Written by: Jay Chen c2023 McMaster Medical School, Hamilton Campus Where was your placement and what specialty was it in?
I did more pediatrics core at Guelph. How did you get to the placement? My family lives in Guelph so I didn't have to worry about accommodations. Parking is relatively cheap compared to Hamilton hospitals ($55 for a month pass). Describe a typical day at your core. The core rotation consists of 3 weeks of inpatient medicine and 1 week of outpatient clinic. On a usual inpatient day, you would start between 8-8:30 am. The pediatricians at Guelph General Hospital cover both the NICU (which they call the Special Care Nursery) and the pediatrics ward. The clerks spend most their time in the pediatrics ward. You would usually go round on the inpatients in the morning on your own before presenting your assessment and plan to your preceptor. Afternoons can vary depending on how many consults come through. If it's a slow day, the preceptor sometimes does some one on one teaching sessions on the topics of your choosing. I would get off between 3:30 to 5:30 pm typically depending on how busy we were. You are scheduled for 3 weeknight call shifts from 5-11 pm and 1 weekend call shift from 8 am to 8 pm (no overnight!). The call shifts were usually pretty chill and you sometimes got to be called in for high risk deliveries for potential neonatal resuscitation. The outpatient clinic week is very light. I only had 2 full days as I had two afternoons and all of Friday off. Even for my full days I usually wouldn't start until 9:30 or 10:00 and would finish by 3:00 or 4:00. The patients were often booked for 20-40 min appointments which gives you ample time to perform a comprehensive history and physical without rushing. I was given the independence to see around half of the patients on my own before presenting to the preceptor. What level of responsibility/exposure did you have as a medical student? It tended to depend on the pediatrician you were with that week. For some you were more so shadowing for most of the consults while others would let you go see consults alone. You get good practice with dictating consults and discharge summaries. What are some things to review before starting? And do you have any resource suggestions? Definitely look into asthma and RSV bronchiolitis. Fever without a source and neonatal jaundice were also helpful. Learn your developmental milestones and normal pediatric vitals ranges early. The CPS guidelines are great to study from. What was one thing you didn’t like? There wasn't a ton of variety in cases (maybe because I did my core during the winter). Most of the interesting cases would be transferred to MUMC. Do you have any recommendations for things to do/explore/eat in the local area? The Boathouse for ice cream in the summer time, Borealis, downtown has plenty of nice local restaurants. Elora Quarry is fun for exploring. What’s one piece of advice you have for students doing a placement here? This placement is a great place to practice your physical exam skills and to develop your independence. Try practicing otoscopy or your newborn exam whenever appropriate. Don't be afraid of preparing discharge scripts or admission orders even when you're not sure what the plan is yet. Would you recommend this placement to current students? Yes! You get plenty of one on one time with the pediatricians and plenty of independence. Also everyone is super nice! I will say if you hope to see more than just bread and butter peds cases I would maybe rank other academic sites higher.
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Written by: Natasha Bauer-Maison, McMaster Medical School c2023, Hamilton Campus 2 weeks in general pediatrics (first clerkship elective.)
1. How did you get to the elective? Did you need a car at this location? I commuted from Hamilton and also stayed at a friends house on the nights after I had call shifts. 2. What were your accommodations like? Did you get any funding from the school (MacCare etc?) I was eligible for MacCARE. 3. Describe a typical day at your elective. I would come to clinic for 9 am and generally stay until 4-5 pm. It was a primary care/community general pediatrics clinic. Each day involved a lot of vaccinations, well baby/well child checks, ADHD, ASD, and some random consults. The community pediatricians in Guelph tend to have one service week and also do a few 14-hour call shifts throughout the month. 4. What level of responsibility/exposure did you have as a medical student? I didn't feel like I had any responsibilities really! I became very comfortable with administering vaccines but the practice I was in was not as busy so I didn't see patients on my own. The hospital/on-call experience as well felt more like shadowing. I think this is very preceptor dependent. 5. What is your most memorable experience from this elective? Most memorable experience was probably seeing some rare pediatric presentations such as Morquio syndrome and hanging out with the healthy babies and kids! 6. What was one thing you didn’t like about the elective? I did not like the lack of independence. I didn't feel like it was a clerkship elective at all. Also I found it very repetitive day to day but maybe if I had been taking care of more patients by myself I would have felt differently! 7. Has this elective influenced your career decisions? If so, how? It makes me want to discover peds subspecialties. 8. Do you have any recommendations for things to explore & eat in the local area? Bread bar, Balzac's coffee 9. What’s one thing you wish you knew before doing this elective? Just knowing that it would be a lot of shadowing! 10. Would you recommend this elective to current students? If you are looking for some exposure to peds but don't want many responsibilities/looking for a chill elective this is the one! If you are really eager to learn how to be a good pediatrician, practice your interview and exam skills with children this specific elective might not give you that experience. 11. Anything else you want people to know? Very preceptor dependent! It was still nice to get a good sense of what a community peds practice looks like :) |
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