Week 3: October 29, 2008

Not the best day today. Had a good morning, where I was in the pool, part of the amputee team meeting, then had to go put a few patients prostheses on before the ward round, but I did not enjoy the afternoon and I can’t really pinpoint why – it just wasn’t good!

In the afternoon, I was assigned an indigenous Australian woman, who was in the gym for the first time, because she had just come to the hospital. The patient has recently had a below knee amputation, hence her presentation in the amputee gym. My supervisor told me to perform an initial assessment of the patient, which included an amputee rehabilitation assessment, LCI, strength and muscle tests and then left me on my lonesome. This pissed me off immensely, because not only was it basically the first time I had seen these sheets, but I was with a middle aged woman with poor eyesight, hearing problems and a lack of english and general communication skills. I got started on my assessment though and did the best I could.

About half way through, one of the senior amputee physios came over to lend a hand with the remainder of my assessment and we made an exercise program for the patient as well – the extra bit of guidance was fantastic. I know the things that I did were not very good, but under the circumstances I think I did a bloody good job, and yes, I will look for excuses. My thoughts at the time were that I might as well get on with it because there was no way I would get better without practice. I guess this also alerted me to the fact that I will not always be working in ideal circumstances and there is not a whole lot I can do about it!

To improve the process, I would have shown the patient the big map of WA earlier, so that she could point where she lived. This was a significant event in the process, because it gave the patient a chance to speak more about her normal setting, something she appreciated, which also allowed her to open up more.

This was a good learning experience.