Clinical Journal #1
Before going to the hospital for clinical I was quite nervous because I was not sure
exactly what we would be doing. However, I knew we would be on labour and delivery, but that
made me more nervous because I had hardly been around babies, and never around new babies
and because of this I felt like I was going to be so much more behind than the others. However,
when everyone arrived and not many people knew much about young children it put me a little
more at ease to know our knowledgebase was all relatively close.
When we arrived into the L &D unit and heard the new babies crying just after delivery I
became quite excited about being able to witness someone giving birth. However, I was a little
disappointed that we did not get to do much the first day. I was expecting a part of the day to be
orientation, but was not expecting the whole day to be.
I thought orientation in the first day was quite long; however, we need to be orientated to
know what was going on around us, so in that retrospect found it very informing. When we were
able to set up trays I thought that was good because I am a visual learner so seeing it done right
in front of me made it stick more than if I had to read or hear about it. By the end of the day I
felt quite over whelmed because so much information was thrown at us. I was quite stressed the
night after our first clinical because of everything we were told that day.
On the second day when we got to apply the ultra sound and TOCCO on each other and
pretend like our peers were real patients, which I thought was very good because I am a visual
learner. I felt by actually doing it, it made it more real and prepared me for when we will have to
do it on a labour patient. I still will be nervous, but I feel a little better know that I have used the
machine before. The second day seemed to be quite long because there was no one in labour and
delivery and I felt like we sat in a room all day.
Overall, the two days of clinical I learned so much that I did not know about before then.
I look forward to our second week of clinical and hope we will get to experience a lot of
different things. If I can watch many different procedures I will feel so much better when I have
to do them on my own because I will know what to expect before I do it and just watching
someone do something help so much with my learning.
Kimberly Nelson
Labour and Delivery
September 25, 2008