Clinical Rotation Help

[PTStudent2011]

Hello. I'm a first year DPT student and I'm about to choose my first 4 week clinical rotation site. The majority of the sites that are available are orthopedic and acute settings (I have only learned about UE ortho). I'm mainly interested in peds and prosthetics so I was thinking about doing a peds rotation. However, I talked to a 3rd year and she recommended for me to do a rotation which I would prefer the least (which would be acute) because this is the shortest rotation. I have 4 rotations total, 1st - 4 wks, 2nd - 8wks, 3rd & 4th - 10 wks. Can anyone give me advice on the order I should choose my clinicals and what they think about the type of settings (especially peds and acute)? Thank you.

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[MinnDasota]

As a first clinical, I would recommend acute/subacute as you can apply knowledge that you already have and refine them in the clinical setting. If you do ortho right away with only UE knowledge, you may be "lost" for the other parts of the body throughout the clinical, limiting what you can get out of the experience (although you may pick up a few things here and there). I recommend peds as a late/final clinical as it requires quite a bit of knowledge on childhood development and disorders and can be overwhelming in the early clinicals.

When I was on clinicals, I found acute to be the easiest. Many of those patients are only in the hospital for a very short period of time so you don't get to work with the patient through the end of rehab. Thus, acute is perfect for the short earlier clinicals. Save the longer clinicals for those rotations requiring much more in-depth knowledge so you can learn, experience, and apply more. They also allow you to follow the progress of a patient from eval to discharge (hypothectically speaking).

Hope that helps.

 

[PTStudent2011]

MinnDasota, thank you for your help!

 

[uneditedtales]

I just finished my last rotation and I would say save your last affiliation for something you know you are gonna get into. For instance, if you know you wanna do ortho outpatient...I would try to get your last one at an outpatient place. It will not only give you a confidence boost but will also help with the transition from going in to the real world. Good luck.