Week of 1/21/19:

During my first mentorship day, my mentor and I ordered a blood culture, prescribed medicine to
manage pain status for a gunshot wound, and assessed abdominal pain. I really like my new
mentor. I had a great time and I feel like I will learn a lot from her. I look forward to going to
mentorship the rest of the semester and figuring out if I want to do nursing.

Week of 1/28/19:
For my ISM spring project topic, I am planning to discuss the issues of pain management and
how they can be controlled. I also plan to incorporate things about opioids and the effects of
taking them. I believe my mentorship experience can help me with this project because my
mentor deals a lot and specializes with pain management.

Week of 2/4/19:
My mentor played an important role in helping me decide what my project topic would be since
she specializes in pain management we both thought it would be a good idea to do a project
over something that is very familiar to her. This week at mentorship we treated a patient with
influenza that was on a ventilator to sedate him properly. We also managed a patient with
chronic knee pain and treated them with a steroid injection.

Week of 2/11/19:
Something new and interesting I did this week as mentorship that I got to see this week at
mentorship was my mentor got to access a patient’s implanted pain pump. My mentor did this
using a ultrasound. Most people think ultrasounds are for when a woman is having a baby, but
an ultrasound can be used for a variety of things. My mentor used the ultrasound to refill
dilaudid, marcaine, and fentanyl. An ultrasound can be used for a fetus, a person’s abdominal
and pelvic organs, muscles and tendons, and heart and blood vessels. Another new and
interesting thing I saw at mentorship this week was my mentor looking at an acromioclavicular
joint. She gave the patient an injection to treat a subacromial bursa. One more interesting I got
to experience this week at mentorship was many people with migraines. My mentor diagnosed
them with a migraine and treated the different patients with triptans. This week at mentorship,
multiple people with chronic back pain had come. This was the first time I got to experience
people with back pain. It was mainly their lower back that was in pain. My mentor had reviewed
and checked their back pain and she renewed their prescription of medicines like oxycodone or
oxycontin.

Week of 2/18/19:
While doing my mid-term presentation powerpoint, I put a lot of effort into it, but not as much as
I did during the fall semester. Since I already have my fall semester mid-term presentation
powerpoint saved, I only had to change a couple things here and there. On the first slide, I I only
had to change fall to spring and my project topic. Since this semester I have a new mentor, I
had to change my whole second slide and make it of my new mentor. This slide was fairly easy
since I already had all my information on the mentor poster project. For the 3rd slide, I kept it the
exact same since nothing has changed about ISM. My project topic slide I had to change since I
have a new project. The key points and research topics slide I had to completely change since I
got a whole new topic. For my current event, I just had to summarize my current event which I
already did. My product slide basically came from my goal setting form. My conclusion and
thank you slide was not changed drastically, just a few words here and there. My works cited
slide was not changed since I do not have anything but my current event yet. I did not ask for
help from my mentor for the mid-term presentation, since I already received all the information
from her for previous assignments.

Week of 2/25/19:
I think what interests me the most about working with patients and specializing over pain
medications is the fact that you can be changing someone’s life. By realizing what is wrong with
a patient and diagnosing them with a disease or anything that is wrong, you can be saving
someone’s life. With detecting something early, you can realize what is wrong so the patient can
get the best medical care that is available for them. One new thing I have learned about this
career topic and by mentoring a FNP is that a nurse practitioner does more diagnostics rather
than helping patients throughout a hospital. They work more with medications and running tests
rather than just being there for the patient as a registered nurse would. Another new thing I have
learned this nine weeks is that the most common pain area is your back. If you have back pain
for more than 3 months is less common than acute pain. Some conditions due to back pain can
be a muscle strain or a ligament strain. Another new thing I have learned about this career this
nine weeks is that nurse practitioners do a lot of work with injections. As well as diagnosing
people, they can also inject needles/pain medications.

Week of 3/18/19:
I believe my greatest strength in completing my semester project for ISM is being very
informative and giving great variety of topics. Although all my information is under pain
management in some type of way, I believe that I give such different categories of pain
management. My plan is to discuss opioids, pain management in general, the brain, pain
receptors, etc. It is good to talk about all different things instead of just talking about just pain
management, so the audience does not get bored and so all the information is not so repetitive.
I believe my biggest weakness is keeping up with my weebly website. I have been slacking on
uploading my assignments and staying on track. I could be more productive by everytime I get
an assignment back or everytime I complete an assignment online, I can upload it to my weebly
right away so I do not get behind and have to do everything all at once. I would love to make my
life easier, so from now on I will try my hardest to stay on task, especially in class and upload
my activity logs when I get them back, upload assignments like my research as soon as I
complete it, etc.

