Running head: SERVICE LEARNING JOURNALS
Service Learning Journals
Erin McCann
Ferris State University
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SERVICE LEARNING JOURNALS
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Journal 1
Village Pharmacy
November 10th 2014
I decided to volunteer at Village Pharmacy in Ann Arbor, MI. This is the
pharmacy that my mother works at. I am volunteering to take blood pressures and help
with flu vaccinations. I looked up information about blood pressure first. I wanted to
thoroughly explain what blood pressure is, in a way that people can understand. After I
looked up information I created a simple definition, “the pressure of blood flowing
throughout the body. It is related to heart rate and the force of contraction the heart must
have to deliver blood to the rest of the body.” This was a definition that anyone would be
able to understand. I read through my book to look at the blood pressure tables for the
definition of “normal” blood pressure, prehypertension and hypertension, as well as the
typical treatments for each category of abnormal blood pressures. I found information
about why people get high blood pressure and the things people can do to lower his/her
blood pressure. I then made a flyer to give people about the flu vaccine that included
information on why people should get it and its benefits. As well as why (in January) it is
not too late to receive one.
By researching all the information I was going to use to make flyers and my
poster I made sure all the information I was giving was accurate and helpful. The
information I included answers a lot of questions that pharmacists and nurses get every
day. This activity helped me learn a little bit more about blood pressure and flu
vaccinations. I figured out ways to help people learn how to lower their blood pressure
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and I also learned the information I needed to share with patients when they were
receiving flu shots.
By researching this information more I met the theoretical base for practice goal. I
did this by looking for reasons why blood pressure could be high and what to do in those
cases so I can teach patients how to correctly monitor their blood pressure. For example,
if the patient has been up and walking around they need to sit down for ten minutes
before getting his/her blood pressure checked (this is best practice since activity elevates
blood pressure). I also read about flu shot administration, who does and who doesn’t get
them, and adverse reactions. I know now that I have to ask about food allergies, thus I
learned how to be even safer with administration in more ways than just the injection. I
also met the scholarship for practice goal. I did this by looking through several different
websites and deciding which research and information was reliable, and consistent with
what I’ve learned in nursing school.
Journal 2
Village Pharmacy
January 5th, 2015
I put together a flyer to hand out to people that came into the pharmacy and
wanted information about blood pressure. I had to go over the information I would be
handing out with the pharmacists at the store. They made sure the information was
accurate and appropriate to give to their patients. Once I finalized the flyer I made copies
of it and folded them like brochures. The first day I volunteered in the pharmacy I mainly
took blood pressures. I learned something new though, with the type of blood pressure
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cuff the pharmacy provided, it had to be taken on the right arm, and the arm had to be
resting on the table as close to heart level as possible or the blood pressure reading would
not be accurate. The patients I had the first day had fairly good blood pressures, I just
talked to a few of them about the exercise they could try to keep their blood pressures
normal. I also talked to one of the pharmacists about flu shots, and how I was taught to
give them because he was very nervous that he was going to hurt someone. I watched
how he did it (which was the same way I learned) and just reminded him not to massage
the site, which he had forgotten about.
The time I spent volunteering helped the patients because it helped them
understand what a good blood pressure is and how to keep it there or how to get it to a
healthier level. I also feel that I helped the pharmacist who was certified to give flu
vaccinations become more confident in his ability to do so. Also, making sure he was
doing it correctly (to my knowledge) helped ensure that he was safe in giving them. This
experience helped me meet my goals because I was able to communicate with another
health care professional and help them gain some confidence in what he was doing. I also
got to help a patient come up with some exercises she could do to lower her blood
pressure.
A course outcome I met through this experience is theoretical base for practice. I
was able to provide safe, quality care to patients by taking their blood pressures, asking
them about their exercise habits, and asking them if they are on any blood pressure
medications. These questions helped me to assess a little bit of their history and address
areas I could discuss with them. Helping a pharmacist make sure he was going to give flu
vaccines correctly also helped me provide safe, quality care because I made sure I looked
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at my books for how to do it correctly, helped him actually perform it correctly, and made
sure that it was given correctly and safely.
Journal 3
Village Pharmacy
January 6th, 2015
Today I went to the pharmacy and set up my work station with a sign that said,
“Free Blood Pressure Screenings.” I got several patients to participate in the screening
today. A lot of them were on blood pressure medications or knew they were prehypertensive and wanted some advice on foods they could eat or exercise they could do
to help themselves lower their blood pressure. I got asked several times if I knew what
cold medicines they could take if they had high blood pressure; for this I had to ask the
pharmacist. I learned a lot about medications that are made for people who have a history
of high blood pressure. For example (name of the drug) is designed to not alter
someone’s blood pressure and the patient could take it and not have to worry about the
drugs affects.
I helped the patients in this community today because I was able to help them
address questions they had about medications. This in turn lead to them safely treating
their colds with medications that wouldn’t cause issues with blood pressure. This helped
me meet my goal to use my communication skills and practice patient education, which
was something I really wanted to do with this experience. It also helped me interact with
another discipline (pharmacists) because I had to ask them about the medication the client
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was already taking and then about what type of medicine he/she could take if he/she had
a cold.
