Future Healthcare Heroes

CCMA students begin clinical rotations after a three year hiatus

Natalia Zavaleta | Co-Editor

Pressed white scrubs and tan pants in single file lines are seen throughout the hospital in the mornings. Notebooks in their hands scribbling away every time their mentor does something. Brains eager to absorb as much information as possible. Hearts filled with excitement to care for others.

Students in the Certified Clinical Medical Assisting (CCMA) practicum class have started their clinical rotations at St. David’s North Austin Medical Center as of Jan. 17.. Students in the class visit the hospital where they are given the opportunity to shadow health professionals in a clinical setting. They are placed in one of nine units such as respiratory, imagining, cardiology, etc. This is the first time in three years that students have been allowed back into the hospital after COVID-19.

“I learn better from observing– truly how the units interact with each other and how they incorporate students into their practice and how they teach them by throwing them into the water like children letting them swim,” senior Sofiange Ayida said. “It’s ten times better than being in a classroom or being told ‘here’s this machinery, go and operate it’ without any further explanation. It’s very enveloping, it takes up almost every section of your mind when you get there and you find yourself getting in tune with the hospital. You dive into the world of medicine and you get to see it in action and it’s completely different from what you see on TV.”

In order to join the program, students must meet prerequisites such as taking certain health pathway classes such as Health Science Theory. They must also complete an interview with Career and Technical Education (CTE) directors and program leader Cristine Gilbert.

“The purpose of the rotations is to give students a more global perspective instead of a classroom perspective,” Gilbert said. “They actually have that clinical perspective to see how healthcare professionals function in a hospital environment; what the jobs and duties and responsibilities look like within that clinical setting. All the different characteristics that are important that they can carry with them as they move forward in either school, or even as they progress into a health career.”

During the months leading up to the rotations, students are tasked with completing online modules in preparation for their national Medical Assisting certification exam. Additionally, Quizlets are completed for every medical unit that the students will be visiting that week.

“Quizlet has helped me prepare and just the four years that have led up to this moment,” senior Abigail Piggott said. “There were many prerequisites, being professional, and being prepared to ask questions to mentors. Just being there and seeing all the different units and all the different people– although there weren’t a whole lot of people– it's neat to see that.”

These rotations are meant to expose students to the real world of medicine and health. It offers an opportunity to observe skills they have been practicing inside the classroom being used outside in the world.

“Clinical rotations are for exposure,” Gilbert said. “It’s for clinical experience in the hospital to increase exposure to all the different departments and professions within the hospital and to observe clinical professionalism to see all the skills that we practice in the classroom. Because it’s observation only and hands-off as determined by the St. David's network, students can only observe. However, what we learn in the classroom are things like vital signs, taking patient history, leadership, professional communication, EKG, phlebotomy, injections, transferring a patient, bed making, and other things that can be observed in the hospital. So even though they can’t do hands on, they can still observe what they have practiced in the lab setting.”

A typical day for a student during rotations consists of getting ready in their white scrub tops and khaki bottoms and getting on the bus to travel to the hospital. They are placed on one of the nine units that are participating in high school clinical rotations, they are then paired with a one on one mentor who will just talk outloud and demonstrate how to input things into an EMR, (electronic medical record) show how to interact with patients, answer call lights, and answer to all the patient needs.

“I think just the experience itself is sort of inspiring,” Gilbert said. “When students walk in for the first time, they’re a little bit anxious. But as they spend more and more days at the clinical site, they start to feel like a budding professional and I think that serves to inspire and it’s something that you can’t get in the classroom.”

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