Internship Week 1

Whoa.  What just happened?

A week has already passed by???

True story.  This week was orientation!  We spent most of the week touring the 3 sites where we'll be spending most of our time, visiting with dietitians in various clinics and inpatient units to get an idea of where we'll be working, and getting lost in the hospitals a lot.  We went over the internship program's expectations - what's expected of us and what we can expect from the program, our projects, and our preceptors.  We discussed patient centred care, the standards of care at the hospital and how to chart/what we're legally allowed to order by medical directive, and how to use electronic patient charting.

Maybe it was the fluorescent lighting.  Maybe it was the fact that it's been super overwhelming.  But I left the hospital on Monday with a cray migraine.

Yet here we are at the end of week 1, and it all went by so fast O__O!!!!

So far so good.  The other interns are awesome.  I couldn't have asked to have been put into a better group if I tried.  We've only known each other a week, and we've already bonded so much and are really looking forward to working together, learning together, and supporting each other through the next 11 months.  Despite how HUGE the hospitals are and how lost I've gotten this week, it's starting to become more intuitive and beginning to feel like home.  The staff, especially the dietitians we've met so far who will be mentoring us, have been incredibly supportive and showed how enthusiastic they are to have a fresh batch of interns.  I can't wait to get started!!!!!

We also (finally!) got our schedules this week, and I'm SO EXCITED that I got almost ALL of my top choices for clinical rotations!!!!  For the next 12 weeks I'm going to be in foodservice and industry rotations, followed by my clinical and public health rotations for the rest of the internship.  I'm working with a few other interns in foodservice, though I'm rotating by myself for the first 4 weeks before I meet back up with them.  Though I'm not too frightened of the foodservice rotation (since I have a business background and some experience in foodservice already), I'm anxious about working solo with my preceptor when the others are working in a team together!

For now, we've got a long weekend ahead (thank you, Canadian Thanksgiving :D) to do our readings and prepare for the first rotation.  And to, you know, breathe before starting up for real on Tuesday when we had back to work.

While I'd like to post an update here every week to keep y'all posted on how internship is going, I don't think that's very realistic.  Plus, with my foodservice rotation lasting a hundred years (well, 12 weeks, but it seems like FOREVER), it might not be too interesting to be like "I'm still here. The end!".  So, I'll post when I can - I'd guess every 2-3 weeks, depending on the rotation and what's going on.


Phew.  Here we go.