Journals
These journals reflect my weekly experiences as an athletic training student. Each journal reflects either an actual patient contact experience, or something I am working on in my athletic training courses.
I believe my favorite part of clinical experience so far is being able to perform evaluations on athlete. Since I am with football this semester, there is a ton of injuries. I used to be very hesitant with injuries, and now I want to perform every evaluation I can. From the beginning of the year to now, I have grown a lot as an athletic training student. I was nervous to make mistakes, but now I am not afraid to speak what I think for certain injuries. Cole has been very helpful in directing me into the right direction when performing evaluation. So every evaluation I perform, I can feel my confidence boost. Its also really exciting when you perform an evaluation, and your preceptor agrees with your diagnosis. I believe as the semester continues, I am not going to be nervous when performing my exit interview. This semester has been preparing me a lot towards my exit interview. This is special to me because I used to be very conserved when performing evaluations. Now, when an athlete walks in and needs an evaluation I jump at the opportunity. I believe the more evaluations I perform, the more I learn how to perfect them. I have been clinical experiencing a lot during clinic times which allows me to have a lot of opportunities for evaluations. I have also been performing a lot of rehabs. I used to hate rehabs and everything to do with physical therapy, but this semester it has grown slightly on me. I’m not sure if this because I have performed so many and it seems to flow easier, or if I enjoy doing it. But I don’t think PT would be something I would want to pursue in the future. However, performing evaluations is what I want to do in the future, which is why I think I love doing evaluations so much. I want to become an orthopedic PA, which I would perform many special tests. So this is another reason why this has been my favorite part of my clinical experience so far. I also been slacking a lot on getting my clinical packet finished. I have been working on it, however, not as often as I wished I could have been. I have been focusing a lot of my time trying to get ahead in classes, which has been helping me a lot. My plan is to work over thanksgiving break to know all my injuries and can come back and get masteries. This week I was able to get 2 attempts.
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Coming to the end of my junior year, I have had a lot of ups and downs. I came into the semester with a positive attitude and was very excited to begin a new year. At the beginning of the year, I constantly talked with the sophomores/freshmen asking if they needed any help or assistance with their schoolwork. I have also tried to be a mentor to them while in the clinic. I know my sophomore year I was hesitant to help athletes because I didn’t know a lot at the beginning, so I have been trying to help them feel more confident while they are in the clinic. My biggest advice that I have shared with them is to try to get ahead in every class. This advice isn’t as easy as it sounds. I am still trying my best to use this advice. However, I have realized by getting ahead in classes you are able to understand the lectures easier and can begin asking questions on the things you are still confused on earlier. I shared this advice with them because getting ahead in classes helps a lot when tests come along. This way one wont need to cram for the test the night before, and this not only helps with academics but with one’s stress level. I know for me personally I stress about a test that is two weeks away. However, when I started getting ahead in my classes I was able to have two sets of notes (one from reading on my own & the lectures in class). From my point of view, I believe this is the best advice for any student who is struggling in their classes. Upperclassmen have also been very helpful to me. I am able to go to them for advice or questions when I need assistance. I believe the best word to describe the start of the program with the upperclassmen is the word encouragement. This semester is the first semester I have taken a class with the upperclassmen. This class is just as hard to them as it is for me, which shows there isn’t a difference between my class and theirs. They have always been encouraging since the beginning of the year by influencing me to begin my clinical packet early and studying for classes. I enjoy being in this program because the upperclassmen have been very helpful to me when I am struggling in classes or life in general. Its nice to hear about their stories and how they figured out what to do in situations.
