When the third year of med school comes around you start working as medical professionals as real patients. You will no longer be limited to only a classroom-based experience. Clinical rotations will expand your clinical exposure and it will shift to dealing with real patients on an everyday basis. In doing so, you will be practically creating the very foundation of your career.
1. Actively communicate with your medical school seniors
Connect with your fourth-year medical school seniors. The reason is very simple. They have already completed their clinical rotations and therefore taking advice from them will be invaluable to you when you are starting out. You may also write down any questions that you may have and set aside time to clear your doubts. Try to learn about the details of rotations from your seniors as they know the experiences you are likely to face and give you much-needed insights.
2. Practice the necessary skills for clinical rotations
You will need to learn a lot while on rotation but it is equally important to practice all the necessary skills before you start. List down the things you want to learn and start early with it. Use a smart study platform to save time and learn more efficiently. Utilize opportunities whenever available– like attending seminars, attending clinical workshops, etc. in order to master the technical skills needed to do the job. The more you prepare before your clinical rotation, the better you are going to perform.
3. Absorb information from your patients like a sponge
Every patient encounter is a unique experience and there is a lot to learn from each subsequently. Each is a way to learn different things like how to interact with different types of people as your patients, identifying symptoms accurately of different health situations and diseases, each encounter is an opportunity to continue learning new things and develop new skills if you pay attention. To further assist you in this pursuit, you may write down things you find important and review them later for your reference.
4. Always be open to learning
Each student might find some branch more specifically than others. While some may like psychiatry, some might like neurology better. But as a medical student, there’s a reason why you need to go through these rotations. Rotations are meant to prepare future doctors and physicians, and real patients will appear for help, suffering from different conditions or ailments. You’d want to be ready to provide the best care you possibly can. The more open one is to learning, the better doctor one will be.
Start with your preparations slowly but surely and it will guide you to definite success in the future.