Day 7- Wednesday, March 15th
For my second clinical day I had the opportunity to fly to Seldovia. When we got to the Smokey Bay Air airport in Homer they said they could fly us to Seldovia but there was no guarantee they could fly us back because winds were starting to pick up and all flights the day before were cancelled due to weather. It was roughly a 15-20 minute flight in a 5 passenger plane. The ride to Seldovia was very bumpy but it was incredibly beautiful! I flew out with a Nurse Practitioner and the MA was running late so he was going to catch the next flight. The NP I was with is a traveling nurse so she has been in Alaska for about 3 weeks and this was only her second or third time traveling to Seldovia.
When we landed in Seldovia we had to walk through the parking lot and find the SVT clinic car that we were supposed to drive to the clinic. Once we found it, we looked inside and tried to find the keys so we could start it. Neither one of us could find the keys so we were rummaging through the car for quite a long time. Once we finally found the keys, we got inside and tried to start the car only it wouldn’t start. There were only 2 keys but neither one was working. Eventually we got one to work and finally started the car. Then my nurse turned to me and said, “Alright, here’s another one for you… I don’t remember how to get to the clinic.” We both laughed because it had been quite the adventure getting here already and now we didn’t know where to go. I told her that the town was small enough and if we drove around it a few times we’d find our way soon enough. So she put the car in drive and started driving… right into the airport runway. We both saw what looked like a road and headed towards that. We found our way to the clinic down the road after about 10 minutes of driving.
Because the MA hadn’t arrived yet, I was admitting and rooming the patients along with taking their vitals before reporting to the NP. Here I learned that the clinic in Seldovia is open 3 days a week. Because the winds were starting to pick up again they had to fly the NP and MA back to Homer on the 1:10 flight. This got me thinking about how much of the medical services Seldovia residents actually receive. They had to close the clinic early to make sure the clinic staff got back safe but this also limits the amount of time the clinic is open to provide care. If they had more staff they could fully staff the clinic but because of their lack of resources, medical staff from Homer has to fly out to work at the Seldovia clinic. Unfortunately I was only able to be at this clinic for a few hours before I had to fly back. I was signed up to attend an immunization clinic back in Homer beginning at 1:00pm. Once I landed I was picked up by a nurse at the Homer clinic and drove to the workshop. It was a very informational presentation that covered vaccination rates in Alaska and how immunizations are given and documented in their health care system.
After the workshop was done I was picked up along with the other students and we went back to the house. This is one of my favorite clinical days because I was able to experience so much and meet so many different people!
For my second clinical day I had the opportunity to fly to Seldovia. When we got to the Smokey Bay Air airport in Homer they said they could fly us to Seldovia but there was no guarantee they could fly us back because winds were starting to pick up and all flights the day before were cancelled due to weather. It was roughly a 15-20 minute flight in a 5 passenger plane. The ride to Seldovia was very bumpy but it was incredibly beautiful! I flew out with a Nurse Practitioner and the MA was running late so he was going to catch the next flight. The NP I was with is a traveling nurse so she has been in Alaska for about 3 weeks and this was only her second or third time traveling to Seldovia.
When we landed in Seldovia we had to walk through the parking lot and find the SVT clinic car that we were supposed to drive to the clinic. Once we found it, we looked inside and tried to find the keys so we could start it. Neither one of us could find the keys so we were rummaging through the car for quite a long time. Once we finally found the keys, we got inside and tried to start the car only it wouldn’t start. There were only 2 keys but neither one was working. Eventually we got one to work and finally started the car. Then my nurse turned to me and said, “Alright, here’s another one for you… I don’t remember how to get to the clinic.” We both laughed because it had been quite the adventure getting here already and now we didn’t know where to go. I told her that the town was small enough and if we drove around it a few times we’d find our way soon enough. So she put the car in drive and started driving… right into the airport runway. We both saw what looked like a road and headed towards that. We found our way to the clinic down the road after about 10 minutes of driving.
Because the MA hadn’t arrived yet, I was admitting and rooming the patients along with taking their vitals before reporting to the NP. Here I learned that the clinic in Seldovia is open 3 days a week. Because the winds were starting to pick up again they had to fly the NP and MA back to Homer on the 1:10 flight. This got me thinking about how much of the medical services Seldovia residents actually receive. They had to close the clinic early to make sure the clinic staff got back safe but this also limits the amount of time the clinic is open to provide care. If they had more staff they could fully staff the clinic but because of their lack of resources, medical staff from Homer has to fly out to work at the Seldovia clinic. Unfortunately I was only able to be at this clinic for a few hours before I had to fly back. I was signed up to attend an immunization clinic back in Homer beginning at 1:00pm. Once I landed I was picked up by a nurse at the Homer clinic and drove to the workshop. It was a very informational presentation that covered vaccination rates in Alaska and how immunizations are given and documented in their health care system.
After the workshop was done I was picked up along with the other students and we went back to the house. This is one of my favorite clinical days because I was able to experience so much and meet so many different people!