Post-Internship Reflection

The program has come to a close! I have a final presentation for my internship course tomorrow morning and then I fly back to Minneapolis on Saturday.

I picked Borderline Personality Disorder as the topic for my presentation. Many of the patients at the clinic had observable symptoms of their disorders/illnesses; However, there were a few who's symptoms weren't apparent at all. I found myself wondering why they even needed to be there. Many of these patients are diagnosed with BPD, which is partially what sparked my interest in researching this disorder. From the group psychotherapy session that I sat in on, I understood that many of them had issues with regulating their emotions and had extreme reactions to events, as well as negative self-image. I ended up learning quite a lot about its symptoms and treatment. This also helped solidify the concept that you can't always tell what people are experiencing just by being around them.

I agree that this internship has offered me an unique experience that I would have never been able to have as an undergrad in the US. I've been able to interact with the patients in a very candid way and see the cultural differences between caregivers in Spain versus in the US (in terms of geriatric patients, of which I have had a lot of experience with in nursing homes in the US).

The largest takeaway from this internship experience, for me, is that I would definitely be enthusiastic about working in a similar environment to this some day.

Week 4

Last week, the activities that I participated in were all centered around the week's topic which was Grief and Mourning.

I sat through a presentation on strategies for coping with grief. However, I was only able to grasp a little of it.
My classmates that were more fluent in Spanish translated a paper about how to approach the topic of grief and death with a child. I got the gist of it from listening to them translate out loud, while searching for the occasional mystery word on Word Reference.
We also sat in on an art activity, where the patients were asked to create an art piece that depicted their emotions, with a list of 40+ emotions to prompt ideas. Some of the patients' drawings were really moving to see. This activity was especially interesting to me, because you don't need a common language to interpret art. As the patients described their reasoning for each illustration, I think my interpretations of them were pretty accurate. This activity seemed to prompt a lot of deep thought from the patients as they worked.

Week 3

I've noticed that there's been a bit of a lull in the days since our first week. Whenever there isn't a lot of activities that we can observe or be involved in, they give us a research article to read and discuss for one of the hour slots. I feel like weeks 2 and 3 involved a lot more of that than before. We've spent more time sitting around and discussing different thing with the psychologists there. We've discussed patients history and symptoms, prognosis, & treatment. This week, we were encouraged to ask questions without hesitation, although this tends to be more difficult with the people who don't speak much English. Still, being given the opportunity to "interrupt" people's work to ask for clarification or explanations of something has definitely prompted us to feel less guilty about bothering people.

Week 2

The Clinica Lopez Ibor has an educational theme that changes on a weekly basis. During my second week there, the theme was Impulse Control. We watched a video and slideshow presentation on compulsive shopping and consumerism. We sat and watched a music therapy session; which I noticed is one of the activities that the majority of patients seem the most excited for and engaged by. They also had a workshop emphasizing the importance of saying, "No." During this workshop, one patient would roleplay a person who wanted the other to do something for them, being very persistent and trying to give as many compelling reasons as to why the other should give in. The other person had to practice saying no in different ways without faltering.

It was interesting to see more of the activities and workshops specifically tailored to the weekly theme, as I had not seen as many related to the previous week's.

Week 1

My name is Katherine and I'm currently interning at the Clínica López Ibor. This is my first time observing work in a clinical setting, so I don't have much to contrast it with (as far as how it compares to clinics in the United States).

The clinic has a diverse number of patients, with the main differentiation being between outpatients (patients who attend the clinic during the day and go home in the evening) and residents (patients who live in the hospital for a given period of time).
My internship has mainly consisted of shadowing professionals during different scheduled activities. My Spanish comprehension isn't strong, so I have difficulties understanding the content of certain activities, such as group psychotherapy and discussions. However, I like to interact with the patients whenever possible, despite the language barrier. 
Some of the activities that I've seen include: Exercise, yoga, meditation, arts and crafts, music therapy, group psychotherapy, & group discussions.



I've also sat in on a Rorschach (inkblot) test and a staff discussion of the past medical history, diagnosis, and treatment of a patient. The staff hasn't previously gone into detail about patients' diagnoses and treatment. I hope to sit in on more of these sessions where we can discuss these details, so that I can gather more information for a case study as my final presentation.