At the beginning of this semester when we first heard about this program, I did not know much about delirium. I had some knowledge from previous courses, but it was still a fairly new topic to me. My first shift with HELP, we spent a majority of the time getting to know how the program works, what we will be doing, and a tour of the hospital. Our job as volunteers is to speak with the provided patients, and just be someone to interact with them without providing direct medical care. We are there to see how they are doing, if there is anything they need, and to talk with them to give them a friendly face to chat with and reorient them.
As the shifts continued, I got to talk with a number of patients which was really nice because while some of them were not that talkative, some were very happy that I took the time to sit and talk with them. This was the most meaningful part of the experience because It made me feel good that they were appreciative. I met my learning goals because I wanted to learn more about delirium and how we as nurses can help prevent it and by participating in this program, I did just that. I will take what I learned and bring it forward into future practice because this is something that is always relevant and always something that should be considered when admitting patients to the hospital and when providing treatment.
