The Family Practice Clerkship is six weeks long. At the location I am doing my clerkship, we are sent to different clinics every two weeks. The idea behind this is to expose us to different aspects of Family Medicine. The first two weeks, I was working with geriatrics patients. I believe the average age of the patients at this geriatrics site was 85 years old! There were many, many patients in their 90s and 100s and some of them still had excellent memories. I really liked working with these patients, especially those with the excellent memories because they have seen so many changes in their lives and it was fun to hear their stories.
For the next two weeks, I will be working at a homeless shelter's free medical clinic. I am really excited to be able to help out people who would otherwise have no medical care. Farley and I stopped by the free clinic yesterday after we finished at the geriatrics locations. They told us that they give medical students a lot of autonomy. We will be given a patient, do a history and physical, come up with a diagnosis and treatment plan then present to an attending physician, who will see the patient and either agree or disagree with our diagnosis and plan. We will even be given the chance to help with procedures, such as draining abscesses, under the supervision of the attending physician. I am really excited and scared to be able to do more hands on work. One of my personal doctors once told me, that they never let students do anything they are not ready for but at some point you have got to learn. I guess I am ready!
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