Hospital Volunteering

01 Jan 2017

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Prior to pursuing a degree in computer science, I’ve been dreaming of becoming a doctor. As a potential candidate for medical school, it is recommended that one should volunteer and spend their time being around doctors and the medical field. This is for them to get in field experience and what being a doctor is really like, and I am glad I did it.

I spent close to 9 months volunteering several hours every week at Kaiser Moanalua Medical Center in their first-floor department. This was the “general” section of the hospital I come to find out later. Specifically, certain floors were dedicated to certain needs, but here we got a little bit of everything. It was an eye-opening experience because I got to see and talk to many different doctors from varying career paths. What was most impactful, however, were the patients. Some had hard loving families who came to see them every day, while others not so much. Some refused help from the nurses and were being a bit difficult. One case stuck out to me. There was a patient who was there every day for as long as I can remember. He was not able to talk and was on life support but was 100% aware of his surroundings. Basically, on his deathbed. Muscles had atrophied and he either had no family or none that came to visit. This patient really made me reconsider a path in medicine. I could deal with blood and various fluids, but couldn’t bear to see such sadness.

I am glad I got to volunteer at Kaiser. It made me reconsider my career path and literally changed my life.