Shadowing in the ICU

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Aceventura74

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Hey my fellow pre-meds, I come to you with a huge question today. I was asking around to shadow, and a few physicians conveniently said yes. One is an internist, the other is a ICU physician.

I asked my pre-med adviser who do I pick, or do I split etc. He told me go full out with the internist, any ICU shadowing is a waste of time. But to me, I see it as varied shadowing experience. Idk how it can be bad to shadow an ICU physician, so any and all advice is appreciated.

So, any advice on shadowing this ICU dude? Perhaps just internist and nothing at all...? Or split some time each way, etc.? Completely blow off the ICU guy?

Thanks, any and all advice is appreciated 🙂.

Sincerely,
Aceventura74
 
I know that shadowing pcp is recommending, so I would do 70/30 internist/icu doc
 
I would probably shadow the ICU guy once so you have the experience, but it's not likely that you'll get much out of it.
 
Hey my fellow pre-meds, I come to you with a huge question today. I was asking around to shadow, and a few physicians conveniently said yes. One is an internist, the other is a ICU physician.

I asked my pre-med adviser who do I pick, or do I split etc. He told me go full out with the internist, any ICU shadowing is a waste of time. But to me, I see it as varied shadowing experience. Idk how it can be bad to shadow an ICU physician, so any and all advice is appreciated.

So, any advice on shadowing this ICU dude? Perhaps just internist and nothing at all...? Or split some time each way, etc.? Completely blow off the ICU guy?

Thanks, any and all advice is appreciated 🙂.

Sincerely,
Aceventura74
Do both. Hour breakdowns aren't important, as long as you have some shadowing of primary care physicians, you are good shadowing anything else you can that you find interesting.
 
I shadowed in the cardiothoracic ICU and it ended up being a huge part of my application. I went along on rounds a couple mornings and even got to stand bedside during a code blue. It is also a great place to see how multiple disciplines (MD,DO,PharmD, Advanced Practice RN, etc) come together and add different insight to form a treatment plan. I would definitely go to the ICU at least a few times.
 
Your adviser probably meant that you wouldn't see much patient interaction in the ICU, which is true. However, the internist you're shadowing had to spend a lot of time in the ICU to get where he is today, so I'm sure he/she will tell you it's a valuable experience. I think critical care medicine is much more interesting than primary care, but to each her own. I would shadow both for sure.
 
may i ask how you asked around? were u randomly asking around in the hospital?
 
I'd go heavily with the internist. As premed, you can intuitively understand a lot of the cases and get to see patient interactions. As a MS2 now, I had mixed experiences with the ICU rounds, because it's highly technical and without any training (especially) in lung physio and mechanical ventilation, you can get totally lost quickly. Also, patient-doctor interaction is...minimal.
 
I'd go heavily with the internist. As premed, you can intuitively understand a lot of the cases and get to see patient interactions. As a MS2 now, I had mixed experiences with the ICU rounds, because it's highly technical and without any training (especially) in lung physio and mechanical ventilation, you can get totally lost quickly. Also, patient-doctor interaction is...minimal.

Truth. I've been on ICU rounds a few times and I'm always looking around like, "uhh any of you guys gettin this?? Cause I'm lost..."
 
I shadowed an Anesthesiologist in the ICU. There was no hands on opportunities because of legal red tape issues and whatnot, but I saw a bunch of awesome stuff. The doctors didn't really interact with the patients, but I did notice that they spent some time talking with the families, comforting them, and they did talk with some of the patients when they had moments of being conscious. That's kind of a downside. However, any time there was a code, the doctors went to work, and the residents pushed me up right by the doctors and let me see everything very up close and personal. Like someone else mentioned, it was interesting to see how the different professions overlapped and how they worked with one another to make the ICU "work". I even peaked into a surgery cause the doctor I was shadowing said there was nothing interesting in the ICU. He just asked a colleague to let me in. It was pretty awesome. With that being said, shadow a PCP as well. Get diversity.
 
I too have shadowed in the ICU, actually more than anywhere else in the hospital, with a pulmonologist. I had a really great time and always look forward to going home and getting to spend some more time with him at the hospital. I would shadow him as he rounded on all the patients in the ICU as well as some patients on the general floor who had only pulmonary issues.

I can understand the sentiment of some of the med students saying you won't take as much from the ICU as you would with, say, a general internist because of the high level of complications and the patient's issues being over your head. I actually have to disagree with this though, almost every little bit of patient care even with general internists is over our heads as pre-meds, and we're not there to pick up on information like that anyway. We're there to see the career that physicians have, and what it's like to be around patients in a clinical environment. The ICU is a great place to see lots of varied, interesting and life threatening issues as well as the interactions with the loved ones of those in the ICU. I also had the chance to see some patients improve, occasionally drastically, over the course of rounds 4-5 days in a row; that was really awesome.
 
Hey man. Nurses in the ICU are world-renowned for their "doc-shopping" proclivities. Slip on a white coat and a blue glove and start palpating some "suspicious microcalcifications" if you know what I mean. If you are female, disregard the preceding message.
 
I'd go heavily with the internist. As premed, you can intuitively understand a lot of the cases and get to see patient interactions. As a MS2 now, I had mixed experiences with the ICU rounds, because it's highly technical and without any training (especially) in lung physio and mechanical ventilation, you can get totally lost quickly. Also, patient-doctor interaction is...minimal.

Yeah, well, most of the patients are like a GCS of 3. The ICU was never that exciting for me. It was just interesting to hear about how people ended up there.

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