not be with my site again this next school year and I will be starting opportunities elsewhere. I have definitely learned how to function in an office environment, and adjust to what is expected of me. I did not get as much lab time as I expected to get this year, so I unfortunately did not reach my goal of hoping to gain lab experience for the future. By this time next year I hope to be an extremely strong and independent student, and I would love to flourish in doing so. 

Learning Goal #1: I want to learn how to conduct myself in a professional office setting. 

Relevance: Obviously, the field in which I plan to go into is extremely professional, and I will need to know how to properly conduct myself in front of patients, fellow doctors, and my superiors. 

Action Plan: I will keep in close contact to those in my office and ask for feedback on my performance and upkeep in the office. With their feedback, I can actively incorporate it into what I am working on achieving. 

Progress: I have learned a lot about working in an office! Everyone works closely together to help out one another, and I have gained valuable experience about coexisting in an office space. It was a strange adjustment initially, having never worked in an office environment before, but I have grown to learn how to conduct myself and uphold what it expected of me. I had to learn how to adjust to having team meetings--something I had never experienced before--and learn how to offer something to the table at them. 

Learning Goal #2: I want to learn how to inform and educate people about clinical trials. I also want to learn how to properly reach out to healthcare providers when requesting information from them.

Relevance: Where I will be someday working in close quarters to many other healthcare professionals, it is extremely important to have a clear understanding of how to ask for certain information when I'll need it. 

Action Plan: I can review presentations and notes of promoting tissue collection properly and communicate the information I learn to others to ensure I have a solid understanding of it. As for requesting information, I can compare early requests to later requests and compare them for improvement. 

Progress: I got the wonderful opportunity of listening to our volunteer informed consent team at one of our donation events! They walk the donor through the process of what it means to donate breast tissue, while also explaining the importance of tissue donation and how it helps researchers all over the nation. I learned on a deeper level what it means to run the ins and outs of a clinical trial and what that does for us on a national level. 

Learning Goal #3: I want to learn the ins and outs of lab life so I can assist with research and get hands on experience in it.

Relevance: Being a doctor means being hands on, the earlier I can get this experience the better.

Action Plan: I can shadow our lab manager as well as assisting in pulling samples from storage. On my own, I can improve my personal knowledge by reading articles and studies in my free time.

Progress: This goal was not met as I did not have much, if any, lab time during my year here. I would've loved to see the nitty-gritty work up close and personal, but there was not much of an opportunity to. My goal has changed to hoping to find some lab experience going forward to be prepared for my future.