March 08, 2012

Clinical Dietetic Internship

I am now 9 weeks into my clinical rotation of my dietetic internship.  It started off as very stressful, time consuming, and confusing.  I was tired and stressed at the end of each day initially. After taking a few weeks to get used to everything, I actually love it.  Prior to this rotation, I was mainly interested in going into more of counseling dietetics such as diabetes or weight loss.  Now that I've been working in a hospital seeing patients, I see that I am extremely interested in doing this.  There is a lot to know and it is much busier than other rotations but I really enjoy it.  I feel like I'm really helping people.  In fact, once I finish my internship, I now would love to find a position as a clinical dietitian in a hospital.
Here are some interesting things that I have done so far in my internship:
-Wrote tube feeding orders for patients. I'm able to choose the formula, the rate, and how many calories the patient gets.  This really uses my math skills and is a very important part of dietetics. I was scared when I began the internship that I would not like this or it would be too difficult to me but it has gone very well so far.
-Worked at a cancer center for a few days. This was really interesting and I see that there is so much to know about cancer. I am going to do another week at a cancer center for my elective rotations because I want to learn more.
-I worked at a bariatric center for a day. It was fascinating to learn more about bariatric surgery. This particular center mainly did lap bands which kind of forces you to eat slower and helps to lose weight.
-Helped host a National Nutrition Month health fair. I created a couple of MyPlate posters and a fun matching calories game.  I had people match the number of calories to different foods. Did you know that the average cup of granola has 450 calories? That one stumped most of the hospital employees.
Let me know if you want to know more about my internship. I have learned SO much and love seeing patients and helping people. I am someone who loves to be busy and work hard and it amazes me how

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Comments

  1. Of course I would LOVE to learn more about everything you're doing in your internship-I think it's fascinating and I'M learning as much as you are! :)

    So I guess I should thank you for that, too :)

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