Today in the hospital …
For those of you who don’t know, I am currently in school to become a medical speech language pathologist. Right now, I am on an adult acute care rotation, which means lots of time in ICU. We see patients to assess their cognitive and language abilities and assess their overall swallow function (among other things). Anyhow, I had a very interesting March Madness discussion with a 70-year-old patient today.
This patient has dysarthria, which is a speech disorder caused by an injury to the nervous system. So, talking is not easy for him and requires a lot of repetition for anyone to understand him. Since he has been in the hospital for awhile, he asked my supervisor who is in the Final Four. My supervisor went to UNC, and, of course, she is a huge college basketball fan. She asked him to guess where she went to school (with absolutely no hints). Yep, he guessed it. He said that he figured it out by her North Carolina accent. I was impressed … keep in mind, he can barely talk and can’t move on his own. Anyhow, she increased the ante and asked him to guess where I went to school (again, with no hints). He looked at me for about 20 seconds, and squeezed out, “a hokie.” I was shocked! I told him when he gets better, he has a new career to try out 
Pt and family interaction is one of my favorite parts of this job. People in the hospital are so interesting, and the way God designed our bodies to heal is so cool. It is awesome to see the way God has encouraged me throughout this endeavor. He is so real, and so good!
I know why patient interaction is your favorite part. God hand-picked you for the medical field because you are a people person. We need people like you in the medical professions. Thank you for your obedience to this calling.