Oops!

Today I went in to finish the November excel sheet Maria and I started on Friday. As I was doing the excel sheet I noticed the way we set it up was kinda CONFUSING....just a little...so I reformatted the file in a way that would be easy to read and interpret. As I am sitting down in the front lobby, keying data in a million letters a second, an older woman rushes in the clinic screaming, "WHERE CAN I MAKE AN APPOINTMENT AT??!!". The lady at the receptionist kept trying to calm her down, but she went on stammering about how its frustrating that San Jose has doctor appointments booked until January. I felt bad hearing this but at the same time, I felt relieved in a way because it means that more people are being taken care of. It was an exciting discovery for me to see that San Jose's staff was taking the initiative to go the extra mile and seeing more patients over the weekend instead of just Monday-Friday. When that episode was over, I continued back with my excel programming and finished the November entries! It felt SO GOOD putting in the last patients name. As I was walking up to Nieves' office to tell her I finished, I started wondering if I could incorporate stuff I am learning in my bioinformatics classes with my tasks at the clinic. I suddenly got motivated to try and make a database for the clinic. I wasn't sure how long it would take me, or if it would even work, but I am thrilled to pitch the idea to Nieves and try it out. I am sure she will be happy to hear my proposal and I truly believe this database could help the clinic with their organization! Starting on a big project like this makes me feel like I am going out with a bang. Its a little sad that this semester is almost over, and therefore these blogs will soon end, BUT I decided I am going to keep on volunteering at San Jose and keep up with being Nieves' part-time personal data assistant because I like knowing that my help is doing something for them no matter how minor it may be :-)


until next time :-)

Help is on the Way!

This past Friday, I went to volunteer in the morning with Maria W. We met up with Nieves and she gave us a task we could both work on together. We were going to make a new excel sheet for November's patient lab visits. Once again, I was getting a new task to do! This task was interesting because it let me have another chance to do more computer programming work! I typed in the patient information as Maria read them out loud so the process went by a lot faster and we both got a lot more done. Nieves seemed pleased that there were going to be two of us working on this task and that made me happy. I feel like I am lifting a weight off Nieves' shoulder when I come in to help her because she seems more calm and relaxed when she gives me stuff to do and sometimes it feels as if I am her personal assistant, which is awesome because she is always telling me she needs someone to help her 24/7. It is starting to feel like a normal routine for me and I also get positive feedback from Nieves every time I come to volunteer! It does feel good to help them out because they were short staffed and Nieves had to work at the front desk taking appointments instead of in her office. Hopefully next time I can finish the November excel sheet and try to format the template for the December excel!

until next time :-)

Big Picture

I am definitely liking my volunteering sessions on Fridays! Instead of going in the afternoon, I went in the morning and had a slightly different, but rewarding experience. I met up with Nieves and she gave me a new project to do. Although every project she gives me gets completed in one sitting, I really like knowing that I am helping with many tasks! It allows me to learn more and see other parts of the clinic. I got my access to the healthport system and began fixing a couple pharmacy billing statements for patients. To my surprise, I finished the stack of bills pretty quick and Nieves was very pleased and then handed me another HUGE stack. The process of entering and changing the pharmacy bills isn't the most exciting task, but I know by me doing that job Nieves can spend her time doing something more important in that moment, especially since the clinic was unusually busy for a Friday. As I waited for Nieves to find more papers to be entered in, I took the time to sit and observe the clinic. I over heard a patient talk about how she lost her job and is about to lose her home. I don't like hearing things like that because it makes me frustrated people are living in those conditions, but in reality there are MANY people like that woman who aren't employed and barely holding on. It does make me happy however, that San Jose takes care of people like that especially since they wouldn't be able to pay for health care. With any task that I work on at the clinic, no matter how boring or small it is, has taught me to look at the bigger picture....every small amount of help counts and it is making a difference!

until next time :-)