Reflective Paper on Personal Experience as a Healthcare Worker

This reflective paper is based on personal experience as a health care worker at Rouz hospital and maternity hospital. It provides critical reflection of claimed learning in context of current theory and practice. The impact of learning on personal and professional practice along with suitable conclusion is provided in this reflective paper.

Reflective Paper
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Contents
INTRODUCTION.........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY ...............................................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION.............................................................................................................................10
REFRENCES................................................................................................................................11
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INTRODUCTION
This reflective paper is based on personal experience as a health care worker at Rouz
hospital and maternity hospital. This reflective paper provides critical refection of claimed
learning in context of current theory and practice. Reflection involves looking back at past
experience to support continuous learning from such experiences (Campbell and Rogers, 2022).
The impact of learning on personal and professional practice along with suitable conclusion is
provided in this reflective paper. Clear list of learning outcome which have resulted from this
learning experience and will be reflected on this module are provided below:
As a result of the experience I am now able to:
 Build better self-awareness skills and use reflective practice to enhance additional
characteristics of professional performance such as empathy and commitment to patient
advocacy
 Applying reflective theories and models to look back at past occurrences and learn more
about personal strengths and weaknesses in order to propel professional development and
improve emotional capabilities
 Improving caring capabilities by usage of reflective practice during interaction with
patients to understand their current requirements and enhance responsiveness to their
physical and mental needs
 Application of reflective practice during collaboration with other healthcare professionals
to integrate principles of reflection and reflective practice as a part of daily working
environment during improving in person interaction with patients.
MAIN BODY
Self reflection is an important practice for healthcare employees because it helps them
understand their strengths and weaknesses so that they are able to continuously work on their
professional development (Agyekum, 2022). The Rolfe reflective model is probably among the
easier ones as this depends upon mainly three questions only. Though, it does not mean that
reflection might remain superficial but could be as comprehensive as possible (Moritz and et. al.,
2021). In addition to this, it is a simple yet effective reflective model because it covers the
positive and negative aspects of the past experience so that further action can be taken in line
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with professional development (Patel and Metersky, 2021). The application of the Rolfe
reflective model is provided below:
What:
This is the first element of the reflective model which involves describing the situation
and writing about achievements, consequences, feelings and problems faced during the specific
experience or event (Rogers and et. al., 2020). I was a volunteer at Rouz hospital during the year
2020. During this year COVID-19 pandemic reached its height at the hospital which resulted in
many challenges as the hospital was facing a healthcare crisis. There was shortage of staff
because many healthcare workers also got infected by the COVID-19 virus and I had to become
an important member of my team from a simple volunteer because of this healthcare crisis and
staff shortage at the hospital. I was dutiful towards my new job role but was also really nervous
about taking on these new roles in the light of the pandemic because I had not anticipated this
type of drastic situation occurring at the hospital when I volunteer for my services.
I had to ensure that sanitation policies are followed including wearing suitable equipment
for daily job such as masks and protective gear so there the COVID-19 pandemic does not expect
or in fact anymore workers while also ensuring smooth functioning of the overall healthcare
organization. I was unaware of the challenges associated with volunteering during COVID-19
because it required me to work in constantly shifting and changing situations as basic
requirements for the healthcare workers such as PPE kits and masks were also in shortage. This
resulted in healthcare workers facing many challenges such as constantly being alarmed because
of the sanitation conditions at the hospital. I used my skills and knowledge related to healthcare
to always follow hospital policies regarding the COVID-19 pandemic.
In addition to this the healthcare crises bought about by the COVID-19 pandemic became
even worse because of the misinformation which was being spread online about the impact
symptoms and overall recover of the coronavirus disease (Goel and Gupta, 2020). I personally
saw individuals and patients coming to the hospital who were influenced by the online
misinformation and contracted the virus or made their condition worse on the basis of advise
from bogus misinformation which was being promoted in every online platform including
various social medic channels. This increased my frustration as much of the misinformation
about the virus which was being propagated online was increasing skepticism among patients
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abut the response form healthcare institutions and staff to he point they were not trusting many
healthcare workers and ignoring their instructions.
