This week in ISM, I continued working on my case study at my mentor visit Thursday and got to see progress in patients I have seen previously. One patient which I saw the first time last week who has an achilles tendon injury made progress in balance and one of his exercises which involved grabbing a towel with his toes and moving it around in an arch, my mentor took out because it came to easy for him. During the visit, I got to observe another initial evaluation of a shoulder patient. This patient was older than my case study and previously has been very healthy, but her injury was caused from falling on her shoulder. My mentor noticed she has instability in her shoulder, so the focus is rotation. I am incredibly grateful for this opportunity to get to work with a patient and be trusted with my mentor to get some practice in walking patients through exercises for my final product. I have learned so much about different injuries and ways to treat them especially seeing a difference between patients in a shoulder injury and what the main focuses are in order to rehabilitate the patient based on what they can do.
This week in ISM, I continued working on my final product. During my mentor visit Friday, I worked through the patients exercises with him with the guidance of my mentor. Based on the initial evaluation from last week the patient has bursitis in his shoulder so the focus is to get strength back in his arm with the use of exercises. The last visit the patient had my mentor did dry needling and tissue scraping mostly in the upper area and the pectoral area and the patient said it helped a lot. This week while I was walking him through his exercises I noticed a difference but still could tell he needed to get strength back especially when my mentor worked on him at the end of his visit. It was so cool to be able to tell him the exercises he has to do, but it was also nerve racking because it was my first time so my mentor and the assistant physical therapist helped a lot with the process. Towards the end, I felt better about what to do and can’t wait to see progression in my case study for my final product. Over the next weeks, I need to look up how to write a case study and also look at the exercises my mentor printed out for me so I have a better understanding about the action we are going to take to rehabilitate the patient.
This week in ISM, I went on a 3 hour mentor visit at ATI Physical Therapy in Coppell. It did not feel long though because I got to see so much; some that I have seen before such as same patients, dry needling, tissue scraping. Through different patients, especially ones I have seen before it is amazing to see their progress over time with the help of physical therapy. The progress I see from patients is so meaningful to me and the reason I want to be a physical therapist because you could be there to help them progress that way. I was partly apart of an initial observation of a shoulder patient and asked him about the history of the injury as part of my final product, but not quite there to be able to ask more without getting nervous because it was my first time and I was not prepared. It was amazing to be able to have some input in an initial evaluation collaborating with my mentor and now over the duration of time the patient is there I get to see the progress since the first time. From the initial evaluation from last week, I saw the patient progressing this week and my mentor had to do dry needling on her calf because the muscle was tight. I learned the lower muscles in the leg go directly to your toe making it turn out and in which was interesting because I am a dancer and never knew that before I saw the motion.
This week in ISM, I had an amazing opportunity to observe an initial evaluation alongside my mentor, Amber Ingram. Throughout this experience I came to understand that there are signs when the patient is injured there is a big difference between the side that is injured and the side that is not. Specifically in this patient with back and left leg pain while observing her walk, I did not notice she was putting more weight on the right side until my mentor pointed it out. As she walked back to us, I noticed the limping more. Throughout the evaluation I noticed a lot more than I would have in the past which included how they need to be stretched and what muscles are needed when doing the exercise. Specifically, while doing a bridge which is a common exercise I have seen the muscle when pulling up needed is the glute rather than the leg. Also, while looking back at my original work/reflection presentation there was a tremendous need for improvement for the final presentation speech. Preparing for my final presentation speech in May, I want to focus on going into detail about processes I have seen my mentor do on patients such as dry needling and tissue scraping in order for my audience to get a better understanding of what I experienced this year with my mentor.
This week in ISM, I focused on treatment of low back pain in physical therapy through my mentor visit on Friday and mentor visit assessment from December 29th. From Friday, I saw my mentor do an evaluation of a patient with back pain. During the evaluation my mentor focused on strength through hip flexion, adduction, and adduction. Another factor she evaluated was balance on one leg on a flat surface. I had never seen an evaluation for back pain done before, so it was helpful for my final product which is a case study of a patient with low back pain if possible. An exercise I have noticed that is common for back pain from mentor visits and the evaluation I saw is bridges and it would make sense because it connects with the back and you have to use those muscles to get up, but I would have never thought of it as a strengthening exercise before I started mentor visits. In regards to coming up with my final product proposal and discussing with my mentor I came up with the idea of doing a case study on a patient preferably with back pain so I can use the research I have done this year on my final product and come up with an exercise plan after doing an initial evaluation of a patient and working with my mentor to make sure I am doing the most effective thing. Over the next weeks, I want to start working on the case study as well as research more exercises so I have ideas of what to do.
