Joon Park submitted 2015-12-20
People who work in the health care field cannot avoid the stress in their job. Health care workers must oversee every aspect of patient safety and ensure that they receive top quality care. This includes monitoring patient safety from the time of admission until the time of discharge. Each health care worker must perform his or her job without error and must also try to meet the patient and family’s needs. Having all of these responsibilities can cause emotional stress, physical fatigue and burnout in health care workers. This being so, the medical students who are looking forward to be a medical providers near the future have to think about the pressure from the responsibilities as a health care worker and prepare to control the stress.
One of the most important moment in the health care area is the emergency situation. If medical staffs fail to cope with the urgent moment, it may lead the patient to decease. This can be linked to a lawsuit by the patient’s family, and the medical staffs could be fallen in depression or get trauma due to the frustration. These will influence on their working and they will get severe stress from their work. The only thing we can prevent this situation is a preparation before we encounter the situation. There are lots of reason which fail to cope appropriately, but one of them is confusion at the suddenness and emergency situation. Some people perform the certain life saving techniques or procedure well at other times, but they could confuse the procedure that they have to do at the emergency situation and may fall in panic. To prevent this confusion or panic, we should keep a level of head in the emergency situation and have to be acquainted what we must do at the moment through a lot of experience of it. As always, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. If we can get a chance to practice and experience with an emergency patient in the real situation, that will be perfect preparation. However, that is an impossible because a life of a human is important beyond compare. This being so, the internship is a good option to prepare and experience the emergency situation directly or indirectly, and learn how experienced medical staffs handle it at the moment. The experience through the internship is definitely helpful for medical students, and it is a good chance to practice what we learned in our school. Also, we will be able to learn more about practical skills from the internship. Therefore, the future medical providers can be trained by the internship and this may be helpful to reduce the severe mental stress or panic at the emergency situation.
Patient decease during the performance of live saving techniques on the patients by the medical providers is also huge mental and emotional stress to them. Death is always a serious subject. Even though the medical providers provide good treatment, there is no guarantee that they can save life of every patients. And, if a patient deceased, the medical provider have to see the patient’s family or friends, and convey the sad news. It is also hard to see their reaction such as grief, wailing, crying and so on, and these could lead the medical providers to emotional and mental stress or problem such as, despair, depression, guilty conscience, sadness, etc. And, if they cannot overcome the stress, they might feel anxious or be afraid when they have to perform life saving techniques on their patients due to the past experience and memory. As well as, if the stress is severe, it may influence on their life, such as insomnia, depression, indigestion, etc. This being so, the health care workers have to be able to manage their stress by themselves or participate some relaxation programs such as fitness, yoga, meditation, etc. Also, the prospective health care providers or medical students also have to know how to control the stress for their future. As well as, if there are some group programs which are provided by the health care organization for their workers, they can be a good option for medical providers. Through the program, the providers who are difficult to manage their stress from their job can speak about their problem each other and hear other colleagues’ experience or advices. A seminar is also a good option for prevention the emotional stress situation. Through the regular participation to seminars, the providers and medical students can learn how to respond when they confront the emotional or mental stress situation.
There is a stress on every job and any position. Especially, the stress from medical filed is severe because the medical providers’ purpose is a saving life their patients. Their mistake or failure on their job can be directly connected to the patients’ death. All medical students and prospective medical students must recognize it and prepare about the stressful situation through the learning from school, internships for practical exercise, participation to the seminars, etc. Even if they prepare well, there is no guarantee to prevent every situation, and they might be confused in the real situation. However, one thing is true that the preparation will help the health care providers and medical students to be able to reduce the gap between simulation and real situation, and this is the best what we can do for our career and our patients in the future.