Skills Day Gives Interns a Glimpse of Work Life in the Medical Field

Our Public Health interns spent the day rotating through demonstrative skills sessions designed to build their practical medical techniques. While all stations offered valuable insights, the highlight of the day was the Vitals Workshop. Learning to take vital signs is incredibly exciting and the foundation for all healthcare professionals as they begin to understand the patient’s body.

As interns paired up, they became learning clinicians. They practiced taking their own and their partner’s blood pressure, listening to their heart rate and pulse rhythms, determining oxygen saturation, and finding reflex nerve junctions using various tools provided. They even got to take their very own stethoscope home as a learning tool in their journey into becoming healthcare leaders. For many of our interns, fastening a blood pressure cuff or hearing a heartbeat through a stethoscope for the first time was the beginning of their future career in medicine. 

We were incredibly privileged to have this workshop led by Dr. Aisha, a Nigerian physician who is a practicing nephrologist, medical researcher, and healthcare administrator and Dr. Zainab, a chemical pathologist and medical professor. They both brought immense depth and knowledge to the session using their experience to teach the interns proper techniques and tips to taking vitals. 

Using her extensive background in health administration and research, she showed the students how a single set of vital signs helps understand the broader patient history. Explaining how it helps prevent disease progression and shape patient care.