COPE Interview
What does it mean to be a part of the patient care team? How will you contribute to the care team?
To be a part of the PCT means that I can make a change in health care by contributing my basic patient care skills in order to facilitate the best experience for the patient's treatment and stay at the hospital. I will contribute to the care team by providing not only comfort care but I will also help alleviate any emotional stress that the patient and family might be going through. I will always be enthusiastic, helpful, accountable and I will never stop from trying to improve myself.
Tell me about a time when you had to deal with a difficult customer/client?
A time when I had to deal with a difficult person would be when I had a part time job at Kung Fu Tea last year. We had a customer who placed a very large order the night before she wanted to pick it up and our team was not prepared to take such a big order the next morning but our trainee at the time had accidentally accepted the order. The problem was that no one in the team was free to come into the shop early the next morning to prepare the extra ingredients for this big order. So I took charge and came into the shop early to take care of this large order myself because I knew that it was important to make this customer satisfied. When I gave her her order, she was very impressed with my customer service and left us a great tip and my boss was very happy with me for doing this.
What are some skills a Health Scholar should have?
Dependable, accountable, friendly, and enthusiastic are some of the skills that I think a Health Scholar should have.
Tell me a little bit about yourself
Hi, my name is Vy Nguyen. I am a fourth year student at UC Riverside. I'm interested in applying for the COPE Health Scholar program because I am currently taking prerequisite classes at UCR and Chaffey college to apply to an Entry-Level Master of Nursing program. Previously, I have volunteered at CHOC Children's Hospital and I was also a CNA student in high school. Now that I am at my last year of college, I would like to re-immerse myself into the healthcare field again by volunteering as a Health Scholar. I'm very interested in the roles of being a Health Scholar because what I'll be able to do at COPE aligns with my passion for healthcare, and through dedicating my effort into this experience I will be able to not only make an impact in health care now, but also gain the clinical skills that I highly value as a future healthcare provider.
How would patients benefit from your interaction with them?
I believe that patients will benefit from my interaction with them very much because when in the hospital, patients are very usually anxious and worried. So with my duties as providing comfort care, I will be the shoulder that the patients need by being there for their emotional support, empathy, and reassurance. Other than that, by attending to every basic need that they have, I will also be able to help streamline the basic care for patients so that they can have a smoother and more comfortable experience at the hospital.
What are your career goals?
I hope to be accepted into nursing school to earn a Master's degree in nursing to become a nurse practitioner. After that, I will practice for a few years before I go back to school to earn my Doctorate of Nursing because I would like to also teach and produce research to improve the nursing field.
How do you manage your time?
I manage my time by keeping a calendar where I write out all of my class assignments, appointments, tasks, and reminders. Then, when I am done with a task, I cross it out so I can stay on track and never miss anything that I am supposed to do.
Why would you make a good Health Scholar?
I would make a good Health Scholar because I will be able to carry my previous experience from CNA to COPE to continue assisting with patient care as I will also be able to learn more from the mentor of health care professionals in the hospital. I am also fluent in Vietnamese and I would like to use this second language skills to help any Vietnamese patients and families who may have trouble communicating in English. My parents do not speak any English so I am always accompanying them to doctor visits to translate for them so I fully understand the struggle of not being able to communicate in English when you are trying to get help for your illness. Also, the Vietnamese community in Riverside is pretty small from my experience, so I hope that I would be able to help out with any Vietnamese translation as needed in the hospital.
How would you prioritize this program?
I would prioritize the Health Scholar program as important as my education, which is my top priority. And by that, I mean that I will follow through all the duties that are expected of me, show up to my shifts on-time, be respectful to all hospital staff and always be enthusiastic to help and learn more. I highly value my opportunity to be a Health Scholar because I know what I put in will be what I get out of it, so this program will definitely be my top priority.
Why do you want to be in COPE? What do you hope to gain from this experience?