This semester I didn’t think I would have much trouble with my classes except for Chemistry. My last chemistry class was my junior year of high school. So I knew I was going to have to study extra for this class. However, I do not think this is the most challenging class I am taking this semester. For me personally, I believe my Human Anatomy class is the hardest. It doesn’t seem like this class would be challenging, but for some reason I can not grasp the material well. I know a lot of the material he teaches in class, but I cannot do well on the tests. I think one part of this reason is because I am very intimidated by Dr. Graham. He teaches the PA students at Emory’s Graduate school, which is where I want to go. So I feel a lot of pressure in his class to make myself do well because I want to be able to open up to him and let him know I am very interested in Emory’s PA program. However, I have not felt like I have been doing good enough in his class to be able to do that, so I am trying to push myself to get better grades so I can open up to him. I think that’s a main reason I find this class challenging because I am putting a lot of pressure on myself to do so well in that class that I begin to second guess myself. Since our first test, I have changed how I have been studying. I have been reading the chapter before he goes over it in class which has been really helpful. I have also begun to do this in all of my classes. I have been finding it hard to find time to do this in all classes, but it has been so much helpful to know the material before the lecture. I think this is a good way to change the way I study. I have been focusing a lot of my time on Human Anatomy. I have a test coming up this Tuesday, so I have been studying for this test for the past two weeks. So hopefully I have figured out a way to increase my grade in this class. This week I was able to get 3 attempts. I have been slacking a lot in clinical book, so I am trying to plan time this week where I can go into the clinic and get masteries.
My clinical question this year is “Does consistent lack of sleep affect sports performance in collegiate athletes.” My clinical committee consists of Am as my group partner, Melissa Davis as my AT advisor, Brianne Kilbourne as my Faculty Advisor, and Mike Caro as my content expert. Am and I decided to research this clinical topic because as athletes we feel we do not get enough sleep. Of course there is multiple variables that take into account when complaining of not having enough sleep. This question is more personal to us in order to find the answers to how to better ourselves as athletes. There is also a player on our team who does not get enough sleep each week, and we wanted to know if this affects her performance. However, this question is a lot bigger than just personal use. We are very curious to research the different amounts of sleep needed in order to have the highest performance rate. Being a part of the SAAC committee, I have been able to hear a lot of complaints from the athletes. A big complaint involves getting back from an away game around midnight and having to go to classes or practice early in the morning. This research would be good information to relay back to the SAAC department to show what the studies have proven about collegiate athletes, and their performance based on their sleep. Lastly, this research will allow me to be able to help other athletes in balancing their time to either get more sleep or prioritize when they have multiple games during that week. So far we have been able to find three articles that will be really beneficial to our question. Coach Caro has read many studies on this case and is eager to work with Am and I on finding the best articles for our clinical question. This week I didn’t have much time to get many masteries or attempts because it was fall break. However, since it was fall break I was able to attend a practice (which I haven’t done in a long time). It felt really good being back in the clinic for pre practice, because I was able to do a lot more things like taping, bracing, and ultrasound. I was able to get three more attempts this week. I know this is not my ideal goal, but I am planning time in this upcoming week to meet my goals.
I do believe what I have been learning in the classroom has paralleled to my clinical experience this semester. My clinical class this semester has brought up a lot of topics on the things I have seen when I am clinically experiencing in the field house. Throughout my clinical class this semester, we have learned about different injuries from PBLs. Since I do not spend a lot of time with the football team when they practice, I get to see a lot more injuries/rehab because I am scheduled for clinic times. Recently, I was able to observe/assist Cole with a back injury. The athlete had already had an evaluation, so it was a following rehab that I assisted Cole with. Cole walked me through what happened to the athlete and the steps taken to help him recover. I was able to talk with Cole about different back injuries as in: lordosis, kyphosis, swayback, and forward head posture. We were able to assess that the athlete had a significant forward head posture, and we immediately started rehab to decrease this action. It was interesting to bring this situation to Cole because he was impressed I knew these terms. So I felt like I gained some brownie points from this experience because it helped my confidence. Another class that has been really helpful for me is my Human Anatomy class. Throughout this class we have gone over the integumentary system and the bones. Even though I knew a lot about this already, I was able to review these subjects which has been very helpful. Cole has taught me that knowing anatomy helps a lot with an evaluation. So this class has been really helpful because it has refreshed my memory. For example, an athlete came in with a hand injury and Cole asked me to perform an evaluation. I was able to tell Cole which carpal bone I thought was injured because I had just recently gone over the anatomy of the hand in my class. This is just a few examples of how my classes have been tying into my clinical experience. It has been really helpful this semester, even if some things are a review. This week I was able to record 1 mastery and 7 attempts. However, I did not meet my goal for this week. I was able to clinically experience the football game, which allowed me to get most of my attempts for this week. |
Reflective JournalsThese journal entries express my experience as an athletic training student Archives
April 2019
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