Consider what you have observed and learned about your mentor or other employees at your site, and reflect on your own academic and professional preparationThroughout internship, I have seen that my mentor and coworkers all exhibit outstanding professionalism, and are dedicated to the work that they do. For them, running the practice is not just about making a profit or seeking recognition; it is about serving the people around them and making a positive impact in their community every day. I too hope to be as dedicated to my own career in the future and be a force for positive change and improvement in the community.
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Project Link: all_about_hipaa__3_.pdf All About HIPAA - an infographicAs I mentioned briefly in previous blog posts, HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) is a legislation enacted by the U.S, government to protect the privacy and security of sensitive patient information. The infographic above serves to educate patients on how HIPAA rules and regulations as well as compliancy by healthcare providers help to protect their safety and private information. I was inspired to create this project by a HIPAA compliancy course that I was required to take prior to the start of internship. I wanted my project to help me reinforce my knowledge of HIPAA and its importance in healthcare professions.
I decided that my infographic would look more professional and organized if I created it digitally, so I started to work on it in Canva during the second week of internship. When I was finished with my initial draft, I presented it to my mentor for critique and feedback. I received mainly good feedback on my work overall, as well as a few formatting suggestions. The night before my on-site POL, however, all my information was accidentally deleted from the infographic. Fortunately, I had saved an earlier version of the document with all of the original content. Since my mentor had insisted that the infographic be letter-sized, I had to create my own template with custom dimensions. In the end, it still looked professional, organized, and engaging, which was my goal for the project. In my POL, I used a presentation on Google Slides. The link to it is attached below. my_internship_experience_halker.pptx Part 11. How did you measure the success of the work you did while you were an intern? What did you learn from this?Much of the work I have done during internship so far has been time sensitive and required me to learn and get things done quickly in the right way. I am used to taking my time to finish my work so as to ensure that it is done well. During internship, however, I soon learned that in order for things to run smoothly around the practice, I couldn't afford to take up extra time by doing things my way; there was a specific protocol in place for every task to ensure the maximum efficiency and accuracy in completing it. Thus, I mainly measured my successes by how quickly I was able to learn how to carry out a task and by how accurately I managed to accomplish it in a limited amount of time. 2. How was your work as an intern meaningful to your education?This internship has helped me apply some of the skills that I have used in the classroom, specifically collaboration, good work ethic, and good communication. Every day I was placed in situations in which I had to interact and communicate with people, be they my colleagues or patients. It was of utmost importance that I had to be respectful, polite, and cordial to the people around me in order for this internship to be successful for me and beneficial to the people around me, which ties into the skill of being able to collaborate and work well with others. On the whole, I have learned more about what the professional world is like from day to day and what to expect when I enter into it in the future. Part 21. What new appreciations did you develop while working as an intern? Why?I believe that I came to appreciate more the people who are truly dedicated to their work, because I realized how important it is to enjoy what I do, otherwise every day will be like drudgery. While I am glad that I got the opportunity to work under Solana Beach Family Dentist as an intern, I do know now that I absolutely do not want to go into an administrative job simply because it is not something that interests me enough to pursue it further. Despite this, I appreciate people in such positions even more now since I know what all they do on a daily basis, from faxing documents to dealing with rather difficult clients. It takes a different kind of character in a person to have such patience and to maintain calm even in the most aggravating situations. 2. What qualities or characteristics did you see in the people around you that you want to develop in yourselfMy colleagues are all amazing people as well as highly competent professionals. They are always organized, polite, and adaptable; all important qualities necessary for individuals in administrative jobs. What I admire most about them, however, is their ability to stay calm and patient even in the most frustrating situations. It is not rare for us to deal with difficult patients, whether on the phone or in person. I do not by any means exaggerate when I say that many people would lose all self control when trying to deal with such patients. Through it all, never once have I seen a staff member lose their calm or utter a harsh word. This kind of poise is what I hope to develop in myself over time.
