Submitted by Karissa St.Louis-Leclair, SRT, St.Clair College
Throughout every learning journey, challenges arise. Whether they are big or small, challenges can make or break your personal experience with learning. During my personal journey with learning the skills and knowledge needed for a future RT career, I had to undergo a very unexpected challenge – the challenge of learning through COVID-19. You all know that Respiratory Therapy is a very intense and complex topic to learn. It takes a lot of time and effort to produce a program that can give RT students all of the knowledge and skills necessary to prepare for this complex, exciting future career. COVID-19 was something that approached us so fast that it was almost impossible to change our way of learning and absorbing information as quickly as needed, making it a challenge not only for our Program Coordinator, our professors, student RT’s and practicing RT’s, but for every healthcare worker around the world.
When the first Canadian case of COVID-19 made the news, I was in my last semester of year one. Our first action to stay safe began with switching classes to an online delivery system. Going from in class learning to virtual learning was a tremendous change. Our labs could also no longer be offered since it was impossible to practice our lab skills without actual equipment at home. Lack of practice for our lab skills, coupled with remote learning, caused a lot of anxiety and stress! We felt that we would never be able to catch up on all the lab skills necessary to succeed in the program and prepare us for our futures. Luckily, all of our amazing professors and Program Coordinator Connie Sivyer, worked diligently to give us the best chance at learning all of the necessary information and skills. Although it was a substantial change, my classmates and I were able to adjust in a timely fashion and give our best efforts. We spent many extra hours preparing and pushed through the challenges. Many of us were able to succeed with the switch to online learning.
Once we finished first year, the summer gave RT students and our Coordinator a little more time to prepare for second year. Although we were lacking lab time, we pushed to learn hands-on skills that were missed from year one. Many of my classmates and I spent lots of extra time working on the tasks and skills that were missed. With significant effort and time management skills, we caught up on everything necessary for us to succeed in our few clinical placements offered during second year.
Just as we thought we were finally moving past COVID-19, the second wave hit. Luckily for the students in my program and many programs across the world, we had already adjusted to online learning, and with some new guidelines we were able to attend our labs at school. We managed to attend our first few scheduled placements at the hospital, but unfortunately they had to be cancelled second semester due to all of the outbreaks at our clinical sites and the strain that COVID-19 was putting on the healthcare system in general. Even with missing our placements, professor Wendy Foote was able to organize a meeting with our clinical sites (Erie Shores Healthcare, ProResp, and Hotel-Dieu-Grace Healthcare) for second semester, where we were able to ask the sites many operational questions we had as well as how placements would be altered or affected if we were able to proceed with attending these clinical sites. Each site gave us a breakdown of everything that we needed to know. Although we did not get to attend each site in person, this was the next best thing, as each site did a wonderful job at providing us the information necessary to feel comfortable and familiar with their work environments.
As second year, second semester came to a finish, we all felt extremely proud of ourselves for successfully adjusting through 18 months of change. Instead of being upset and feeling down about how our first two years of the Respiratory Therapy program went, I am thankful that we were able to achieve what was necessary. We’ll continue to take all of the knowledge learned from this challenge into our third-year clinical placements. I feel like the challenges we faced somehow managed to prepare us even more for the unexpected.
Not every patient we see will present by the book values and symptoms, but I feel even more confident in my abilities to problem solve and adapt to any given situation. As a Respiratory Therapist, we often experience the unpredictable, and this challenge certainly fits into that category.
Overall, although my personal learning journey has been difficult, I feel as though it made me even stronger and more resilient. No matter the circumstances, I have learned that I can accomplish anything I set my mind to. I know how to persevere and not give up when things are tough. This quality will serve me well for the future, when I may experience rapid change, an unexpected patient challenge, or the unknown. The qualities and skills learned through these struggles will benefit me, my future patients and future workplace, tremendously.
