Monday, May 14, 2012


The final chapter in the life of a standardized patient....

     Once we are trained in a scenario and given a new identity; we are called back again and again to share the symptoms with  the med students. I do two gall bladder "encounters."  For one I am Rosa Harrison and for the other one which eventually involves an hour-long physical, I am Jane Whitmore.  For the palliative care described in the last blog, I am Mrs. Susan Bullard.  Often I go there with a bad knee, and on those days I am Marie Sonderheim looking for a diagnosis of osteoarthritis!  That one is an easy one!
     So, my phone rings, and I hear, "Hey, Jane, this is Ann.  (fill in the blank) is needed two weeks from now.  Are you available?"  If I can possibly work it in I go. Serving as a SP is very rewarding as well as fun! 
     By the way, I told them up front I would not succumb to the OB/GYN exams! One young med student asked me if my mother was still alive.  I wanted to burst out laughing, but that would not have been within my character, so I merely said....no!

     No idea where I will go with this next, but this has been my "ojt"-ing for sharing the interesting and fun things from Mackinac Island.  I head that direction with stops along the way mid-June.

2 comments:

  1. Jane, you didn't get asked the question I was asked at 50 -- and did laugh out loud. "Are you planning to have any more children?"

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  2. Jane, when signing many forms prior to partial hysterectomy at age 64, I was presented with one stating I acknowledged that this procedure would prohibit any pregnancies in the future. I gave the nurse a blank stare. She smiled and said,"I know, I know. But we are required by law to have that acknowledgement signed." I could not keep a straight face the way you did.

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