I met the course objective of professionalism through this experience because I
used the knowledge I have about blood pressure and medications used to control blood
pressure to help the patient select a medicine he/she could safely use. I also used
professionalism by fulfilling my volunteer job of taking blood pressures, helping the
client understand what it means (if it’s good, bad, or needs to improve), and also helping
them understand that some over the counter medications are going to cause them to have
problems controlling their blood pressure, and there are safer alternatives. Overall, I feel
like I learned a lot more about the pharmaceutical side of the issues with blood pressure
control, and I am really grateful for that because it will help me to give my patients in the
hospital more information if they ever need it.
Journal 4
Village Pharmacy
January 29th 2015
Today I took a lot of blood pressures again. Most peoples’ were within normal
limits and some were pre-hypertensive values, but for the most part those patients knew
they had elevated blood pressure and were consulting with a doctor about ways to control
it. I had one patient who let me take her blood pressure and she knew she had high blood
pressure, and had a tendency to get nervous whenever someone was going to take her
blood pressure. When I got the first reading with the automatic blood pressure cuff it was
very high (around 180/100), so I asked her what she had been doing before she came in
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and it turned out she had been shoveling her driveway and had not taken her medication
in a few days because she ran out of her prescription. I had a pharmacist come over and
talk to her with me about what she should do, and her options for getting automatic refills
so she doesn’t run out again. She also said that she needed rides to the pharmacy to get
her prescriptions so we helped her come up with a way to remember when she would
need to schedule that ride. She took a pill there and the pharmacist had her wait for a
while and I took it before she left and it was 150/94, which was a lot better than before.
Having her wait was partly go get her body to relax so her blood pressure would go down
and also to let the medicine start to work. The pharmacist and I went over the importance
of taking blood pressure medications every day and ways to naturally control blood
pressure (i.e. exercise).
I was able to meet my goals today because I had a conversation with the patient
about the importance of taking her blood pressure medications every day. I helped her
come up with ways to make sure she would remember to take them. I also explained to
her why it was so important to take them by talking about the dangers of having high
blood pressure. This was a good patient teaching experience for me. I also collaborated
with the pharmacists for this patient for help talking about the medication and how it
worked and they also helped explain the importance of always getting the prescription on
time and ways to make sure that happens as well.
I was able to meet the course objective, health care environment, by assessing the
patients’ access to her prescription medication. She is able to get her prescription refilled
automatically; however, she just couldn’t get a ride into the pharmacy quick enough. So a
lack of transportation was contributing to her health. The pharmacist and I went over
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when she can get her next refill so that she can find a ride in advance. I met the course
objective, collaborative leadership because the pharmacist and I worked together to come
up with a way to make sure she gets her blood pressure medications on time, and every
day.
Journal 5
Village Pharmacy
January 31st 2015
Today I went to the pharmacy and did blood pressure screenings and the
discussed healthy blood sugars, as well as what is considered high and low blood sugar. I
also talked about how doctors test for diabetes. The pharmacy student that was there had
never done blood sugar checks except for in a class a long time ago, so he and I reviewed
how to do it.. We talked to several diabetic patients about their insulin regimens and
actually learned a lot more about it than I had before. We also discussed appropriate
foods to eat when blood sugar gets too low and the patient needs something quickly, and
we talked about foods that raise blood sugars a lot and encouraged people to avoid those
as much as possible. I talked about healthy diet and exercise in order to keep blood sugars
at appropriate levels. The pharmacy student was able to answer more questions about
diabetic medications than I was; however, I did learn a lot about medications given to
type II diabetics and about the different types of insulin as well. Most of the blood
pressures I took today were within normal limits, except for one patient whose was
elevated and normally it was much lower than what our machine read. I had the patient
sit down while he waited for his prescription and took it again about fifteen minutes later
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and it had returned to normal. I talked to this patient about the effects exercising or
running around doing things can raise blood pressure, and that it is best to wait twenty
minutes before checking to get an accurate read.
I met my goals today by participating in patient education. I was able to teach a
couple patients stuff they didn’t know about blood pressure as well as blood sugar. I
worked along side a pharmacy student and worked well with him. I think I’ve learned to
work with other professions well throughout my whole experience.
By taking blood pressures and blood sugars on members of this community it
helped me to analyze this community’s general health status. This met the course
objective, generalist nursing practice. In this community there are a lot of patients who
are hypertensive and a lot of type II diabetics. I also met the course outcome,
collaborative leadership by working with another student to perform our tasks for the day.
Journal 6
Village Pharmacy
March 12th, 2015
Today I took several blood pressures and went over the guidelines for “normal” or
“good” blood pressures, pre-hypertensive blood pressures, and then the levels that are
considered true hypertension with the staff in the pharmacy. A lot of them had forgotten
or didn’t know what the ranges were and patients ask them fairly often, so it was good for
them to be reminded. I also discussed this with a few patients who fell in the prehypertensive range and talked to them about starting to exercise and asking their doctor
what they recommend they should do for exercise, as well as things they can do to
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improve their diet. I was asked again today about what medicine a patient could take for a
because she had high blood pressure, and the pharmacist let me counsel the patient while
she listened to my explanation. I felt confident answering most of her questions, and then
I referred her to the pharmacist for a couple additional questions she had about
medications.
