Rebekah Griffith, the ED DPT
In July I floated up to a different unit for the 4th of July holiday weekend. The ED was in good hands with one of my amazing teammates. As a board certified neurologic clinical specialist, it made sense that they floated me to the Neuro floor and the Neuro ICU. It’s been a hot minute, but it was nice to settle into an old and familiar routine. Sort of like putting on a pair of cozy sweatpants after the end of a hot summer.
The first thing I realized was definitely substantially different than preparing to see a patient in the ED. First, the chart review… A common ED chart might have one note and a few lab results. With a patient who began their journey in the ED, traveled through the ICU, and is now on the floor? More recon and review is required. Aren’t charts kind of a beautifully scientific telling of a patient’s story?
After settling in and preparing to see my patients I also had to change my mindset. All of my patients were prepared for treatment sessions and not evaluations of a new complaint. I was jumping in mid-stream and not piloting the episode of care. That required tapping into a different part of my PT brain and determining what were the patient’s goals, what hadn’t been done, what was the most meaningful way we could progress today, and what are the next steps for this patient.
This is when it really hit me. That reminder of the tragedies of life. Most of the patients I was planning to see were my age or younger, beset by, at best, completely life altering circumstances laden with permanent disability, and at worst, fatal diagnosis. That heaviness might not impact others the way it does me. But for me it feels like this huge weighted blanket of grief mixed with possibility. I remembered why I prefer the acute emergency, the limited involvement, the hopeful possibilities in the ED, and why I had somewhat distanced myself from this type of patient care.
But. What a profound privilege. What a beautiful reminder these 4 days of patient care became. I honored who I used to be as a physical therapist alongside who I am now. I fell in love with the moments of carrying hope session by session to these borrowed patients of mine. I remembered how powerful all aspects of physical therapist practice can be.
At the end of the weekend I had connected with so many lovely individuals, allowed them to contribute to me and me to them, and left with a heaviness mixed with grief and joy. I spent time feeling it. I was also reminded why it’s so crucial to have boundaries and life-work flow in place. I’m not ready to be the PT who is so hardened that they can’t or won’t feel these emotions anymore. But I am the PT who recognizes that she can only carry so much.
No matter where you are in your practice journey, I wanted to remind you of your full scope. Your scope of skills, your scope of abilities, your scope of therapeutic alliance, your scope of humanity. I wanted to remind you it’s okay to stay on the softer side at the top of your scope.
