Blog 1: My Workplace: Tuesday Oct.11th

My workplace is called Castro Valley Pediatrics and it is a hospital for children up til the age of 21. Castro Valley Pediatrics is a small business and the address of Castro Valley Pediatrics' address is 22290 Foothill Blvd. Hayward, California 94541. A total of 13 people work here at Castro Valley Pediatrics. My workplace employs nurses and doctors.The doctors' have 4 year degrees and some of the nurses have 4 year degrees while others have 2. My workplace serves children in the Bay Area who are 21 and younger. A strength my workplace has is that because it is a small hospital it is more organized and not as hectic as a big hospital would be. A weakness my workplace has is that because not many people work here and because they have a lot of patients the workload for one person is a lot.

Blog 2: My Mentor: Tuesday Oct.18th

My mentor's name is Dr. Jerrilyn Johnston and she is a pediatrician at Castro Valley Pediatrics. On a typical day at work the office opens at 9. Dr. Johnston usually goes to the nursery in the morning to see new born babies before heading to her office. She and other doctors see their patients from 9am to 12:30pm. Lunch break starts at 12:30pm and goes on until 1:30pm. During lunch Dr. Johnston usually returns advice phone calls from her patients and does paperwork. From 2pm to 5pm Dr. Johnston begins to see her patients again and the hospital closes at 5pm. After the hospital has closed, Dr. Johnston returns more advice phone calls from her patients and does paperwork. Dr. Johnston attended CSU East Bay and majored in Biology because she was interested in science. She usually volunteered at Red Cross and the dean of Red Cross told her that she would be a good doctor and should go to medical school, which gave her the motivation to go to medical school. When she attended medical school, Dr. Johnston found out through rotations that she may be interested in pediatrics and so she did some research on premature babies and knew that she wanted to become a pediatrician in order to take care of children.

Blog 3: My Role: Tuesday Oct.25th

My main role at Castro Valley Pediatrics is to fill out Children Health and Disability forms for patients who have appointments at the hospital the next day. It is mainly just a form that the hospital fills out to make sure that the children who make appointments have insurance and are eligible to see their doctors. In addition to filling out the Children Health and Disability forms, I also copy charts for medical record releases, which are charts for patients who want to leave Castro Valley Pediatrics and go to a different hospital. I also shadow my mentor Dr. Johnston when she sees her patients, and I file patients' medical information in their charts. I usually get to my internship at 8:45. I then talk to my mentor (if she is there) and go straight into the office where I work and go online to see all the appointments that all the doctors have the next day. I write down the paitients' names and I go inside the lab to pull out their charts. I give the charts to Judy and Lanice who are the nurses who are in charge of making appointments for patients. I then being filing medical records for patients while waiting for Judy and Lanisha to finish working on the charts I give them. This usually takes from 9am to 12:20pm. Lunch break is from 12:30 to 1:30pm. I then come back to work and I talk with my mentor for a couple of minutes and shadow her to see a few of her patients. After shadowing her, I go to the office and take the medical charts from Judy and Lanisha and fill out the Child Health and Disability forms for the patients and return them back to Judy and Lanisha who keep them and give them to the patients the next day. If there is more time, I file some more medical records for patients, which usually ends my day at my internship.

Blog 4: Project Brainstorm: Tuesday Nov.1st

For my WLE project, I am thinking about creating a book to publicize a day in the life of a pediatrician by taking pictures of my mentor doing her job and writing information under the pictures about what it is like for her to be a pediatrician. My advisor Joel helped me come up with this idea on Thursday because I was not really yet sure about what type of project I wanted to do for WLE yet. I am excited that I will be creating this book for my WLE project because it can help me and others who are interested in becoming doctors to get a glimpse of what being a doctor looks like and what types of skills a person will need in order to be a successful one. It can also show other people in the community who go to the hospital the things that their doctor does. The first thing that I will need to do to finish my project in the next 3-4 weeks is to continue shadowing my mentor and taking pictures of her taking care her patients, making advice calls, doing paperwork, reading lab results, and doing other important things. Next, I will start to get the materials that I need to make the book. After I have gathered all the information that I need, I will then begin to put my book together. 

