Becoming a senior can open a lot of windows of opportunity as far as looking to further explore your career.

Some senior students have been involved in the career exploration program at the hospital, which allows seniors to follow doctors and other medical professionals around as they perform different operations and take care of patients.

Senior Hunter Perryman said he is interested in brain surgery.

“I shadow surgeons, so I am in the OR,” Perryman said. “I am in the room with the patient that is receiving the operation.”

To become a certain surgeon, Perryman has to go through a certain process. But he claims that undergoing the shadow gives people reassurance of their career.

“The surgeons, anesthesiologist, and RN’s almost always tell me what is going on,” Perryman said. “They tell me things like what organ of the body they are looking at, what they are doing exactly to the patient, and what tools they are using.”

Senior Brianna Aldrich said she wants to be an OBGYN so she follows the nurses in the acute care unit.

“I am not allowed to change bandages or give medications,” Aldrich said. “But I have learned where to get the medications from, how to prevent cross contamination, how to treat patients and basic duties of a nurse,” Aldrich said.

Some students have not learned specifics but the general role of working in the hospital.

“I have learned a lot of things just by observing,” senior Brandy Pfeifer said. “I have also learned the environment of the hospital in general, too.”

Aldrich agrees and said that doing the job shadow gives her guidance of what it’s like to be a nurse at a hospital.

“I am going to FHSU for nursing and it helps to give me an idea of what nursing is like,” Aldrich said. “It also shows me my options of where I can go and what it is like to be a nurse.”

Although Pfeifer follows the OB nurses at Hays Medicine, she ideally wants to work in the NICU.

“I plan on getting my Master’s Degree in nursing and then starting out as a floor nurse,” Pfeifer said.

The career exploration program is a way to further explore what career is best for students. The beneficial side of shadowing at the hospital is it gives students the real hands on portion of what it is like to perform in the medical field.

“I think that the career exploration program is very helpful,” Perryman said.  “You get to experience firsthand if you truly want to do that job for the rest of your life.”

16hbaxter@usd489.com