I met my goals today by not only working with the pharmacists to coordinate
patient care, but I also refreshed their memories on the guidelines for blood pressures. I
went over my information packets with them too and had them keep some if they ever
needed to reference it. They taught me a lot more about medications than I knew before,
which was nice too. I got to educate a couple patients about medication administration
and cold medicines they could take with high blood pressure.
I met the course objective, theoretical base for practice by teaching the new blood
pressure guidelines. This allowed me to refresh the pharmacists’ knowledge about what
prehypertension and hypertension is defined as, and the interventions done for both of
them. This was based on the evidence-based practice research I found on this topic. I also
was able to meet this objective by teaching patients ways that they can naturally lower
their blood pressure by exercising and diet modification. The things I was teaching them
were also evidence-based practice interventions.
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Service Learning Proposal
Erin McCann
Ferris State University
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Abstract
This paper will describe the opportunity a student has to further her experience
with patients. The paper will describe the facility the student will be volunteering at. It
will also talk about how the facility contributes to the community and helps with
community health. There will also be a description about the student’s responsibilities
and tasks, as well as, what the student expects to learn from this experience. How the
student’s performance is going to be evaluated will also be included.
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Service Learning Proposal
Service learning is something that was started not too long ago. It is becoming
really important to colleges to incorporate it because of the benefits it has shown to give.
According to AACC (2010), students who were involved in service learning scored
higher in five out of six academic areas than those who did not participate in a service
learning experience. They also had higher GPAs. It has been proved that service learning
improves students’ learning outcomes.
Agency Description
The facility I chose is a small, privately owned pharmacy in Ann Arbor, MI. The
purpose of this facility is not only to fill prescriptions for the community, but also to
provide information about their overall health. They have to be able to provide
information to patients about the drugs they are taking as well as answer questions about
their medications, and also about their every day health (Welcome to Village Pharmacy,
2013). See appendix A for their contact information.
Volunteer Role Description
My role at the facility will be to host a health screening on four different
Saturdays. I will be taking blood pressures, blood sugars, giving flu vaccines, and talking
to patients about questions they may have on the screenings I have done. I will also
answer any other questions that I may be able to help them out with. I will provide a
pamphlet about blood pressure and how to keep it in a healthy range. I will also talk
about blood sugars and how to control them and the differences between type I and type
II diabetes. I will also hand out information that the pharmacy already has about the flu
and the vaccine the patients have received.
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Objectives as Related to Program
By volunteering to host health screenings, I hope to gain a lot of experience with
explaining the importance of the patient maintaining or improving their health. I haven’t
had that experience in the hospitals very much yet, so I hope to enhance my teaching
skills here. I will also be able to communicate with different health care professionals,
and gain experience with that. I think that will help me in the future when I go to
collaborate my patient’s care with other health care professionals. This experience will
help me to enhance my communication skills, practice professionalism, and be able to
adjust my explanations and evaluations across life spans.
Activities to Meet Objectives
I plan to have a place in the back of the store by where the pharmacists are filling
prescriptions to run blood pressure and blood sugar screenings. I will have a trifold poster
board that says, “Free blood pressure and blood sugar testing.” In it I will have the
“normal” values for each, and I will list what affects them. I will have an automatic blood
pressure cuff to use and I will have a manual just in case the automatic seems off or is not
working for some reason. I will also be helping with flu vaccinations. This pharmacy gets
very busy and the pharmacists would like some help to move the line along faster when it
gets long. So, I will work side by side with the head pharmacist to give flu shots. I plan to
give out pamphlets about blood pressure and blood sugar and how to keep both in healthy
levels. I will also be giving out pamphlets that are supplied by the pharmacy on flu
vaccinations.
Evaluation
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In order to evaluate myself, I will keep a daily log of what I did and how I felt it
went, as well as anything I could have done better. I would really like for the patients to
have some input as well. So I would like it if they would fill out score sheets, essentially.
I will have them score it from 1-5 in categories like, professionalism, satisfaction with the
information provided, and things that could be improved. I think that the pharmacists
should have input too, so at the end of my days, I will go to them and ask how they felt I
did and have them write down anything that they think I can do better.
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APPENDIX A
Contact Information:
Village Pharmacy
325 North Maple Rd.
Ann Arbor, MI 48103
(734) 668-9600
Pharmacists: Sheri McCann and Al Knaak
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References
Prentice, M., Robinson, G. (2010). Improving student learning outcomes with service
learning. American Association of Community Colleges. Retrieved from
http://www.aacc.nche.edu/Resources/aaccprograms/horizons/Documents/slorb_ja
n2010.pdf
Welcome to village pharmacy (2013). Village Pharmacy. Retrieved from
http://www.villagepharmacy2.com/Home.html