20TH DECEMBER 2019
By Sam Coleman
So when looking back on week 6, I think we are all in agreement that it is beginning to feel like all the weeks are blurring into one. The things that Caroline and I have to differentiate these are the teachings that we deliver week to week. This week was a big week in terms of content delivery and change of practice.
Monday saw us complete a teaching on respiratory assessment. Slightly unsure at what level to pitch this at as we were well aware of previous teachings on a similar subject. However, having observed current practice there appears to be little respiratory assessment and no linking this to appropriate treatments. Nonetheless teaching was reasonably interactive and seemed to go down well with the team. We followed this up by arranging joint bedside teaching sessions to allow the physios to practice their new assessment skills.
Work aside, we are trying to keep ourselves busy in the evenings; trying different places to eat and various activities. So, this time with a Christmas themed evening promised I was convinced to go to the same “Drink and Draw” as the girls had been to in previous weeks. However, to our surprise when we arrived we saw no canvases that I felt comfortable to paint a stickman on but instead it was water jug painting (just a bit different to expectations). Despite my severe lack of artistic flare and creativity even my jug turned out not half bad.
General ICU support of the physiotherapist on rotation has been going really well over the last few weeks and this week has been no exception. She has been incredibly good at taking on our teachings and directly translating them into practice on ICU. For every patient she has been auscultating as per teaching last week and has taken on our respiratory assessment format. The question that keeps coming back to us is how are we going to get this to happen with everyone rather than just the person its directly relating to?
Meanwhile Robyn has been continuing to develop relationships over in the Neuro ICU and has been working on smaller projects on their charting and their storage of the charts whilst still developing her family NEWS project.
For our Friday teaching this week we were kindly joined by Robyn and it was based on note writing and its importance for communication and progression. Now this must have been the most active and noisy teaching we have done so far, break away groups all watching YouTube videos at different times, games of Chinese whispers and practical demonstrations. Everybody seemed to be having a great time and really understood the point of our session. Reality hit when we asked them to start writing notes for each of their patients. We are still awaiting approval for the physio notes to be put in the medical notes alongside the doctor’s, so we decided to give everyone a notepad to start practicing. Some seemed more responsive than others. We don’t think that it’s what we are suggesting that is such a shock, but instead the change in work culture which can be difficult.
So, overall, another productive week all around. For now, a rare weekend with little planned so we think some more presentation prep, laptop work and maybe some holiday planning to come.
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