Senior Project
April 11, 2013
Ever since I began sports, I knew I always wanted to know how to help injured players. That is when I discovered a career pathway focused around aiding people post-injuries. Athletic training was an option for me, but after much research I deterred to studying physical therapists. For my senior project I chose to create multiple brochures for a local physical therapy clinic. In order to do this, I needed to gain hours interning and job shadowing a physical therapist.
Michigan Rehabilitation Specialist, otherwise known as MRS, is the clinic that I intern for. Jennifer Ray is the owner of the clinic and she is also my old neighbor. This was my connection into a huge internship opportunity. Over the past couple months, I have completed over 40 hours of interning. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I would come in for two hours at a time.
Prior to entering the internship, I did not have much knowledge about the job description before hand. In the beginning I was taught the basic rules of a clinic and the daily routines. The biggest rule they had was about privacy, no one is allowed to talk about patients outside of the clinic due to their right to privacy. Other than that, I was welcome to ask patients about their injuries.
When a patient first enters the clinic, they have to have a note from a doctor recommending that they go through rehabilitation services. After turning in all insurance information and making a schedule for dates to come in, they have to get an examination. Jen takes them into a private room to evaluate the injury. After determining what happened, they discuss different strengthening exercises and stretches with the patient. Basically, the physical therapist job is to show the patient what exercises to preform in order to get the injured area back to full strength.
Our number one goal at the clinic is to improve range of motion/ restore strength and to help lessen the pain in certain cases. Physical therapy is a great option for those with painful joints or ligaments because it can help strengthen the areas and reduce pain. In most cases, depending on the severity of the injury, patients will attend several weeks or months of office visits.
At office visits, a patient works one-on-one with the physical therapist. They are instructed how to use exercise machinery and given simple, but beneficial tasks. For example, someone with a knee injury would rate their pain level each visit. At each visit the therapist will increase their pace and tasks. This ensures that the muscles or joints will be working hard, but not to the point of feeling pain or discomfort.
After completing many hours in the clinic, I began to think of ways I could give back for this amazing opportunity. I noticed that the clinic would constantly be photocopying millions of pages of exercise packets for each patient, or they would be writing down many instructions. I came up with the idea of creating multiple brochures that focused on exercises for each type of injury location. I made brochures for post-knee operations, shoulder injuries, hand injuries, ankle injuries, and many more.
Each brochure contains pictures and descriptions of basic exercises. I included larger font sizes since many of our patients are older folks. Another feature in the brochures is areas for the physical therapist to fill out. These areas include how many things to preform in each set and how many sets to do each day. The brochures are easy to hand to the patient and are well laid out.
In order to make the brochures, I needed my computer and Jen’s help with what exercises to include. I started out by creating a basic layout for the brochures and including the clinics logo. On the front, every brochure lists what it is for, the clinics phone number, and the office hours. On the inside of the brochures, a picture is listed with a description of multiple exercises. After the description there is an area for the physical therapist to fill out. They fill out how many reps are in a set and how many sets to do each day. Patients are able to talk to their physical therapist to install a daily routine that will help speed up recovery.
This project was very important to me because physical therapy is the career pathway that I am going into. It has taught me that I enjoy the working environment and the task of helping out patients. I have also always enjoyed science class throughout my younger schooling years. Working towards my doctorate in physical therapy will consist of mainly science classes and many hours of studying. I believe I am well prepared before college since I have been given a preview of this job field.
Along with my internship, I am going to be working on furthering my education in college. I am going to attend Eastern Michigan University to gain my bachelors degree and then transfer to a larger PT school. Grand Valley State University is where I want to eventually transfer. I believe I have a very good outlook on my future and that I will become very successful. This project and internship has given me a look into what I can possibly doing someday. Becoming a physical therapist is my career goal in life. Ever since I had to attend physical therapy myself, I knew it was something I wanted to pursue. The work atmosphere is calm and fun, I love meeting new people, and I have always taken kind to helping out people in need.
Works Cited
Michigan Rehabilitation Specialists, Jennifer Ray
Athletic Trainer/ Physical Therapist, Jay Richardson
Interning college students, Garid, Ashley, Danelle, Kate
Brochures
acute_shoulder.pages | |
File Size: | 2023 kb |
File Type: | pages |
ankle_instability.pages | |
File Size: | 406 kb |
File Type: | pages |
post-op_knee_excercises.pages | |
File Size: | 1780 kb |
File Type: | pages |