More experience, gain interpersonal interactions, experience the hospital environment because it is where I would like to work. Work under a charged nurse to gain more one-on-one experience. I hope to be apart of the COPE Health Scholar team to be more familiarized with the hospital environment, gain experience in working with patients, learn important basic skills on patient care, and build relationships with the health care professionals so that I can take this experience with me help me become a more qualified nursing student applicant and future nurse.
What is your greatest strength?
My greatest strength is that I am a fast learner who can work efficiently under complex situations. As a busy college student, I have always been the person who takes many classes. I also live at home with my parents because they don't speak English and often need my help with everyday things like making appointments, driving, and taking care of household things. Because of these responsibilities that I have, I have learned quickly on how I need to manage my time, stay organized, and work efficiently. By doing that, I keep a calender with every thing that I need to do at school and home so I don't miss a single thing. I also stay organized by keeping my desk area clean so that I can focus easily and get my assignments done quickly. I learned that I need to do things in an efficient manner in order to keep up with my busy lifestyle.
What is your greatest weakness?
My greatest weakness is taking on too many responsibilities and burning myself out in the long run. This weakness is the most apparent in my studies during college. I tend to enroll in many classes, sometimes up to 20 units at once because I liked to keep myself busy and accountable for my studies. However, by doing this, I became very stressed during the quarter and I ended up not having any time to take proper care of myself or spend any time outside of school. However, I eventually understood that it is not good for my physical and mental health for taking this many classes, so I have been taking less units and using my time outside of class to take proper care of myself such as working out and spending time with my family. By doing this, I have seen tremendous improvement in my overall well-being and I also became a much happier person.
Why do you want to work in healthcare?
My passion for healthcare has always been something very obvious to me since I was a child. Whenever I was sick, my parents would bring me to the doctors and I would always love being there when other kids around me would be screaming and crying. When they gave me shots, I never even cried once. Then when I was in high school, I was in the Health Academy program at my school. Throughout my 3 years of this program, I learned to be a front desk medical receptionist, and I was also EMT and CNA certified. Throughout all of these training, I have never felt so right and I was thriving in these classes, I knew that working in the medical field was where I belonged. Then fast forward to this year when I had an incredible encounter with a mental health nurse as I wrote about in my application, this encounter with this nurse solidified my love for nursing because she was exactly who I wanted to be as a nurse myself. And that is someone full of compassion, empathy, and understanding for the patients and their families. Because of all these reasons, I believe that being able to know the human body, provide constant bedside care to facilitate patients well-being, not only physically but also emotionally is a privilege to be able to do for others.
What would you do if another obligation you had conflicted with this program?
The COPE program would be the first priority on my list, along with my education. Since I will know exactly what day and time my shifts are, I will schedule any other obligations that I have around my shift times so there will not be any personal obligations conflicting with my volunteering at COPE.
What's the most difficult situation you have faced & how did you manage it? What did you learn?
The most difficult situation I have faced would have to be last year when I was helping a very close family member through her mental health problem. It was a very severe situation for my family and being the only person who can speak English in my family, I was responsible for making calls to the hospital, speak to healthcare workers and police personnel about her situation. I was very stressed and emotionally-compromised. I managed the situation by using self-reassurance and telling myself that I have to stay composed and stay strong through this situation, even when it was very hard. Through several months of dealing with this situation, I learned to acknowledge that I am a strong-willed individual who will not give up easily even when I may be at a low point in a my life.
What makes you stand out from other applicants?
What makes me stand out from other applicants would be the fact that I will always give my full 100% at the hospital. By that, I will always be fully present and ready to do my tasks enthusiastically even if I am having a busy day outside of my shift. Without a question, college students are always busy. But what makes me stand out is that I'm able to put off other things that are on my list that day and not let them affect me - in order to fully focus and be present during my shift at COPE.
Why do you want to be in COPE instead of doing CNA again?
When I was in high school, I was in a Health Academy program that allowed me to train to become a CNA. But now, I would like to be a Health Scholar because I would like the opportunity to experience the hospital environment rather than the nursing home environment which was where I trained as a CNA student. Also, as I am taking prerequisite classes for nursing, the hours of the COPE program would allow me to balance both school and volunteering much better than if I were to work as a part-time CNA right now.