My journey to Medic mentor began when I attended the National Health Conference in February 2020. Here, I saw perspectives from recent successful applicants giving me an insight on what it is like to be a medical student. This motivated me to apply for the School ambassador leadership programme, in which I was successful.
Additionally, I believe I have demonstrated leadership when setting up junior Medoc. I ensured to support my team by seeking for advice from the Year 13s as I was struggling to organise and encourage students to join. With their guidance, I was able to create a plan and we worked as a team successfully to gain more members of the society.
Team work is also essential in medicine in order to collaborate a multidisciplinary team. I have shown this through a knitting project which my peers and I created. We created a knitting project to make clothing which aims (to improve dexterity skill) and distribute these to the homeless. This has enabled me to improve problem solving and communication. This is because, to successfully teach these students new concepts, I have to ensure my tone is clear and engaging, and that my non-verbal communication supports what I am saying. Through this, I have also learned the importance of active listening in a conversation, as this allows me to respond to any questions students may have.
Good communication is at the centre of what a doctor does, as they must be able to talk with patients and with their colleagues clearly and effectively in order to provide the best possible care.
My first involvement with Medic Mentors projects, was the COVID 19 innovation project. I embraced the effectiveness of applying leadership skills in a challenging teamwork scenario about PPE. For instance, there was a disagreement amongst the team about PPE research and I was able to discuss calmly with each member and suggest a voting system to decide on the final decision. This helped me develop empathy and conflict resolution by engaging with other team members from different backgrounds and understand their point of view. Some members of the team were quieter, so i used my leadership skills to make sure everyone was heard as I learnt that even the quieter members had some brilliant ideas to share. During this role, I encouraged every member of the team to participate and share their ideas. I improved my RESEARCH AND CRITICAL APPRAISAL skills when writing a list formatted in Vancouver style which is a key skill for higher studies and when going into the field of medicine.
My problem solving and innovation skills was improved when coming up solutions for the distribution of PPE such as using risk assessments and then distributing it more effectively to reduce waste. This is important as I believe (Every case is a problem that needs to be solved in medicine. During our debate on ethics we used , the four pillars of medical ethics such as justice highlighting how we must distribute fairly to ensure benefit to the whole society , as well as balancing it with beneficence and non-maleficence. Doing this project via zoom was a new experience for me, and making new friends over the fantastic week during the project is a invaluable experience that I will cherish.
I hope that as a school ambassador, I would like to share with other students what I have learnt and in turn hopefully inspire them to search themselves into the medical world by emulating qualities of listening, supporting and communicating with others.
Thank you Medic mentors and I am looking forward to being part of Medic Mentors again!