Shadowing a Doctor
Vanderbilt AED, the pre-health professions club here, sponsors a shadowing program, through which undergraduate students are paired with physicians at the Vanderbilt medical center. The doctors allow the students to shadow them, or follow them through their daily routine. Getting matched with a shadow is very competitive, especially for freshmen, just because there are so many pre-med students there. Therefore, I decided to take it upon myself to find a shadow.
I emailed Dr. Ivan Robbins, who works at the Vanderbilt Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis Center. Dr. Robbins specializes in Pulmonary Hypertension. He sees extremely high risk patients, who also, for the most part, are low income. He eagerly let me shadow him yesterday! In the three hours I spent with Dr. Robbins, I learned about dialysis tubing, saline and swelling, and bypass surgeries. Most of these other problems seem to have nothing to do with pulmonology, but as Dr. Robbins says, “[The body is] all a circle.”
My first day as a shadow was great. I’m scheduled to go back next Monday!
