Blog 21: Mentorship

Literal
Mentorship Log - 56 hours total

Michael Bravo (Volunteer Coordinator) - San Dimas Community Hospital

Interpretive
The most important thing I have taken away from volunteering with San Dimas Community Hospital for the Senior project is the experience I have culminated. Senior Project prompted me to take this opportunity which I never would have taken advantage of had I not been required to. I am almost certain after taking into full consideration my experience that I will not go into nursing. I have seen both the good and bad in it and don't think it is the best course to take. However, I am sure that health care is something I want to continue exploring and still holds my interests, perhaps the research aspect of it. What I have accomplished up to this point in time however is truly remarkable. Taking advantage of the Senior Project, I have explored a future career and have been given access to an experience that not anyone can get by just walking into a hospital. I've become an integral part of the health care staff as a volunteer by talking to patients and helping nurses with what I can. Apparently, I've even made it farther than many volunteers who I've heard left maybe after a month. By sticking it through, I learned more and more each day about nursing and the hospital setting as a whole too and how it is all integrated.

Applied

Mentorship has helped me answer my EQ by providing a real life application of research to what I observed at the hospital. I watched as the entire health care team utilizes the patient assessments that nurses make. I've also watched many assessments take place (not up close for privacy reasons obviously). I see how nurses take an advantage of the interaction with their patients to communicate an understanding of what's going on and how they are doing in terms of health and recovery. These observations helped me cement my best answer as well as the others, watching all the measures staff take with sanitation and infection prevention every single day. My mentor, Aubrey Abiva, also helped  make my answers concrete through our interviews as well as discussing them with other nurses when I could.