In between all of this I was also facing pressure from the overflow of patients at the
hospital which affected my own mental health. The rising isolation cased because of my daily
office work affected my stress levels and I also felt demotivated at some points. High stress
levels are common among healthcare workers which were increased because of daily stress of
COVID-19 (Karan, and Wadhera, 2021). Even though the healthcare crises affected my stress,
my passion and dedication towards healthcare and focus on helping people kept me focused on
the task at hand even if the situation become more difficult. In the end I am more grateful for this
experience as I was able to use my skills to help people recover from this pandemic. This event
provided me ample experience for working in tough and pressurizing environment of the
healthcare industry without losing my motivation.
So what?
The second section focuses on what the individual has learned about themselves. (Rolfe
and Freshwater, 2020). During my experience at the Rhouz Hospital I have understood the
difficult demands and the complicated situations that individuals in the hospitality industry have
to face. This experience has improved my skills in many areas such as time management and
emotional intelligence. Re-examining the experience at the hospital I have understood that time
management skills are essential for becoming a valuable staff at the hospital. I have evaluated
that I have a punctual attitude towards my daily work. The evidence behind this action is that I
completed all my daily duties with commitment that they will be delivered to the superiors in
time without any compromise on quality.
I was used to create a to-do lists on a daily basis which helped me ensure that I complete
daily tasks in a timely manner. I would also like to state that sometimes I had to complete
emergency tasks because the hospital was at full occupancy because of the pandemic. I used
different kinds of time management tools to ensure that I address each of the various emergency
situation in a timely manner, weather it was meeting with the family of new patient to help them
with hospital admission or assisting a medical professional in supplies management. On the basis
of the above experience I have understood that my time management skills improved during the
experience at Rhouz Hospital.
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I used my time management skills to get various things at the hospital done in a timely
manner and complete my duties effectively. This was specifically difficult because of the staff
and equipment shortage at the organization. I used the time management tools which are popular
among professionals such as 4-D time management and pomodaro technique. The 4 Ds are: Do,
Defer (Delay), Delegate, and Delete (Drop) (Hardy, Powell and Pharris, 2020). I remember that
I used this time management tool during the hieratic of the pandemic at the hospital and prepared
4-D rime management lists for each the patients I was tasked with looking after.
I categorized various tasks such as reporting on patient needs by assisting nursing staff,
answering calls or restocking supplies into different categories for each patient so that I am able
to complete my volunteering duties in a timely manner. The advantage of using this tool during
my volunteering experience was that it helped me manage limited time more effectively and stay
focused on what matters most at the moment. I used this tool to complete my personal as well as
professional activities in a timely manner. In addition to this I always had data about various
patients so that I offer better assistance and help to the nursing and medical professional staff in
taking care of the coronavirus patients.
On the other hand I have realized the a major disadvantage of using this tool was that I
was not directly involved in each of my duties as a volunteer as I used the tool to delegate, defer
and drop some activities which did not seem significant. I have analysed that the usage of the
time management tool reduced my learning opportunities as I was not directly involved in
understand the specific activities completed in a hospital at a time of crises. In addition to this
another technique I used during the experience for time management was The Pomodoro
Technique is a time management system that encourages people to work with the time they have
—rather than against it.
The Pomodoro Technique is implemented by breaking workday into 25-minute chunks
separated by five-minute breaks. These intervals are referred to as pomodoros (Gregg, 2018). I
applied this technique when handling my daily activities while also staying energized during my
long hospital shift. Specific instance of application of this technique was during the pressure
inducing evening shifts where I felt stressed and was not able to focus on my daily tasks. I
started applying this technique a little later during my volunteer experience because the pressure
of the evening shifts was too much to handle and I felt that time was not enough for me to
perform with high quality.
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I believe that the main advantage of applying this technique during the volunteering
experience was improvement in my capability to handle stress. The 5 minutes breaks during each
day helped me relax and look at the bigger picture of the COVID-19 pandemic instead of
stressing about little things, I have also observed that my personality is threat sensitive. This
means that I am easily overwhelmed by the environment. Individuals who are threat sensitive are
not able to cope up with uncertain environments (Coifman, Halachoff and Nylocks, 2018.). In
this way the usage of this time management technique reduced my stress by helping me manage
my volunteering time effectively. I will keep the knowledge of this time management tool for my
future professional experience as it has provided me great help.