This week in ISM, I planned for my original work speech and all the processes I have gone through in my journey through ISM so far. Through my speech I came across evaluating mentor visits I have gone to so far, and how much I have already learned and seen just in the month I have gone on them. One experience with a patient with a shoulder injury last week on a mentor visit was he had a scar on his shoulder and when pushed on it came to be a hole, so my mentor, Amber Ingram, used a tissue scraper to get the hole gone and for about five minutes of scraping it got it out. One of the main techniques, I have learned on mentor visits is tissue scraping which I hope to continue seeing on more patients with different injuries other than shoulder, but it is used with a metal or marble tool and is to create blood flow because the muscle is tight, so you have to apply lotion and use the tool to scrape where the patient has pain. Through my future mentor visits I hope to see more techniques like this and possibly get to use them in the future as the year goes on to showcase what I have seen and learned.
This week in ISM was the research showcase on Wednesday. In preparing, I set up my display board and original work website. Overall, the showcase was amazing and so many people I didn't know came up to me and speaking was a little hard at first to know what to say, but as the night went on I started to know what to talk about and specifically answer peoples questions as they came across. Most questions were about the low back and my exercise program and what the main causes are. Based on these, an idea for my final product is to create an informational brochure about the low back and some questions someone may have about the symptoms and think of the most rare symptoms to the most common in order to encompass everyone and educate people about low back pain. During the showcase, a professor from Texas Woman's University came up to me and asked about my work and wanted to maybe implement it for teaching. This type of experience taught me to not assume about people and treat everyone like they are important in life and physical therapy because I did not know she was a professor at first. Over the course of the next week, I want to research and discuss with my mentor different symptoms relating to low back pain and the reason behind the cause.
This week in ISM, I focused on finalizing my display board for the research showcase and had a mentor visit. For display board, I added more pictures which showed the steps of mckenzie progression showing laying down, prone press-up on elbows, and full prone-press up. I added three different exercise pictures having to do with the lower back which were child's pose, seated gluteal stretch, and plank on knees in order to showcase a couple of exercises I have on my website that are good for the low back. On my mentor visit on Friday, I got to see Amber dry needle someone again and learned that when taking the needles out it will go along with the muscle which is why it comes out at an angle sometimes because of the tightness. Based on previous mentor visits and now I have gotten to see that exercises do not change for the patients and physical therapists go with the program created. Sometimes not doing every one or modifying one a little and once they get better they add a new one. For example, one of the patients who had an elbow injury my mentor added a harder one on the ball. For next week, I want to focus on how much progress is seen from the previous patients I have seen and where they have gotten better.
This week and during christmas break in ISM, I focused on the completion of my original work and creating the display board for the research showcase. During, break I had three mentor visits, during the first one on break I created an exercise program with my mentor for my original work all having to do with the low back. The three main areas I focused on were stretching, strengthening, and mckenzie progression, in those I put four to five exercises and video-taped them using the physical therapist assistant of my mentor with her approval and put the videos on my website. Over the next ones, I got to shadow another physical therapist, Hannah, who works with my mentor to see her working with a low back patient. She told me that most of the time the patient will wait until the pain is down to the foot, so as a physical therapist they have to centralize the pain to the knee and up. I have learned from mentor visits so far, that educating the patient about the injury and where you are working on them as a physical therapist is beneficial both to you and the patient. Creating my website was a learning experience for me because I learned how to put videos and create an exercise program online as I was doing it. Through creating my display board and preparing for next week, I want to focus more on how physical therapists come up with exercises on the spot based on where the pain is for the patient, as well as process and more learning in my mentor visit this week and next.
This week in ISM, I focused on asking my mentor questions about certain exercises to focus on for my original work. Also through the first mentor visit with Amber on Friday, December 8, I learned how documentation looks and different processes used when working with patients. Based on the visit I am starting to research a variety of exercises based on the ones I have seen with Amber and other ones that certain injuries that deal with mainly the low back, but also hip, knee, and hamstrings and quadriceps. I am very excited to continue working with Amber and start videoing a variety of exercises working with patients and other physical therapists at the Coppell location. With original work coming up, I want to mainly focus on low back for videoing and possibly for final product add more for other injuries or create a brochure for all the information on the injuries and exercises, also for a tangible item to be given to patients with the website on it for extra help. Thinking about the design for display board I want to focus on the low back in the center and maybe include pictures of different exercises. Also for the background of the board I either want it to be black or the coral pink that is my theme for the year depending on what the store has and have paper be the other color so it matches and looks appealing. Next week, I want to focus on exercises and learning more about how a normal physical therapy visit looks like.
|
|