Solana Beach Family DentistSo far, here are some photos of my internship site which include the sign out front, the waiting room, front office, and my own workspace.
I will be commenting on Melia and Kaycee's blogs How have you advocated for yourself during your internship, or seen advocacy demonstrated in other situations?
Are you following the advice in "How to be an intern everyone remembers"? If so, how is it working out? If not, what are you going to start doing?
What you plan on doing/creating
What skills you will need in order for it to be awesome
What support you will need, and who you will need it from
I don't have too many questions regarding internship except for the following:
High Tech High has helped me develop my interpersonal communication skills greatly, and I find that this has been very helpful in my internship so far, since I interact with many people throughout my day in different ways. I have learned to be professional and polite when speaking with my colleagues, patients, and many others. Professionalism and good communication in conversation, especially over the phone, are crucial to helping a practice run smoothly since working with people is essentially what running a medical/dental practice is about. I can confidently say that my time at High Tech High has been well spent in learning effective group collaboration, communication, and public speaking. Today, actually, not four days after I officially started my internship, I was assigned to train up a new member of the practice who would be there for the summer. Her name is Jaimie Cardola, and she is currently a sociology major at SDSU. My internship mentor told me to show her around the front office and tell her about everything that happens on a daily basis. I was surprised and shocked that she would ask me, a hatchling intern, to carry out such a task. Of course, I realize that she may have done so in order to see how well I really understood what I was doing. In any case, I felt odd teaching someone who was far older than me about such matters as scheduling patient appointments, scanning documents, and recording phone messages. Despite this, I believe I did my best and sincerely hope that I didn't confuse the new person too much. Solana Beach Family Dentist's mission statement is: "Caring for Healthy Smiles." As I heard Dr. Rajasekaran discuss with a prospective patient today, the practice is about giving patients care as suited to their specific needs. The end goal isn't merely profit; it is in bringing satisfaction and improvement to the lives of many people with strong interpersonal connections and personalized care. As I mentioned earlier, much of the work I do during internship involves cold-calling or taking calls and messages. Especially over the phone, I need to be attentive, professional, and cordial. I have always had a hard time in speaking with people over the phone, even at home, so this was something I was more or less thrown into on the first day. To keep phone conversations as short and effective as possible, I had to follow a sort of script, which was different for different situations. Slowly but steadily, I have been improving in this area; I can now confidently introduce myself when receiving calls. With normal traffic, the commute to Solana Beach takes about fifteen minutes, sometimes twenty to twenty-five minutes on rainy days or days when I accidentally oversleep. I am supposed to arrive on site at 10:00 a.m. and leave at around 4:00, so I usually leave from home at 9:35 to 9:40 a.m. The commute is definitely not an issue for me since I don't live too far away from Solana Beach. The interviewee is my internship mentor, Dr. Anu Rajasekaran or "Dr. Raja" Q. Why did you choose to start and run a private practice?I chose to start a private practice because I wanted to have more freedom in to serve my patients in the best way, that is, with professional care and treatment options that best suit their needs. I enjoy helping my patients and interacting with them on a daily basis; it always makes my day. Q. What skills and training are necessary for your position, and how have you acquired them?In general? For a degree in dentistry, you have to of course start with four years of basic licensing and then get two to five years of specialization, depending upon the specific type of dentistry you want to go into. That's about how long it took me to get my D.M.D. As for other skills, I've gained them both in dental school and on the job. I do have to perform oral surgery on occasion, so surgical skills are a must. Some other skills include creative problem-solving, communication, and computer skills. Yes, more often than not I have had to do some computer troubleshooting on my own, so I have to have some basic knowledge of hardware and software systems. I continue to build on and improve my skills by running my practice from day to day. Q. Do you consider your career satisfying? In what ways?I consider my career extremely satisfying for many reasons. Day in and day out, I get to be creative at problem solving and in general thinking. I also get to use creativity in everyday situations. But most of all, I find much satisfaction in being of direct service to people and interacting with them in very personal ways. I do this work for the sake of improving people's lives, and I think that for me, it is one of the best ways in which I can contribute to and give back to society. I wouldn't give up my