Week of 3/25/18:
During this semester, I have learned many new things at my new mentorship. I barely knew
anything about this field of a nurse practitioner, but every week I go to mentorship, I learn
something new. This week at mentorship I saw my mentor order a new test. I have seen her
measure a patient’s pain and decided what to do or what medicine to prescribe after seeing that
type of pain. This week a patient had came with acute abdominal pain, so my mentor decided
that ordering a chest x-ray is a good idea to make sure that everything is okay. There was
another patient who had a case of influenza. My mentor decided to put that patient on a
ventilator to properly sedate the patient for their own benefit. The patient with the acute
abdominal pain can help me in my semester project by showing the areas of common pain
locations. I can also address what you would do if you see a patient with acute abdominal pain,
like ordering a chest x-ray. The patient with influenza can help me with my semester project by
talking about what pains come as a side effect to influenza. I can also say how you can treat a
patient with a case of influenza.

Week of 4/1/19:
During this school year, the most enjoyable thing that I have experienced during our ISM class
is all the little creative assignments we do. They are easy grades, fun, and creative.
Assignments like the mentorship poster project was an easy 100 if you did it and made it look
pretty. Activities like these that are easy going are fun to do, since there is not much stress to it.
During this school year, the most enjoyable thing that I have experienced during my mentorship
is that seeing all different kinds of patients with all different problems. It is very interesting to see
someone with an issue and being able to help them. I love how you can make a difference in
their lives very easily. The least enjoyable thing in ISM class is the little things like structures to
our papers. For example, in our research assignment we could only have one sentence and no
more and we have to have a hanging indention. The least enjoyable experience at mentorship is
how you have to be on your feet most of the time. There is not very many moments where you
can sit down, take a break, and relax. You always have to be making rounds and looking after
patients.

Week of 4/8/19:
This week at mentorship, I watched my mentor do a left intertrochanteric injection for hip joint
pain and reviewed a patient’s ekg. For my final presentation, I feel very prepared. I have
completed everything that has been told of us up to this date. All I have left to add are my
artifacts, complete my research and key points slides, and fix grammatical errors. With a rubric
of all the things we need on our final presentation, it would be very helpful. When we got a rubric
for our mid-term presentation, it was very effective of knowing what exactly needed to be on our
powerpoint and it helped by having a checklist to make sure we had everything that was needed
to get the grade we deserve. For my final product, my first goal was to buy my tri-fold board by
April 1st, which I have done. The next date I have to complete something is on April 15th, which
is next week and I need to complete all my research, which I will be starting this week. I feel
very prepared with all my tasks that I need to complete, since it is just a repeat of last semester
with a different topic.

Week of 4/15/19:
In my most recent experience at my mentorship site, my mentor and I saw a patient with
erythema nodosum that has sarcoidosis. My mentor helped this patient by treating them with a
toradol IV, so that the pain could be reduced. Also at my most recent experience at my
mentorship site, I saw a patient and used Butrans patch on them, which was not very effective
at all. Later, my mentor and I started the patient on OxyContin. Another thing I saw at my most
recent mentorship experience is that my mentor treated a patient that has hepatic carcinoma
cancer pain and started a fentanyl patch on this patient, so that the severe pain of the patient
could reduce. Also at mentorship this week, my mentor conducted a right knee steroid
procedure, since the patient had difficulty walking on their right foot. Before doing this
procedure, we identified the risks, benefits, and alternatives to this procedure. My mentor used
a Chlorhexidine swab to cleanse the area around the site of the procedure, We also went
around to different patients whose medications needed to be adjusted, so we would adjust the
medicines of these patients according to their severity level of pain.

Week of 4/22/19:
During my most recent mentorship experience, I saw a intercostal nerve block on a patient with
multiple rib fixes. I also saw my mentor drain an abscess that was caused by a picc line. I think
the spring semester of the ISM course helped me discover what I want to do. I have always
found passion in the business field, but after going to mentorship during the fall semester, I do
not see myself doing a business career anymore. I wanted to experience something in the
medical field, since I started to get interested in that earlier last year. After going to mentorship
every week at a hospital, I found out that it is something I might want to do in my future. Maybe
a nurse practitioner is not my wanted career path, but definitely something in the medical field.
Dealing with patients and helping them get better is something I enjoy, since I feel a sense of
happiness that these people get to live their lives. Out of this ISM school year, I will take that the
business field is not for me. Also, I will start looking more into medical classes to see if those are
it for me and what I want to do as my career path in the near future.