After the quick holiday break from the internship, I FINALLY started clinical! My entire MNT rotation is 14 weeks long and is broken up into 2 week increments. My first 2 week rotation was in a general medical floor and cardiac ICU. The hospital I am doing my MNT rotations at is a huge cardiac hospital in Milwaukee, around 500 beds and over 100 ICU beds. The first day was pretty overwhelming, to say the least, but since then has gotten much better!
The first dietitian I worked with on the general medical floor and CICU did a lot of tube feedings and wound care. After my two weeks with her I have done a lot of tube feedings and am starting to feel pretty comfortable with them. She also taught me a lot about wound care; focusing on increased calories, protein, vitamins and minerals. During this rotation I became more comfortable with EPIC medical record charting formats for the hospital and writing PES statements with an intervention, monitoring, and evaluation component. Being in a large hospital provides opportunities to see very different patients and conditions which has been very interesting!
While the first two weeks in the clinical rotation were a struggle and each day is a challenge, I am slowly but surely getting the hang of things and retaining new information. The hardest part is wanting to look up every term I don't understand when I see it, but that would take all day, and there are tons of patients to see!
I have now moved on to my second preceptor into a new area which I will blog more about later but I have been working on talking and interviewing the patients on my own, which sounds a lot easier than it looks!
-Success doesn't happen overnight. Keep your eye on the prize and don't look back.-
