Going into clinical practice as a 3rd year student or even any other can be quite daunting. Taking responsibilities associated with professional role is an important aspect of experiential learning for undergraduate students on work-based placements (Clouder, L., 2009). Being in an environment of impacting people and working to get them back on their function requires trust from the lecturers, clinicians, the patients and the individual themselves. Focusing on the patients; when one first meets a patient they are allocated to, there can be a barrier of trust from the patient. Some patients are do not feel that they can trust a student enough to disclose and give out necessary information about themselves. For example, there are patients who do not feel comfortable disclosing that they are smoking or might be addicts because they fear judgement and they do not know how safe it is to disclose such to a student.
This may be problematic in a sense of not giving a patient the necessary treatment and fulfilling the needs they might require, in this example, rehabilitation services. This imposes a risk of ineffective treatment as well. There are much more examples where patients do not disclose information because of trust, but this tends to reduce with spending more time with the patient, connecting with them and showing empathy towards them. From the patient’s perspective, reciprocal trust has a significant impact on the experience of being a receiver of health care and on the development of competency with illness management ( Thorne, S.E., 1988). As much as we are still students, it is quite evident in some cases that a difference is being made in people’s lives and trust is one of some issues that can cause barriers.
The people we treat are at times at their greatest need for physiotherapy, even then, they may withhold because they are with a student and they are not quite sure of their capability to help them with their problem. Needing help does not necessarily mean a person is open to receive it from anyone, the patient’s life can be on the line, they think as far that because it is their life that is on a student’s hand. In my experience, some patients eventually show progression in their trust, and some never really do. Either way, it has an impact on the effectiveness of treatment.
REFERENCES
Clouder, L. (2009). Being responsible: students’ perspectives on trust, risk and work-based learning. Teaching Higher Education. Vol.14: Issue 3. Pages 289-301.
Thorne, S.E. (1988). Reciprocal trust in health care relationships. Leading Global Nursing Reasearch. Vol.13, Issue 6. Pages 782-789.