B
iomedical Science senior student, Taylor Jackson, has enjoyed amazing job shadowing experiences this summer due to her involvement in St. Luke’s Biomedical Science program.

She first shadowed at a local dermatologist’s office where she stated “I had a blast and really loved the atmosphere.” During the first half of the day Taylor observed office visits and the second-half was surgeries.

“The office visits were casual, many checkups for recent skin cancer patients, some patch testing for allergies (he showed me how to read the patch tests!), and other visits for things like eczema. If a patient presented with a new and concerning spot, he would tell them it was precancer, freeze it off and cut a piece to send to the pathologist or dismiss it as everyday keratosis,” Taylor says.

Taylor stated, “The surgeries I observed were a few cancer removals (mostly basal cells, I believe). Because he uses local anesthesia rather than general anesthesia, these surgeries were nothing too drastic. There were some removals on the legs, neck, back, etc. He numbed the area, cut out the cancer, cauterized it, sewed it up, and called it a day. I was able to get very close to everything and had a great view of him cutting the cancer out. Everything was very casual and he kept a conversation with the patients as he was doing all of this.”

Taylor's next job shadow was with a local OB-GYN. She arrived at the hospital early one morning with the plan of observing two hysterectomies, but quickly learned how fast plans can change in a matter of minutes.

The first stop was a postpartum checkup where they discussed medication that would be prescribed for release from the hospital. Next, Taylor watched her first ever surgery in an operating room, she stated, “I observed a total laparoscopic hysterectomy/bilateral salpingectomy (removal of uterus and fallopian tubes). It was very fascinating to watch the use of the instruments while completely looking at the screen in front of the patient. I got to watch every step of the procedure as I had the perfect spot by the screen. I actually watched 2 of these surgeries and they ranged from 45-minutes to over an hour.”

They next hurried to (Taylor’s personal favorite) a c-section, “The c-section was for a mother with a past history of 3 c-sections. I even observed the cutting of the umbilical cord and closing the incision,” she states.

Last, Taylor observed a suction D&C due to an early miscarriage. She said, “I observed the procedure to suction tissue from inside the uterus. This procedure was extremely bloody, but from what I understand, not too bad to recover from.”

Taylor very much enjoyed both experiences, although very different, noting that the biggest difference was that the hospital environment was a much faster pace. She considers both opportunities a blessing and says, “I’ll never forget this for the rest of my life. I can’t believe I had these experiences at such a young age.”