I am currently very strong in establishing strong communication with my team on a weekly basis. As of right now, a lot of the work I am completing is remote. Because of this, it is very easy to get confused about tasks or deadlines. That is why we have agreed on weekly zoom meetings and email communication daily until our in-person research resumes. I have found myself become the team member who is reliable and willing to go out of my way to complete tasks before a deadline. A lot of the work for this internship is remote and on potential participants schedule. I must answer their emails, schedule eligibility screenings, and be a constant form of communication for them. In order for this to work successfully, I must be organized and eager to complete tasks and get these potential participants through the study. Over the course of the internship, I have seen more responsibilities be handed over to my direction. This has helped me develop into a stronger team member that is able to handle a lot more tasks at a single time.
A lot of the growth I want to see is in my confidence. I want to gain confidence in using medical jargon and professional language. Sometimes I convince myself that I'm not "old enough" or "smart enough" to use professional medical language. However, being in a setting where this language is not only encouraged but expected will help grow my confidence both in and out of the workplace. Completing eligibility screenings in the position with potential patients will also help to develop my confidence in using medical terminology. I also would love to grow in my ability to recieve and apply feedback. Being in LHSI is a great way to develop this skill. I recieve feedback on all of my assignments from my LHSI Supervisors so I can work on applying that feedback to improve my ePortfolio and other assignments. Specifically for my internship site, we are meeting for a weekly check-in where I will be recieving feedback on the previous week's work. I plan on challenging myself to take this feedback in stride and apply it to the next week's work. Taking feedback and applying it will improve my overall quality of work and is a transferable skill for any future career I might obtain.
I have definitely grown in my organization skills and multi-taking skills. A large part of this internship is the moving parts working in each participant's case. I must keep track of their therapy sessions, providing them compensation, and remembering to send them reminders. This has really caused me to write down my tasks with their deadlines to ensure that tasks are completed on time. I have also become a lot more confident during eligibility screenings and communicating with patients. I feel that the scripts I am reading are sounding a lot more natural because I am way more comfortable with the material.
Since the beginning of the school year, I have taken over many jobs to help out at my internship site. I have made many runs to Logansport to pick up surveys from potential participants, conducted many eligibility screenings, and recruited many potential participants at Eskenazi hospital. Without these tasks, we would have recruited not as many people for our research study.
Working with others on a team has offered me a chance to broaden my problem solving skills and to think in ways I have never thought. Being on a team with diverse perspectives gives an entire team time to brainstorm ways to solve problems. The team I work with communicates frequently throughout the week and shares ways to solve the problems we are going through. It teaches you to compromise as well as discover other ways to solve problems that could be easier than what you were thinking.