My week at SouthCoast Medical Group

This week was at SouthCoast Medical Group in Savannah. I am so glad to finally be truly learning something! I spent all of Monday observing. It is mostly diabetes counseling, but sometimes there is just an obesity case. On Tuesday I started counseling any new client, while my preceptor still did her followups. I knew that diabetes and obesity were huge in America, but this has really made it even more real in my mind. As I started I was super choppy and all over the place, but it got better as the week went on, though I still have lots of work to do. I’m still trying to learn how to individually tailor a session, but I’m getting better. With diabetes, you typically find out if it’s a new diagnosis, if they are checking their sugars, and if they’ve made any changes. Then, you go through a typical day and find out what they are eating. Then, you’d typically go over what carbohydrates are and go over carb counting with them. It’s always important to find out about physical activity to see what they are doing, because physical activity will help get their blood sugars under control. I’ve also been able to counsel those with obesity. With obesity, you obviously focus more on overall diet (the highest BMI I saw this week was 69 (and a BMI over 25 is overweight)!!. I am really trying to work more on my motivational interviewing. It’s all about guiding with open ended questions. I also got to observe a chronic kidney disease patient. I had one patient with elevated triglycerides (455!! and you want them <150).

I also got to meet another dietitian in Savannah who is a Certified Diabetes Educator (CDE). She also brought me some free education material which was awesome! She also talked to me a little bit about diabetes which was awesome.

These were a coupe of ADIME (Assessment, Diagnosis, Intervention, Monitoring & Evaluation) notes that my preceptor had me do. She took the time to go over each one with my and give me critiques on each one. With an ADIME note it is important to write down their basic anthropometrics, past history, meds, dietary recall, and physical activity. When writing a diagnosis, you do it in the form of a PES statement (Problem AS RELATED TO Etiology AS EVIDENCED BY Signs/Symptoms. My first note had a lot of work to be done on it, but they got better as time went on. With my PES statements I would sometimes be redundant on my symptoms but I think I got it down now.

           

I am also working on a 5-10 presentation about physical activity for Vivian (my preceptor) to give to the staff.

I learned a lot at this rotation. I am so thankful!

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