Blog 5: Progress on my WLE Project, part 1: Tuesday Nov.8th

Today at my WLE, I continued to pull charts of the patients that had appointments on the next day and I filled out the Child Health and Disability forms for the patients who were coming in for Health Checks or for shots and had Medi-Cal as their insurance. I also filed medical records in different patients medical folders. I told my mentor, Dr. Johnston what I was thinking about doing for my WLE project, which was a book that would publicize a day in the life of a pediatrician. My mentor thought that it was a good idea but she felt that I could do a project that would actually help me learn about something in the medical field. We talked about possible projects and we came up with an idea of making like flyers/ information sheets about diseases that can harm children. For example, I would make a flyer talking about the disease pertussis (whooping cough), its effects on our community and list the cost of getting vaccinated against this disease at local pharmacies like Walgreens, Rite Aid, Safeway Pharmacies, Longs Drugs, and local free clinics. After I have made the flyers, the hospital would hand the information out to their patients as they come in to check in with the front desk. More people have been getting affected by pertussis in the Alameda County each year and people don't even think about getting vaccinated against the disease because they naturally think that they won't get sick from it. I also feel like this research will not only help the community, but will help me understand the affects of common diseases and how I can protect myself from them better than I do right now. When I was at my WLE on Tuesday, my mentor and I looked at different websites like the Alameda County Public Health Department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to find out information about whooping cough and she printed out all of the information that we found on them and gave them to me to look at.

Blog 6: Leadership Skills: Tuesday Nov.15th

The leadership skills that I am using the most at my internship are completing projects effectively and communicating powerfully. I am doing a good job of using the leadership skill completing projects effectively because I always complete the assignments that the nurses and my mentor Dr. Johnston give to me and I do the work the way that they tell me to do it. I am also doing a good job of communicating powerfully because whenever I need help to complete an assignment or if I don't fully understand the directions that were given to me I always ask clarifying questions to do a good job on an assignment. I could improve on these leadership skills as well by telling the people at my internship what I think about the assignment given to me and tell them when I feel like the work I was given was too much or if I would like to have more work.Completing projects effectively and communicating powerfully help me to do my work better because they help me work better with the people at my internship and get the work I need to get done in order to complete my WLE project. My mentor uses the leadership skill communicating powerfully the most because she lets me know what she thinks I should do for my daily task and helps me whenever I am confused on what I should be doing. Also, whenever I shadow my mentor she teaches me how she diagnoses her patients and uses a lot of showing details to describe the things that she treats her patients for and how she treats them.

Blog 7: What I learned, Reflection: Tuesday Nov.22nd

Something that I learned about myself is that I am a fast learner. Whenever the nurses give me a new task to do I try my very best to make sure that I complete the work as best as I can. I also learned that I love the work that pediatricians do. I like how they are able to take care of children who are sick and know what to give them in order to make them become well. Because I love science I also like how doctors are able to tell what to diagnose their patients with based on scientific findings. A challenge that I faced during my WLE is not fully understanding how to do a task that was given to me, for example, using the computer to find information to use to fill out the CHDP forms or how to file back patients' medical records correctly, but I overcame these obstacles by asking the nurses a lot of questions in order to fully understand what I was supposed to be doing and not to make any mistakes. I learned that I have a passion for taking care of children. When I first came to Impact I wasn't really sure about what I wanted to become in the future, but then I began to realize my love science and I always loved to take care of children. It was last year that I realized that I may want to become a pediatrician and so I took this internship to see if I would feel the same way and I do. Now I know that I do not have to go to school and get a PhD just to become a doctor. I always thought that I'd have to go to school for a very long time, but that's not the case. I just have to get my masters' degree in order to become a pediatrician and if I decide that I want a PhD, I can get that later on. A specific skill that I practiced at my WLE is communicating powerfully. I needed to be able to tell people what I am thinking about and express my concerns and ideas about a certain task and I will definitely need to use that leadership skill when I am a pediatrician because I will need to be able to communicate with my patients about questions and concerns about their health. If someone were to ask me why what I did at my WLE was important I would say that making informational flyers about the whooping cough disease is important because it would help educate people who do not know about the affects the disease has on our community and what they can do in order to lower the amount of people who get sick and even die from this disease. The skills and information about peoples' health that I have learned will affect the choices that I make in the future because I will now take my health more seriously and talk to others about how important it is to make sure that they stay healthy and let them know the types of things that can happen to them if they don't do so.

