My University Placement Experience
Luke McDonough-Stratford
Physiotherapy BSc(Hons)
Hi, I’m Luke. I'm a second year Physiotherapy student at the University of Huddersfield. Read about my placement experience so far.
Huddersfield has so much to offer and my course alone caters to a whole variety of learners, but the amount of placement time was definitely an aspect that drew me to Huddersfield because I consider myself to be a practical learner. Having never done a placement before, to say I was a little nervous may be a slight understatement, but the highly organised approach taken helped ease those nerves which soon gave way to pure excitement.
The University placement team took care of arranging everything, so I didn’t need to worry about the stress of finding my own placement. I was simply provided with all the relevant details a few weeks before starting including the contact details of my placement educator, enabling me to contact them and get to know them a little before starting.
My placement was unique, because even though it was a hospital-based placement in rheumatology outpatients, I was based across three of the Mid Yorkshire Teaching Trust hospitals, due to my educator’s working pattern. Although this presented challenges regarding travel, the University made sure that I would be able to reach placement by public transport and my journey time never exceeded 90 minutes even in heavy snow. I am really glad I was able to move around Pontefract, Wakefield and Dewsbury, because it opened up so many opportunities and experiences, plus the canteens served gorgeous food!
In the lead up to placement, despite feeling prepared in terms of the theory covered and fully supported by our tutors through specific placement Q&A sessions, I wasn’t really sure what to expect.
Being a first year, I didn’t anticipate my role would be substantially hands-on and envisaged that I would likely spend the majority of my time observing, however my first day proved it would be much more of a patient-engaging experience than I could ever have imagined. Although my first day consisted mainly of induction sessions, just halfway through my educator’s first appointment, he encouraged me to get hands-on in assessing a patient’s knee. That approach then developed throughout offering me a wide range of practical experience and opportunities to engage directly with patients, which if I had thought about prior, probably would have felt quite daunting.
Pontefract Hospital- one of my placements in the Mid Yorkshire Trust Hospitals.Getting the right support
Me and my educator formed a strong team and his approach in offering me the opportunity to lead appointments in the knowledge that he was there to guide and support me through it, led to some quite extraordinary results. As I grew in confidence, I naturally started to lead a little bit more of the appointment each time and much to my surprise, by week three almost led a full appointment on my own. That felt like a huge achievement because it proved to me exactly what I was capable of and having those opportunities to put our university learning into practice validated it. In just three weeks I had not only led appointments, but I learnt how to use the NHS systems. I wrote my own full set of SOAP (subjective, objective, assessment and plan) notes, I led multiple warm-ups in the gym-based exercise sessions and a major highlight was teaching a full hydrotherapy class - all of which I had never done before.
Whist my time with the team was short, my educator was very keen for me to get as much out of the experience as possible. I was lucky to be able to spend time with other health care professionals including one of the department’s doctors, a rheumatology nurse, an occupational therapist, teaching interns and, of course, other physiotherapists. This enabled me to gain an insight into how closely physios work with the wider multidisciplinary team.
Every member of the team I had the pleasure to work with was exceptionally friendly, encouraging and supportive. I always felt like part of the team and not just the student. A Band Five physio who I spent quite a lot of time with was also a recent Huddersfield graduate and I picked up a lot of new skills from her. She was very methodical so she helped shape how I write my own patient SOAP notes.
Spending time with her felt like looking into a crystal ball and seeing the professional I could become, which was inspiring.
Feedback and progression
The feedback I received in my placement assessment booklet, although just a pass or fail in first year, provided me with lots of encouragement for future placements and clearly outlined what I did well and identified how to improve. There were also some really lovely comments that have given me a sense of belonging as I progress into year two.
Overall, I was amazed at just how much I was able to grow in that time and I loved every minute of placement, whilst also gaining a newfound respect for the remarkable NHS staff.
If I could take just one thing away from placement, it would be that it’s left me with absolutely no doubt that this is the best course for me and is a profession in which I can see myself thriving.
My key advice to other students would be to fully immerse yourself in the experience and although it can feel challenging, say yes to as many new opportunities as possible because, like myself, you’ll be surprised at what you can achieve.
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