The main disadvantage I faced because of usage of the The Pomodoro Technique was
that it did not completely resolved my issues related to stress and time management. This is
because I require longer time than five minutes to take my mind off stress and sometimes the
breaks implemented through the The Pomodoro Technique felt too short. I was able to take
physical breaks but my mind and thinking was still involved in the thoughts about my daily
work. I have learned that my threat sensitive personality is very disadvantageous to becoming
available medical professional in future because I will not be able maintain suitable work life
balance and may face burnout because of the stress.
The primary area where is struggled during my experience as voluntary healthcare
worker during my recruitment at the Rhuz hospital was stress management. It is apparent from
the above valuation of my skills that I am very threat sensitive. I am not able to effectively focus
on my daily activities and easily get overwhelmed. The pandemic conditions along with
uncertainty and challenges of dealing with misinformation affecting patients at the hospital
demotivated me and increased my stress. A specific instance which can be used to examine my
stress management abilities occurred during morning shift when large number of patients arrived
at the hospital because of sudden spike in COVID-19 patients.
I was already ware about the ineffective conditions at the hospital and felt that this
sudden increase in COVID-19 patients most of whom are elderly will further increase the
pressure. Looking around I could feel that other senior medical staff available at the hospital
were also not expecting such abrupt rise in patients. Uncertain environments are common stress
stimuli (Feng, Bozorgzadeh and Harrison, 2020). We were already understaffed with uncertainty
about protective suppliers for medical staff and patients care which further enhanced my
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pressure. During that day I was not able to focus ion my activities and failed to complete some of
the tasks in time. In addition to this, the stress also affected me physically as I started
experienced headache and wanted to lie down for an hour to refresh myself. I had to keep going
to make myself useful ins such abrupt and uncertain environment and also travelled with other
hospital staff to get more supplies for taking care of all the patients,. It was a feverish day and I
feel that I could have performed much better if I had better stress management skills. Looking
back I have understood that my ineffective stress management reduced my ability to focus on
tasks at hand and provide the best care to patients. It is essential that I improve my stress
management capabilities going forward if I want to perform effectively during any kind of
situation in the healthcare industry.
Now what?
This is considered as the last stage of respective model, it has been asked to undertakes
the stages they would be taking in order to develop their activities as well as learn from the
beginning of the experiences (Rolfe, 2019). I have understood from my experience at the Rhouz
hospital that I need to enhance my stress management abilities. I felt extremely demotivated at
certain points of my recruitment in hospital which also resulted in loss of sleep. If it had not been
for the supportive colleagues and staff at the hospital I would not have been able to perform as
well as I have evaluated.
Stress management is important because it helps individuals deal with difficult situations
and collect their strength to handle changeless more effectively. Chesak and et. al., 2019). For
example the the sudden rise in number of COVID-19 patients reaching the hospital including
elderly patients affected my time management skills, daily planning and collaboration with
others. In addition to this, I was also not able to focus on my daily objectives which lead to a
painful headache lowering my energy and focus throughout the day. Now after realizing my
weakness of ineffective stress management skills I am focused on learning about stress
management techniques.
I need to adopt effective stress management techniques in order to improve my skills
when stranded in a stress full situation. I have learned from my colleges at the Rhouz hospital
that one of most common ways through which medical professional reduce their stress issue
mindfulness practices. The concept of mindfulness focuses on relaxing the mind and body to
achieve better control over one's body and mind (Barclay, 2019). I have completed further
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researched on the topic of mindfulness and I learned that certain breathing practices have
positive impact on stress reduction. I personally used some breathing techniques to understand
their application and impact for my body. There were many step-wise tutorials available online
which helped me implement mindfulness breathing practices easily.
I have learned that the primary advantage of adopting mindfulness breathing techniques
and other practices is that it will help me bring calmness in my life. Mindfulness is common
method for build stress free life (Yang and et. al., 2018). I will be able to develop tolerance
towards stress and start practicing handling stress more effectively. On the other hand I have also
realized that the possible disadvantage of relying too much on mindfulness to cope up with
stress of being medical professional may not help me excel in my career. This is because most of
the leading professionals in medical field are able to cope up with stress of this profession by
improving their skills and knowledge so that they are able to make informed decisions and
prepared ins situations of crises.
