How to reflect on work experience

A little bit about me:

Hey guys, my name is Melina and I am cofounder of MindMediconnect. I am an aspiring medic in year 12, studing Biology, Chemistry and Maths for my A-Levels. I am intrested in many topics surrounding medicine, but specifically the anatomy of the body including the nervous system and endocrine system. This is my first post and I would like to focus on reflection on work experiences.

How to reflect:

Finding and doing work experience is one thing, but reflecting is something many students find even more challenging! Reflection is a KEY part of the work experience, as it is not where you did the experience that matters, but what you took away from it.

There are many different ways people reflect, but the way I have found most effective is using STARR which stands for:

S- situation- describe what happened in your work experience, something you observed that stood out to you/ you felt was important

T- task- what did the healthcare professionals plan to do in the situation and why did you think they did this?

A- action- what exactly did the medical team do?

R- result- what happened as a consequence of their action, basically explaining the outcome of this action

R- reflection- what can YOU take away from this experience/ observations?

An example of how I have reflected on my work experience:

After calling and emailing GPs several dozens of times, I was finally emailed back by the practice manager who told me the dates I could come and start an exciting week's worth of experience that gave me such a great insight into the day-to-day life of GPs. During this work experience, I was lucky enough to be there when EMIS (the online system GPs and hospitals use for patient records/ reports/ logging appointments) stopped working for half a day!

This is how I used STARR to reflect on this very important experience:

Situation- the GPs and receptionists found that they could not log on to EMIS where they basically access everything, from appointment times and patient details to patient reports. Slowly, patients started entering the surgery, and at this point it had been confirmed that EMIS was not going to be working for a few hours. Neither the doctors nor receptionists had any idea as to which patient was meant to see which doctor. Calls from frustrated patients also started to increase and it was hard to gain any control over this stressful situation...

Task- the team came up with a plan to get help from patients by asking their details and identification to figure out who they were meant to see.

Action- receptionists began writing patients who came and calls to book an appointment. This helped ease the pressure on the doctor's so they could focous on consultations despite the stressful situation. The professionals also had to guess the timings of the patient's appointments according to when they entered the GP.

Result- this meant that everything became organised and there was a track of exactly what was going on so it was easier to manage.

Reflection- the main takeaway from this experience was how important teamwork is in every situation- big or small and how it can darastically change the quality of patient care. Additionally, this showed me how many unexpected and challenging situations doctors face on a day-to-day basis, and that medicine is not all fun and games. However, seeing the challenges makes me want to pursue this path even more as I know it will be even more awarding once you have tackled them!