Shadowing - from the other side

[2010houston]

Help! I’m faculty who will have college students shadowing this summer.

From a student perspective:
- what is most helpful?
- what should I avoid?
- what do I need to know?
- how can I make this the best experience possible for these college students?

FYI I’m in a hospital-based speciality (anesthesiology) at an academic institution.

Thank you! Just want to do the right thing.

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[Gwynbleidd]

Make sure everyone can see. Explain what you’re doing in simple language. Make sure everyone is physically comfortable - as this is anesthesia, I’m assuming they’ll be in the OR with you a lot, and for some students it might be their first time in an OR, which can be overwhelming at first.

Explain in no uncertain terms what they can and cannot do. Ex, stand here, not here. If they are supposed to wear scrubs, tell them. Help them or get them help for putting on caps, booties, masking up etc. The last thing we want to do is be in the way but as students often aren’t aware of hospital/OR etiquette beyond “don’t touch the blue”.

Give them clear details, like they will be shadowing for x hours between 9-3pm or something to that effect. As a shadower I hated feeling like I needed to linger around because I wasn’t sure when it was “okay” for me to leave. Or maybe that was just my social anxiety, lol.

Try to make it fun. When I shadowed in the OR the doctors and staff who were friendly and tried to involve me as much as they could were far more memorable than the doctors and staff who lived up to the “douchey” OR/surgeon stereotype (sorry). Students shadow because we are expressing a genuine interest in the field and want to learn more about it. Don’t turn off a potentially amazing future doctor from the field because they had a crappy shadowing experience.

And PLEASE don’t pimp them. They’re students. They are unlikely to know anything about anything. That’s kind of the point of why they’re there.

 

[hopefull!!]

In my personal experience, allowing the student to be as involved as possible is what makes an experience excellent rather than great. If you can allow them to try and do math/science pertinent to the case, it really helps material get into your head. Like an example is for inginal hernias, explaining how if it occurs medial to the epigastric, then it is a _____ hernia. Then in the case show where that is and let them try and make an educated guess. It really helped to keep me involved in the case, as well as made me do outside research on our cases and overall made me learn a lot about thought processes.

As for things to avoid, I felt least connected to my preceptor/ and their field if they stressed negatives about being a physician. The students are shadowing for a reason, we can guess that there are frustrating moments of the job but we want a well rounded snapshot of the profession. We DONT want someone to tell us not to become a doctor or to do a different specially. We want to come to our own conclusions!

Since you mentioned they are college students (as am I) I think the most important thing to know is not to treat them like they are children. Most pre-meds are pretty committed to the process and learning/loving medicine, we just need guidance for proper practices etc like written in the post above.

You're already going above and beyond checking in here!

 

[Mr.Smile12]

Thanks for the advice on your expectations for anyone shadowing you and the students with their perspectives! Any other professionals should add their perspectives of what worked for them, please?

 

[2010houston]

@Gwynbleidd and @hopefull!! thank you so much for the detailed responses! Will do ❤️

 

[HuskyMD Emeritus]

Since it is difficult to find doctors to shadow, you can help by introducing the students to your surgical colleagues while in the OR. It’s probably easier to do this in the ICU, where I had my shadowees talk to the various consultants who were rounding in the ICU. Even if they didn’t get to shadow them, at least they got to talk and get some insights into various specialties. The easiest specialties for me to help arrange shadowing in a medical center were pathology and radiology.
An advantage of being at an academic center is the presence of residents. I sent my shadowees to the resident morning report so they can network. Residents, after all are much closer to the medical school experience than us.
If you do pre ops, perhaps you can also have your shadowee shadow you in the office.
Too bad it’s become difficult to find shadowing experiences. The hospital where I work stopped allowing shadowing a few years ago……

 

[JAK2-STAT3]

First of all, thank you for letting students shadow! In my case, I was initially too intimidated reach out to physicians for shadowing opportunities because they seemed so busy and I was afraid of annoying them. So making it clear that you're open to students shadowing you, and how they can get in touch with you, is important!

Try to make expectations clear, for example "you can shadow me from 8am-5pm," "you can dress casually because you will immediately change into scrubs," "now would be a good time to use the bathroom, get a snack, get lunch, etc." This is especially relevant for the OR. One physician I shadowed made sure I was drinking water and had snacks, which was a nice touch. I recently shadowed an Anesthesiologist on a 10 hour shift and we never stopped for lunch--I actually appreciated the more realistic experience, but I was also savvy enough to eat a big breakfast first, which some premeds might not be. Sometimes it's hard to know when it's ok to ask questions vs. not. Saying "do you have any questions?" or "I need to finish this patient's chart" helps with this.

I agree with the previous poster that letting students be involved is good, but I also don't think you need to go out of your way to entertain them
if you feel like they're getting to see an accurate representation of your day to day workflow. As a non-trad, I didn't need to be entertained and was grateful just to be able to sit there and soak everything in. I also think that seeing the more boring parts of medicine is important.

Finally, in addition to what you teach students about being an Anesthesiologist, any pearls of wisdom you can give for navigating the premed journey and building an application will be greatly appreciated. As cool as it is to learn about different specialties, it's hard not to be preoccupied with getting into medical school in the first place.

Good luck this summer!

 

[2010houston]

@JAK2-STAT3 that is super helpful- especially re setting expectations. Thank you!

 

[apple_juice]

I shadowed an anesthesiologist once a week for a few weeks at an academic institution. Here’s something I really liked:

The attending texted me the night before about the type of cases they were tentatively scheduled to work (e.g. electric cardioversion, bladder sling, cataract removal, lumpectomy, etc.)- this gave me time to read up on anesthesia considerations for those specific types of procedures and ask some questions first thing in the morning.

 

[mistertwister]

Thanks for providing shadowing and so consciously. My favorite shadowing experiences were the ones where the doctors let me know I could ask questions later on and prompted me to ask when they had time. It let me be relaxed, and save my questions for later rather than worrying about not getting a chance to ask and trying to figure out the best moment to impose. Also I'm sure you use tons of abbreviations and jargon - if you can try to slow down a bit and explain some of those it really helps. We did chart rounds first which is really nice for getting a lay of the land (sometimes it was a new patient to the doctor as well and that was fun to learn a patient together, not sure if it applies to your specialty), then did physical rounds to observe the patients, then sat down to write notes and discuss questions which was very reflective and insightful for me.

 

[JStarMD]

I always tell shadowing students, irrespective of level (H.S., College, etc.) that they must know the positives AND the negatives of their career choices. If they won't like getting up at 2 AM to provide anesthesia for an emergency C-section.......if they won't like being beholden to insurance companies for payment........if they won't like hospital accountants not involving hospital-based docs in major decisions (we're buying the equipment that's cheaper, OR "we don't care if that cadiac catheter works better--we're not buying it").......if running a private office with its personnel and infrastructure duties will dilute the experience as a physician....then certain specialties will not be for them at all. A good deal of research should go into the decision making process. The downside must be given consideration as well as the reward and like-ability.