Do they teach you clinical skills in Medical school?

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DO_or_Die

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This is a dumb question, but a serious one as well. Do they teach medical students how to start IV's/insert foleys in school/take labs/change a patient? I'm a nurse matriculating in July and am competent in these areas, they even had us start IV's on each other in nursing school. I assumed for some reason that this wouldn't be taught in medical school or if it was it would be very brief because of how much there is that needs to be covered. I say that from the fact that I've never seen a doctor (outside of anesthesia/surgery) do any of these things, lol, so I wasn't sure. I've worked with medical students and never seen them do it either. I would like to keep up my clinical skills so if I am able to do these things on rotation that would be a plus. Thank you.
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Most schools expose students to it but it's definitely not a focus and can be depedent on who you're working wit. Personally, I've started a number of IV's, drew some labs a handful of times, and only put in a couple foleys and NG tubes lol. With that said, you can do as much of these things as you want given you have time to do it - you'll likely have ample time to do it in outpt but not so much inpatient.
 
They go over it in an afternoon. Those skills will be helpful in m3, but will likely atrophy because you won't be starting IVs everyday. Usually the attitude is that let the people who do it everyday do them, because they are more proficient at it.
 
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I change patients into gowns and stuff quite frequently in the ED. Also start many IVs when nurses can’t get a line and I have ultrasound. Rarely have I been told they can’t get a foley in, usually it’s a wise idea to go have a look why, have diagnosed a few cancers/horrible prolapses this way.

Main skill to grow for you will be IV placement. You are no longer limited to just putting in peripheral IVs now and can go wherever you please. In terms of learning how to place lines, that was all during residency. I had to place like 5 IVs during surgery or something as a med student and that was it.
 
Had 0 procedural skills until starting surgery clerkship. 3 weeks in and I’ve placed about a dozen each foleys/ngt/ivs/intubation.

I think part of it is being proactive (telling the interns you want to do these as they come up) and part of it is being in a hospital with a nursing culture that tends to keep these opportunities open.

probably most of my skills will atrophy by the time im an intern, but it’s still a win all around since it improves my relationship with / utility to the team and the patient and the nurses all at once
 
Ive never started an IV or done a blood draw. I had about 45 minutes learning on a dummy before third year. I only have 1.5 rotations left of med school. I got to do one ABG though.

Foleys? Yes. I did plenty of them while on surgery.

Changing patients and whatnot? No. I did in nursing school though.
 
Yes you do, but dummies are different from real patients... but the actual clinical skill is not learned until you do residency.
 
Simulation is pretty common & I'd agree that it varies from school to school. It's going to vary from person to person. Some people like to be very hands-on and want to practice their procedural skills. Those people usually make it known to their interns, residents, nurses, and allied health staff. It's good to have those skills, being able to place IVs, or do blood draws, but in the US, in a lot of major hospitals, it isn't doctors placing IVs or drawing blood, it's nurses or phlebotomy (unless you're in anesthesiology, but I've also seen a colorectal surgeon start IVs on their colonoscopy days to speed things along).
 
We have to sign off (only 5) on IVs, venipunctures, ABGs, Foley's, shave biopsies, joint injections and paps before the end of third year. Most of us did the 5 and called it a day..some did as many as they could and some fudged the numbers.
 
studentdocftw said:
We have to sign off (only 5) on IVs, venipunctures, ABGs, Foley's, shave biopsies, joint injections and paps before the end of third year. Most of us did the 5 and called it a day..some did as many as they could and some fudged the numbers.
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Forgot about Paps. Ive done a LOT of those lol
 
ciestar said:
Forgot about Paps. Ive done a LOT of those lol
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Let's just say I'm not going to miss those...along with the Foley's on patients who required 2 people to insert (one to insert the Foley and the other to lift the fat).
 
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studentdocftw said:
Let's just say I'm not going to miss those...along with the Foley's on patients who required 2 people to insert (one to insert the Foley and the other to lift the fat).
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Lol i love women’s health/gyn. Glad i can get plenty of it in FM
 
ndafife said:
Never did any IVs or lab draws or foleys in med school on an awake patient. But residency in New York City....
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Yup. I started a bunch of IV’s and drew countless blood cultures as a med student in NYC. We even spun hematocrits in a centrifuge in the house staff lab. But that was a long time ago.
 
Do a residency in New York and you will have ample opportunities.

As for me, pass.
 
You will learn these basic skills but, depending on what field you go into, you may or may not actually use those skills in practice. I haven't started an IV or drawn labs in nearly 6 years. I could probably still do it in a pinch, but those are skills that I just don't use on a regular basis.
 
Dantrolene FC said:
They’re unionized at my med school too, yet they still do their job. It sounds like they have too many nurses in the administration there.
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Nurses in the administration, bad nursing to patient ratios, and such a high treshold for bad behavior that you literally have to maliciously kill a patient to get fired thanks to union protections.

It's actually not that bad at my NYC institution (the only IVs I did were the ones that even the most experience nurse couldn't stick, so I brought out the ultrasound), but I've heard worse stuff from our neighbors.
 
I'm pretty sure you're going to my school. We learn these in short sessions in the sim lab. We did practice blood draws and injections on each other, the rest on mannequins. You're probably be too busy during 3rd/4th year to really practice basic nursing skills unless you're really trying to own your patients. In the hospitals you'll be rotating through, nurses don't really need to page the residents for these type of things unless it's a physician procedure. IVs at least will help you later when practicing abgs and central lines. I did do my own bladder scan on a patient once because the nurses doing it was clearly not aiming correctly.

If you're eager, they'll let you do whatever you want, but that's after you're done with your med student duties and rounding.
 
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