All Entries Tagged With: "Career development"

Legislative lessons from school

Many of you have been following my intermittent posts on my journey, at the age of 54, to pursue my MSN degree. In just a few weeks, I will have completed course No. 4 on healthcare delivery systems. One of our assignments was to interview a person in a legislative position and discuss the many facets of his or her role as it relates to how healthcare is delivered to his or her constituents. The legislator I selected happened to also be a family practice doctor. I just couldn’t resist. Oh sure, I could have picked a female legislator, or one whose name has been in a headline more often than deserved, but not me. I went straight for the jugular-a doctor who is my state rep, which brought me to an interview that was more of one as a constituent that that of a master’s level student.

The interview was a grand opportunity to better understand not only how the state process works, but how and why many decisions are made regarding healthcare bills. In the state of Tennessee, our legislature had been handed a bill that would make it optional for adults to wear helmets on motorcycles. Being an ED nurse, I am sure you can guess what my vote would have been on this! This motorcycle-riding physician, father, and state legislature felt otherwise. He strongly felt his job was to represent all of his constituents who wanted the helmet option. We agreed to disagree on this issue and I left the interview feeling our county/district was in good hands.

As we look to the last quarter of this year, by the end of December, I will be halfway through the program. I feel like my brain is packed with so much information, I will have to upload more GB to store any new lessons for 2009!

Are you still wrestling with whether or not you should go back to school? Are you having an argument with yourself over what to specialize in?

Learning a new definition of health

Starting next week, I will be carrying two courses at a time, and I am told it can be done. I have spoken to several other classmates who have management jobs, families, etc., and some of them are actually taking a bigger course load. I don’t think I will ever go there. Just the thought makes my critical thinking skills kick in and ask, “Are you nuts?!”

The three credit course I am in the midst of is related to public health nursing, and I know what you are thinking-the same thoughts I had as I poured over the course objectives. With a bottle of Phenergan at my side, I was ready for boredom and nausea. What I found was an inspiring faculty member whose pointed questions got me thinking about healthcare and how it is delivered to the patient, the family, and the community. The course puts an emphasis on the effects of prevention on public health and assessing the health care needs of communities. Think of all the times staff approach you whining on and on about non-compliant patients. The course delves into the compliance obstacles for some of our population, such as making bad choices in their lives.

The most important questions we had to ask ourselves is to define the word health: What does it mean to each of us? Now I am asking you for your definition of health, and also your staff’s definition. Mine is printed below:

Health: A state of wellness for that individual

I anxiously await my grade for my mid-term paper, which brought back memories of why I do not work the night shift anymore. My final paper is due mid-June and no, I have not started it yet. For my final exam, I have to find a grant available for a vulnerable population we identify in our mid-term paper. Can someone please help me? I feel ischemia creeping into my brain. What was it I identified? Can Phenergan ever be used to help brain perfusion? Hmmm…..

Lessons learned from my first class

When the Leader’s Lounge was born, I started the blog with my decision to return to school in my mid-50s. What was I thinking? It is hard to believe that my first course has already ended, and that I am preparing for the next one. Wondering how it went?

Better than I expected.

I took the one course that was only for two credits, as I knew the load would be less and I could plan from that for the other three- and four-credit course loads. I found out today I received an “A” (I never read so much in such a short time period; eat lots of carrots!) and found the overall experience was good. Getting a good grade certainly helped with that perception. I would prefer to be in a live classroom as I thrive on that interaction, but “life” gets in the way of that. Online courses can be interactive in their own way, but I miss the voices, tones, and facial expressions. Call me a product of my generation compared to the younger ones who don’t use the phone much (they text message).

I learned a great deal from my first course on Issues in Health Care Informatics. Along with the acquired knowledge of real substantial material that I can use, I learned how to study at an airport with people around you talking (shouting) into their blackberry’s, I learned how to scan articles for what I have to read, and mostly, I learned that my nursing experience, every bit of it, is relevant.

Additionally, because this was a two-credit course, it did not take nearly the time away from my home life as I thought it would. Being able to do a great deal of the work while on the road, left little time taken away once I was home.

Are you still on the edge about going back to school? What’s holding you back?