I will be adopting mindfulness practices in my daily life while simultaneously
impoverishing my knowledge abut crises management so that I am able to deliver high quality
work even in moments of high stress. I believe that the advantage of taking this action is
supporting my professional development while also helping me enhance my personality for a
successful professional future. This is because credentials related to medical skill development
and crises management will help me stand out from my peers during my professional journey.
Earning extra credentials through online courses increases employ-ability of individuals as they
have evidence backed skills (Sinha and Bagarukayo, 2019). All the while I will also be able to
improve my stress sensitive personality to become more suitable to the medical field. I believe
that the only downside towards investing my effort and resources in improving my crises
management and mindfulness field in case of medical profession is that it will require huge time
investment and I may have to delay other personal or academic objectives to focus in this area.
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CONCLUSION
As per the above report, it has been concluded that critical reflection is crucial as this aids them
in doing modifications as well as improvements to their activities, understandings, actions,
interactions and learning atmosphere. In addition to this, this is vital aspects of meaningful
learning as well as activities developments. Critical reflection helps individuals move further
from simply looking back at past experience to develop a profound understanding of its negative
as well as its positive aspects. Moreover, for representing the reflection Rolfe reflective model as
it have virtue of straightforwardness as well as simplicity. Additionally, it was formed initially
for nursing and care education but have become much wider into their subsequent applications
not least due to clarity of model and their ease of utilizes. The three phases of model is
considerable by individuals in turn what happened, the occurrence implications and
consequences for future conduct.
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REFRENCES
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Agyekum, R. E., 2022. Professional reflections of a lecturer practitioner during the first COVID-
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Barclay, J., 2019. Anger: Radicalised in Northern Ireland. Journal of Applied Psychology and
Social Science, 5(1). pp.116-118.
Campbell, F. and Rogers, H., 2022. Through the looking glass: a review of the literature
surrounding reflective practice in dentistry. British Dental Journal, 232(10). pp.729-
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Chesak and et. al., 2019. Stress management interventions for nurses: critical literature
review. Journal of holistic nursing, 37(3). pp.288-295.
Coifman, K. G., Halachoff, D. J. and Nylocks, K. M., 2018. Mitigating risk? Set-shifting ability
in high threat sensitive individuals predicts approach behavior during simulated peer-
rejection. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 37(7). pp.481-513.
Feng, Y., Bozorgzadeh, N. and Harrison, J. P., 2020. Bayesian analysis for uncertainty
quantification of in situ stress data. International Journal of Rock Mechanics and
Mining Sciences, 134. p.104381.
Goel, A. and Gupta, L., 2020. Social media in the times of COVID-19. Journal of clinical
rheumatology.
Gregg, M., 2018. Counterproductive: Time management in the knowledge economy. Duke
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Hardy, M. M., Powell, J. W. and Pharris, L. J., 2020. A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF TIME
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evolving crisis. Journal of Hospital Medicine, 16(2). pp.127-127.
Moritz and et. al., 2021. Designing a peer-led approach to teaching review and enhancement in
academia. Journal of University Teaching & Learning Practice, 18(1). p.7.
Patel, K. M. and Metersky, K., 2021. Reflective practice in nursing: A concept
analysis. International Journal of Nursing Knowledge.
Rogers and et. al., 2020. Expert judgements and community values: preference heterogeneity for
protecting river ecology in Western Australia. Australian Journal of Agricultural and
Resource Economics, 64(2). pp.266-293.
Rolfe, G. and Freshwater, D., 2020. Critical reflection in practice: generating knowledge for
care. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Rolfe, S., 2019. Models of SEND: the impact of political and economic influences on policy and
provision. British Journal of Special Education, 46(4). pp.423-444.
Sinha, E. and Bagarukayo, K., 2019. Online Education in Emerging Knowledge Economies:
Exploring factors of motivation, de-motivation and potential facilitators; and studying
the effects of demographic variables. International Journal of Education and
Development using Information and Communication Technology, 15(2). pp.5-30.
Yang and et. al., 2018. Happier healers: randomized controlled trial of mobile mindfulness for
stress management. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, 24(5).
pp.505-513.
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