Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Delivering Bad News

So we did something fun today in CPE. At least I thought it was fun - "Delivering Bad News." Now, I get it...that does not sound like fun. But it is actually something that we, as chaplains at Rush, do to help medical students/residents. They are given a scenario about a patient who has died. It is their job to inform the family of this, and also to ask the family if they want an autopsy done. It is our job to pretend to be that family.

So we do this in pairs. Two chaplain interns, one med student. The med students do not know we are chaplains - they think we are just volunteers who came in to do this. So they come into the room and proceed to tell us that our loved one has died. We are to react in any way we want. In one scenario, I was basically silent. The next I was angry. In one, I tried to play someone who almost had a psychotic break with the news.

This is the first time most (if not all) of these med students have ever had to do this. We, as chaplains, are at every death at the hospital and have seen the vast array of reactions that people can have upon hearing the news.

After about 10 minutes, we called the scene off and told the med students who we really were. We had an evaluation sheet to fill out and we just spent a few minutes talking to them about what was good, what could be improved upon, etc.

I believe another "Delivering Bad News" is scheduled for February 15. I'm kind of excited. :-)

Oh, and at least one med student told us that if the chaplaincy thing doesn't work out, we could be actors instead. ;-)

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