Blog 8: Professionalism: Tuesday Nov.29th

In order to find my WLE and get hired, I had to call Castro Valley Pediatrics. I left a message for Dr. Johnston and she called me back the next day. We then scheduled an interview for that Friday. I had my interview with Dr. Johnston and Dr. Carim. I took my resume and cover letter and wore professional clothes to the interview. The most effective way of looking for a job and getting hired is by calling many different places. You should call a variety of different jobs. A lot of the times when I called different doctor's offices I called after their working hours and was always asked to leave messages. I usually don't like leaving messages and so I didn't leave messages for about 3 offices. When I told my mom she said that I should leave messages and so I did leave one for Dr. Johnston when I called Castro Valley Pediatrics, telling her brief information about the WLE project and she called back. So leaving messages for the places where you would like to do your WLE at is very helpful if they don't answer their phone. It is also good to make a resume and cover letter to take with you to job interviews in order to show jobs your skills and past jobs and volunteer work. It's  important to wear business attire when going to an interview and especially important to speak professionally because it is important to make a good first impression to the person who may be your boss. As a result of my WLE, I think that being a professional or a responsible person in the work world means that you must be able to utilize the leadership skills completing projects effectively, thinking critically, communicating powerfully, and collaborating productively on a daily basis to get your work done. I also think that a professional or a responsible person in the work world is someone who works hard and puts 100% into their work.

Blog 9: Life at my WLE: Tuesday Dec.6th

Today my mentor Dr. Johnston, and I went to George Mark Childrens House to donate 3 boxes of toys to the children who go there. George Mark Childrens House is a hospital that takes care of children with life limiting and severe illnesses by providing them with comfort and care. When we got there we met a lady that Dr. Johnston knew and she took us on a quick tour of the hospital. It was truly an eye opening experience and I was glad that I had the opportunity to go there. I got to see some of the children, meet the very kind staff, and feel the amazingly peaceful and warm atmosphere that filled the air there. Everything that they have there, from the bedrooms to the kitchen, was made in order that families can be with each other as much as possible during this drastic time in their lives. When the child dies, the hospital provides a room for them to preserve the body for up to 1 week and they also help the family with planning the funeral and supporting them as much as possible. There is also a chapel at the back of the hospital where they do funerals. To be honest, hearing about and seeing what these children go through was very heartbreaking for me and it reminded me why I would love to be a pediatrician. So that I can be able to make a positive difference in kids lives whether they have something as simple as a cold or something as severe as life threatening diseases. I also filled out CHDP forms and I filed patients' medical records. I have improved as an intern because I already know the different tasks that I should be doing as soon as I get to the hospital. I also don't get confused when the nurses give me a new assignment to do because I know how to use the system better than I did when I first came here. Something about my workplace that makes it such a great place to work is because the staff there is very nice and very fun to be around. I always have a good time whenever I go to my internship and I feel like working at a smaller hospital like CVP is a better choice than working at a big hospital like Kaiser because I am sure that I learned more here than I would've learned at a big hospital.

Blog 10: The End: Tuesday Dec. 13th

I loved my WLE. I am glad that I was able to have my internship at Castro Valley Pediatrics. I feel that I was lucky to get the opportunity to intern there and hopefully I will go back and intern there next year. I learned a lot of things by working here for these past 11 weeks. I chose to work at a pediatrics office in order to see if I still want to pursue my passion of becoming a pediatrician and this experience of interning at my WLE reassures me that becoming a pediatrician is something I will most likely do in the future. My experience at Castro Valley Pediatrics will affect what type of WLE I look for next year because I will probably go back to Castro Valley Pediatrics, but do a project that will affect not just the clientele of CVP but more people in the community. i would like to organize an event to help fundraise and donate to help parents support the children and the George Mark Childrens House because it is hard to pay off medical expenses. I also hope to volunteer at the George Mark Childrens House during summer break so I will probably be able to get a better idea of the type of project I would like to do.