MedEx Day 18 - July 22, 2021

Today was my second to last clinical day with MedEx Tier III. I had the chance to shadow in the Pediatrics Ward of Prisma's Greenville Memorial Hospital. I shadowed the Pediatrics residency team, including 3 medical students, 5 residents, and the attending physician. We rounded for a few hours, and during that time we saw around 10 patients, including about 5 babies, less than 1 year old. Some of my highlights from shadowing today were getting to see the attending physician interact with some of the babies. She was so good at making them laugh/ very few of the babies were afraid of her, even when she had to use an otoscope to look in their ears. I also thoroughly enjoyed watching the attending physician interact with the parents of the pediatrics patients and empower them to feel like they knew what was going on with their child. She was very quick to identify that one mother was likely suffering from Postpartum depression, as well. The resident team was very conducive to questions/ I was able to learn a great deal about what life is like as a pediatrics resident. My overall takeaways from today were that pediatrics is a very diverse field with patients complaints ranging from cerebral palsy in a 6 year old, to depression/ suicidal ideation in an 18 year old, to anorexia nervosa in a 15 year old, and to prematurity in a 1 day old baby. I also took away that pediatrics is a field of healthcare that requires a major team effort between the residents/ caretakers, as so much communication and education occurs with children and their parents. I greatly enjoyed my experience.