Orthopedics Shadowing Experience Burlington, Iowa

Day One

The day began at 7:00 am on December 17th in the operating room at Great River Medical Center in Burlington, Iowa. Dr. Jameson was an orthopedic specialist in Burlington at the time, so I was placed with him. The day started off with a complete knee replacement. During this procedure, Dr. Jameson allowed me to hold various instruments that were helping keep the patient's knee open. During the procedure, Dr. Jameson walked me through some of the steps that he was taking and what those steps were accomplishing. After this procedure, I was able to shadow him in another knee replacement directly after. During the surgery, again he walked me through some of the steps he was taking and gave some anatomical explanations. After this, we went to another O.R. and he performed his third consecutive knee replacement. To finish out the day I watched two knee arthroscopic procedures where he was repairing some meniscus tears.

Day Two

Day two started at 7:00 am in the clinic of Burlington's orthopedic specialty clinic. Dr. Jameson saw patients from 7:30 to about 3:30. These visits consisted of going from examination room to examination room consulting with various patients. These patients ranged from teenagers to people well into their 80s. The injuries he would see were generally knee problems that required some diagnostic imaging, which he read himself and delivered diagnoses to the afflicted patients. There was one unique exception to this day. Dr. Jameson saw a patient early in the day with an infected hip replacement. He admitted the patient, and I was able to scrub in and observe him fixing the patients infected hip joint. I thought this was very interesting because I was able to observe the patient's initial check up and following treatment via the operating room.

Day Three

This was my final day shadowing Dr. Jameson, and this day was shorter than the others. Even though this day was shorter, I was able to see a procedure in the O.R. that I had yet to see. The day started at 7:00 am again, and Dr. Jameson was performing a labral repair. Again, I was able to hold some form of equipment to aid in the visual field of Dr. Jameson. This was interesting because the incision for the shoulder repair had some arthroscopic components of the procedure, and traditional components. The day closed out with a few more arthroscopic knee procedures where Dr. Jameson "cleaned up" some meniscus tears and other various knee injuries.