Catcher Latta, Frazier Rehabilitation Institute, NeuroRecovery, Week 1

This week I started my internship at UofL Health – Frazier Rehabilitation Institute in Louisville, Kentucky. I thought my first week was going to be a soft introduction into what I had in-store over the next month and a half. In reality I was busy the moment I walked in the building. After being introduced to the people I will being learning from for the next 6 weeks and getting a massive tour of the facility, I was put to work. My first task was was organizing old case studies.

Stack one of many piles of paper I was in charge of organizing

This was the first of many stacks of paper I had to organize. I was in charge of making sure there was a legible digital copy of every paper in the stack. If there was I got to satisfyingly shred the paper. If there was not the paper was placed in a pile to be digitally backed up.

Monday afternoon I got to sit in on two sessions with the same patient. The first session was respotory training. Patients with a spinal cord injury (SCI) sometimes struggle with the ability to breathe. At the Frazier Rehabilitation Institute one of the ongoing studies is trying to increase respot0ry function by stimulating nerves in the body. The second session I watched was a standing session. A standing session is exactly what it sounds like. A patient with a spinal cord injury and no ability to stand on their own, is strapped into a device, and is assisted in standing for an hour. During which PT’s test how long the patient can stand without any help.

Belt and a sliding board, both tools that assist in moving patients

On Tuesday, myself and a few others were taught different ways of moving patients, with spinal cord injuries, to and from wheelchairs. In addition, we also learned how to maneuver patients lying down in a bed. The most important part of moving any patient with a spinal cord injury is having atleast one hand on the patient at all times. At any moment a patient could move or have an uncontrollable muscle spasms. In that situation the PT needs to have controll of the patient to ensure their safety.

1/5 of the CD’s I looked through

On Wednesday, I was introduced to my next orginizational task. I was told that I would be orginizing CD’s. That doesn’t sound awful at all, until I realized the amount of CD’s I would be looking through. My task was to find videos of sessions that had not been backed up to the UofL health server. I was presented a list of CD’s that were missing and was told to find them and back them up. Everyone on the 15 floor was extremely thankful for taking on this task.

Pediatric sized treadmil

Thursday and Friday I had the joy of spending most of my day in the pediatric NeroRecory section of Frazier Rehabilitation Institute. On Thursday I got to be hands on with my first patient before the PT’s started locomotive training (LT). I held the patients knees in a standing position while everyone else got in place. LT is performed on a specialized treadmill that has a harness hooked up to it to support the patient while walking. PT’s guide the patients legs through the motions of walking to get the body adjusted to the feeling of walking. The rest of my time on Thursday and Friday was spent searching for CD’s.

Outside of work I have enjoyed eating plenty of unhealthy southern cuisines. Exploring the streets of Louisville and the many large parks it has to offer, and swimming in the coolest pool EVER! Louisville is home to a pool called lakeside. The coolest, and largest pool I have ever seen! The majority of my free time has been spent swimming or at the lakeside gym.

That’s my first week! Thank you for reading my first weekly post! Until next week, stay groovy!

Catcher