career for anything, because I love what I do. Q. Is there anything you wish you'd realized about the world of work when you were my age?I grew up in a family of doctors, and that was all I could imagine doing career-wise ever since I was a child. I found the field of medicine genuinely interesting, and I thought I would end up going down the "general practicioner" route. Now, several years later, I am the second dentist in my family in about thirty-eight years. If there's anything I learned about life, it's that you don't always end up on the path that you planned out for yourself. I was definitely aiming to go into medical school, but somehow I found out about dentistry and suddenly there was nothing else that I'd rather do for a career. I guess my advice for someone like you would be to never limit yourself to one path, whether that's in life or in college or anything; keep an open mind, explore all your options, and learn everything you can. In the end, that will help you decide what you really want to do. Q. What does a typical workday look like for you?Regarding workdays, it really depends on what day of the week it is, because we alternately have admin days, which are mostly dedicated to paperwork, pulling charts, and taking calls, and days when we actually get patients in. On the days that we have patients, I am usually working with them in the operatory rooms. On admin days, I answer insurance company calls, do some appointment scheduling, and finish up some paperwork. Either way, I am mostly interacting with people throughout my day, and that's where the good communication skills come in.
What strikes you most about your workplace?The one thing that stands out to me the most about my workplace is how extremely organized it is from lab to front office. Everything has its own place and there is a strict protocol of tidiness that is followed by all employees at all times. I am working mainly in the front office, since I do not have the necessary training for handling dental equipment. I have noticed that even the digital patient information is scrupulously organized and maintained. Needless to say, it is of utmost importance that I develop my organizational skills. What strikes you most about your colleagues?My colleagues are all exceptional at communicating with people, be they patients or insurance companies. They also demonstrate a high degree of professionalism when they do so, and are always cordial and poised. I was also surprised by how warmly I was welcomed and accepted by all the other employees. They made my introduction into the workplace easy and are always ready to help me with anything I need. I could not have asked for better coworkers for the duration of this internship. My colleagues are also extremely organized, a skill, as I mentioned earlier, that is crucial to running any organization smoothly from day to day. Every day, calls come in, charts are pulled, and appointments are scheduled, cancelled, or adjusted, and through it all, they maintain an outstanding calm. Through this internship, I hope to develop my own "people skills" so as to better communicate important information to other people, whether in school or in a professional workplace setting such as this. What strikes you most about the job you are doing?Since I am doing mostly administrative work, I spend much of my day behind a desk and either finishing tasks on the computer, taking and making calls, or sorting through important paper documents. Much of it (especially the document-sorting) is tedious work and requires an immense amount of patience. However, I am most struck by how much interpersonal communication is really involved in my work. When I take phone calls, there is a specific way in which I have to respond depending upon the nature of the call. My internship mentor has impressed upon me that it is important to sound professional and composed when speaking to people over the phone, so I have to follow a script in order to minimize the number of awkward pauses or filler words I tend to insert into phone conversations. Since I am not the best at speaking to people over the phone, this has been a bit of a challenge for me, but I do hope to improve over the course of this internship. What are you excited about?I really look forward to honing some of my professional skills that need work and learning more about how HIPAA (the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) is applied to running a successful dental/medical practice. In general, I want to learn about how HIPAA affects patients on a daily basis, whether they are visiting for a general cleaning or getting referred to a specialist for further treatment. HIPAA has been instrumental in protecting the sensitive health information of all patients, and I aim to gain more knowledge on current legislations of the state of California regarding it in a professional workplace setting. What are you worried about?I am worried about measuring up to my internship mentor's expectations of me as well as those of my colleagues. I want to prove that I am more than capable of handling the workload I have been given and that I am a competent intern in general. I try to ask for as much help as I can from the people around me so that my work and internship both progress smoothly. Beyond that, I feel that I am definitely ready to do my best and take on more responsibilities at my workplace.
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