Week 10:
Until Next Time, Colorado

August 21, 2017

Just like that, my internship is over. This week was a little slow as I finished up all my tasks and wrapped up my time at the Children’s Hospital. Thankfully, I was still able to fit in one last shadow while I was there.

I shadowed Dr. Wilson on Tuesday. She is a sports medicine physician, which is a field I’m very interested in. While at the clinic, I got to lots of different types of fractures. She showed me all the x-rays and how to find the areas of concern. Some of the injuries were very clear on the x-rays, but not all. Some were very small, with Dr. Wilson questioning if there was a fracture. I found buckle fractures and growth plate fractures the toughest. A buckle fracture is like a compression break, so there is not always a distinct crack on the x-rays. Instead, the break appears as a bump in the bone. They can be really small, though, and hard for an untrained eye to spot. Growth plate fractures are often seen as too much space or irregularities in the growth plate space. These are also hard to see sometimes.

I really enjoyed being able to use some of my knowledge from my anatomy and physiology class. I had to know a lot of the bones for that class, so I was able to see them and know which bone we were looking at. That class really helped me understand a lot about the problems that arise in sports medicine.

Outside of shadowing, I primarily worked on the manuscript. I was able to get the whole thing written which was very exciting. Cornell has taught me how to be an efficient writer in a short time, which proved useful. Unfortunately, We did not get the opioid information from the health company before I left, so I was not able to help determine final results of our study.

My parents drove in Thursday night with a trailer. I bought some of the furniture my roommate was selling, so I brought a lot more stuff back than I came with. As usual, packing up was stressful but my parents were a huge help. It was sad saying goodbye to all the other interns and the great mentors I worked with this summer. I loved living in Colorado and can’t wait to come back sometime.

I cannot believe how fast 10 weeks went by. Doing research at the Children’s Hospital was an amazing experience and I am so grateful I was able to do so. I was able to work with a great group of people. I could not have asked for a better place to work. My education at Cornell really prepared me and helped me succeed this summer. Now having this experience and seeing how Cornell has prepared me, I feel more confident than ever about applying and going to graduate school to become a Physician Assistant.