Initial Entry - PMH

On finding out that I would be heading to Princess Margaret Hospital for my initial placement I was excited. Peadiatric Physiotherapy is an area I am largely interested in and at this point, have every intention of pursuing this as my future career. From my personal perspective, I feel children benefit so much more from input given and families are largely involved and open to wide varieties of treatment so you are able to experiment with different techniques, games, combinations etc. Also making every session as enjoyable as possible to motivate the child to participate is half the fun. I enjoy the energy children have and enjoy being around children. With past experience in working with children and children with a variety of disabilities I am thoroughly looking forward to expanding my experiences and knowledge in this area. PMH is solely dedicated to the treatment of children and teenagers, which will give me a good perspective on most fields of their care.

After contacting the coordinator at PMH I was informed that my placement will incorporate a variety of treatment settings.

My expectations for this placement are:

• Seeing patients in the inpatient and outpatient setting.
• Incorporating a lot of Hydrotherapy into treatment sessions as this is very useful and enjoyable for kids.
  
• Employing a family centered approach to care. Involving parents, siblings, other family members as well as the child into the goal setting and choice of treatment.
• Seeing a variety of conditions/impairments including musculoskeletal, neurological, cardiorespiratory etc.
• Will have exposure to a variety of children at different stages of development; from premature infants to teenagers.
• Also conducting group classes / sessions. (I was made aware that one afternoon I will be running a class with preterm infants and their parents)

My role as a student will be to integrate myself into the multidisciplinary team at PMH, utilise their expertise to learn and apply my knowledge to create ideal treatment sessions for my patients.

Concerns about this placement include:

• Emotional attachment - I think initially I will need to adjust to the setting and will be working on mental strengthening to be able to survive seeing innocent children in pain and difficulty.
• Communicating with families in regards to treatment strategies and likely outcomes. This will be a fairly new experience and I hope I am able to appropriately discuss their child's care so that they are confident in my abilities.
• Parents generally want the best treatment for their child. Coming as a student with little clinical experience, I hope I am able promote myself well and not disappoint.
• From students who have already had this placement, I heard that they are highly supervised and spend a lot of time observing. Hands on is what I am after so I hope the opportunities are there.
  

Overall I think this placement will be a challenging but highly beneficial experience and I can't wait.